Super pacer wings

[Steve Pierce]

Yep, check with a piece of an old strut.
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[rsrguy3]

The oratex process requires epoxy primer on all bonding surfaces for max adhesion, so I alodined and epoxied the strutt grommets.
I also managed to shoot a coat of the special waterborne oratex heat activated glue. I shot it with a 1.7 aircapped primer hvlp set up. I felt it went on very uniformly albeit a tiny bit challenging to see on ep 420 white. The application shows a bit of orange peel which in my estimation is better than brush strokes or roller stipple. It took about 1/2 a bottle to shoot all of both bottoms and most of the topside of the d tube. At this rate it looks like the two bottles of glue will be dead on .... hope I don't run short.

[Subsonic]

Been reworking a set of super pacer wings for a friend... dakota ribs, and Stuart tips. I had to de-frag the garbage install job on the Stuart's as we're covering it with oratex, so the old beat it into submission with the ball peen would have been very ugly. Had to prime with epoxy for oratex, so that's why.

Something doesn't look quite right to me. Seems like the conduit hoop didn't follow the underside of the upper surface closely, so there's a compound curve in the aluminum sheet, rolling off more than originally intended. The pics I've seen of Stewart tips, and in person appear sharper. Like it was sliced off. Here's a pic from the Stewart STC site.

[rsrguy3]

Well I did what I could to get it in the ballpark. It was pretty sad with the old covering on it.

[rsrguy3]

Here's what the grommets look like on oratex before the doilies.

[rsrguy3]

Wings are moving right along...

[rsrguy3]

I really like the way the tapes go on..

[rsrguy3]

This is the 2nd time I've had the privilege to work with it. I have to say it's a truly amazing material, it has its issues though. Although it's incredibly tough once it's installed it's prone to damage if folded and pulled against creases. It has a tendency to be easily marred and smudged. You can not use acetone to clean it so if you have a soiled section if you can't get it clean with pure isopropyl or the supplied cleaner you're hosed. Do not get excess glue anywhere you don't want it without immediate clean up. Using a rubber grinding wheel cleaner as an eraser works on uncured, dried adhesive works but can lift paint off of the fabric, so fastidiousness pays dividends. what I'm most impressed with is the way it takes paint. The stock finish is ok if you get it installed perfectly, and I mean perfectly, it's somewhat reminiscent of poly tone. The overlaps and tape edges are in my opinion eye sores and tend to collect and show dirt, almost a fabric panel line... not a fan, I don't care for it's translucency either. My solution is aero thane. It's my favorite paint for the money. 1 to 1.5 coats then a thorough wet sand with 400 then 600 then a single top coat of you're aerothane color. Otex is lighter than any other system... by a good margin, so what amounts to 1.5 coats of aero thane doesn't add much and still keeps it light and kills the see through look and the ugly dirt magnet edges. Lighter oratex colors show debris and dirt when it's bright. The payoff.... there isn't a covering system out there that looks as good as properly painted oratex. This set of wings will get a light coat of insignia white. I have a pa12 in line for a full oratex cover and paint in cub yellow... this stuff looks like a brand new shiney jelly belly with aero thane on it!