It is time to get serious about ordering paint for my C180 project.
Looking to order Endura, a white base coat.
How many gallons of paint does it take to cover complete in a white base coat?
Also ... There are different shades of white ... Suggestions welcome.
Thanks

My (unsolicited) advice is to think pretty hard about the paint scheme.
A guy near here repainted his C180 right before putting it up for sale, I assume to make it more sellable.
Unfortunately, he chose a non-standard design which to me anyways is very unattractive.
By the time he got done, the paint job cost him about $20K.
IMHO he would have been better off offering it for $20K less, and let the buyer choose the paint job he wanted or the option of leaving it as is.

If you're keeping it, go wild.

If you might be selling her one day, perhaps just straight white, looks good and the buyer can always add his own trim scheme.

I have owned my C180 for 38 years and am doing a refurb repair after a twister windstorm flipped it over while moored on floats. It is not for sale as I am not done flying yet ...
Wondering how much paint is required for the base coat?
The last time I painted it was in 1988. Planning the same paint scheme, only with a white base coat instead of metallic silver. My avatar shows the design.
I just kind of hoped someone out there new how many gallons of paint it took to do a base coat ...

Your probably not going to use it all for sure, but I'd buy 2 gal. Gonna need more than one, but you want to buy the paint at the same time so the mix matches.

Or painters told me 4 gallons for base color on a 180 sized plane. That would be 4 colour and 4 activator/reducer .

Thanks all ...
BTW to mmartin1872 ...
Your previous post on the early C182/180 instrument panel has provided my project with the missing link which I required.
The project continues ...
Thanks

54c180 wrote:....The last time I painted it was in 1988. Planning the same paint scheme, only with a white base coat instead of metallic silver. My avatar shows the design....

That's a good looking paint scheme. Looks similar to if not the same as the standard 1959 scheme, per this webpage's illustrations. IMHO good call on going with white instead of silver for the base coat.

http://skywagons.com/paint_schemes.html

We used 7 gallons on a Cherokee. That was with an old gun, not HVLP and so much more overspray but I would guess at least 6 even with HVLP. There is a lot of surface area there. Are you going to acid wash and alodine?

It's my understanding that it may take more coats and paint these days with the epa friendly paints. Some folks have gone to a silver base on the theory that the aluminum in it results in less paint being used.

Juneau White. I'd say the 4 gallons of base estimate is accurate.

I'd keep it basic. You can do vinyl stripes and accents. They look great, easy to apply and easy to change when you get tired of them.

Save the weight and polish that bad boy

So, painting the 1954 c180. Doing the parts we carefully applied as little paint as possible to the ailerons. When done with the ailerons we checked the balance on them as is required. The "unbalance limit" is 0 to 8.47 inch pounds for my serial number with a 4.72 weight +/- 2oz. Both ailerons are at 14.5 inches with a one pound weight. Assuming the weight attached is the design 4.72 pounds, adding 2oz at the weight line won't be enough to counter act this unbalance.
Has anybody had this sort of experience or experiences with balancing Cessna ailerons that would be helpful?
The method used was with mandrels and procedure straight out of the Cessna manual. We didn't weigh the ailerons before starting the paint removal process and clearly should have. I'm guessing that there is no way that the paint could be that heavy on them.

In my experience Cessna flight controls have always been way in the envelop both bare metal and painted.

I would give those weights a close look with ol' Mark 1 eyeball.

Also, It never hurts to reset and start over when measuring this stuff. Pretty easy to make a mistake when trying to interpret Mother Cessna's very clear and consistent maintenance instructions [emoji849]

Caveat: my experience is mostly "late model" Cessna, those early birds might be a little finicky

Could you post a photo of the rig you're using to accomplish the balance? Both because I'm curious how it's done, and because maybe a member here will see something that will help you. The numbers are just too far out.

I will get a photo as soon as I can but until then: I am using Cessna's method of a 1"x2"x48" stick parallel to the chord line and held at the trailing edge with stiff wire (the stick is weighted so that it is balanced with the wire). Then have a one pound weight that is slid from the hinge line and which then balances when it's about 14.5" from that line.
I am meeting up with the supervising A&P today and we are going to try weighing the trailing edge with a postage scale and see what that produces.

So this balancing is done with the aileron installed on the airplane?
I was thinking if it's done with the aileron off, you could farm it out to a paint shop who I'm sure has done hundreds or maybe even thousands of them. Sunquest at KPAE comes to mind.
You also might be able to just talk to someone there and pick their brain about it.

hotrod180 wrote:So this balancing is done with the aileron installed on the airplane?
I was thinking if it's done with the aileron off, you could farm it out to a paint shop who I'm sure has done hundreds or maybe even thousands of them. Sunquest at KPAE comes to mind.
You also might be able to just talk to someone there and pick their brain about it.

The balancing of flight controls is done with them off of the airplane.

Matterhorn White. Good shade that is not dull looking but also not a bone pure white that does not look good. I have seen many airplanes done in Matterhorn White, look into it.

Kurt

I balance controls all the time. . What we do when we get one out of balance. . We do it again tomorrow. Most of the time we had done something wrong.. measured down to the table with the wrong number after subtracting out the knife edge height. . Having the mandrel not at 90 to the hinge line, mandrel set too far off the hinge line.. and a new day makes it better. .

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