Jared
Heliman
Location: Hickory NC
| I tried the dye with no luck. I suspended a scrap piece of canopy with a white wire-tie in a mayonaise jar of dye, and the wire-tie died perfectly but the canopy dye all washed off. I gave up and pulled out an old can of red polyurethane. I sprayed one quick layer of adhesion promoter and then one heavy nasty layer of the red. I figured, why bother with prep-work and all of that if it is just going to fall off? About half-way through the curing process I took a rag with paint thinner and wiped away parts of the still tacky paint to improve visibility. I flew with it a time or two before it cured, so there are a few nicks and pieces of grass stuck in it and that kind of stuff. Well, now the only way I am going to get it off is with sandpaper, and I figure I'll leave it on indefinitely. It doesn't look good up close, but it sure looks great in the air. As for the worst paint job ever, I just call it punishment for a canopy that doesn't like to get along with other paints. Yeah, I know I could do all of that junk about sand this and clearcoat that, but if I crash and scuff it up now, I am only out of 10 minutes of work and an overnight cure instead of 2 hours of work and weeks of cure time. |
Nice thought though.
