I bought a Midwest Super Stearman biplane from a guy awhile back. I stripped off all the old covering. I am going to lightly sand it down and cover it with Ultracote Transparent blue. Here is my question:

If the plane is not sanded perfectly, ( I am more of an ARF guy and not very confident with my sanding abilities) will the defects show up more because of the transparent blue or will it actually hide the defects?

Thanks guys,

Jose (aka Bullseye)

All underlying defects will show through the covering. Don't think because you cover it up that it goes away. I've never had a ding, glob of glue, or any other impervection that "disappeared" while covering! Sanding is not hard--just tedious, and takes some patience, but it well worth the extra effort.

Having said that, remember that with the transparent, the blemishes will be even more apparent! Also, transparent covering is a bear to get the seams right. I would definitely NOT recommend transparent covering for your first attempt!

Besides, why would you cover a scale bird in an unscale fashion?

Assuming you don't have heavy callouses on your fingertips, anything you can feel with your fingertips or finger nail will show through the covering, transparent or opaque. You can make any size or shape sanding block you need with scrap wood and sandpaper, and sand until you can neither see nor feel any imperfections. Then when you cover it, you will have, perhaps, only a million or so imperfections showing under the cover.

Be sure you have a covering iron "sock" over the iron or you will see a darker location (where you placed the heel of the iron) all over the place!

Jerry

I agree with 2 slow about covering a scale bird in that fashion but I will take it a bit farther. Most folks don't want powered planes covered with transparent as it can be hard to see at times. Gliders and elect. use it a lot but not many power planes. I did a Kaos in trans. a few years ago but it wasn't all trans., it was still hard to keep tract of sometimes. Don't ask me why but it's not really that great for power.
ENJOY !!! RED

I've done a few planes with transparent.. though mostly it's a mix of trans and opaque..
I'd do the LE and TE of the wings in Opaque with the ribs transparent.
The fuse was almost always opaque unless it had some open framework to show off.

My friend Harland had a Yardstick (about 8ft span) that was done in Trans Green and Yellow. You couldn't loose that big slow thing though