Sunday Sprayin’ and Prayin’

The Prayin’ bit, of a Sunday, should be self-explanatory. The Sprayin’, though, does not refer to anything we might do with the fine firearms that are begging for release from their wintertime incarceration. Nope, it’s literally sprayin’, in terms of EkoPrime primer for the wing skins of the RV-12, assuming (that word!) that the forecast warm weather does appear.

If not, we break down the El Cheapo Paint Booth in garage stall #3, and wait for better weather. But with one spar assembly just about together (and we only had to take part of it apart and start over once!) the time to skin the wings and move on to the flaperons (which look like they’ll go together hell for quick) is right upon us.

wrong_brothers_wing_progress

Yes, we can take it out of the basement workshop. We checked. (We actually built a mock-up to the wing dimensions out of wooden furring and carried it out into the sunlight, just to be sure).

The funny look of the wing ribs is the thin primer we’re using, Stewart Eko-Prime white. We’re not sweating the aesthetics, we just want to cover the bare parts’ AlClad surfaces for corrosion prevention. (We’re only priming internals, and you’d need Superman’s x-ray vision to see them once we skin the wings). The spar itself comes pre-assembled from anodized aluminum plate, and so it doesn’t need prime for corrosion protection. The wing rib nearest to you will be snugged up against the fuselage of the airplane, and the part of the spar jutting out slides into an aperture in the fuselage that receives it. The left and right spars overlap inside the aircraft fuselage and pins join them both to one another and the fuselage; the wings can be removed by two reasonably coordinated people for storage or transportation.

If we’re all pretty stupid in the comments tomorrow, it’s probably fumes from the paint!


18 thoughts on “Sunday Sprayin’ and Prayin’”

  3. james n

    I spent a summer when I was about 15 working in the spray booths at the Short’s Aircraft Factory at Queen’s Island, Belfast. It was our job to clean the primer over spray from the walls and ceilings. It was pretty horrendous stuff, a weird light green colour and I’m sure pretty bad for your health. (Don’t think we even wore masks, those days were pre health and safety). If I recall correctly those booths were for priming the wings, but I can’t remember what type of plane was being made there then. Would have been around 91 or 92 maybe. I did get to see Apaches being built around then too, although that might have been a different factory.


  5. Sixgunner

    Looks like fun. My dad had a scheme to build a homebrew plane back in the day – but the country we resided in at the time did not allow for homebrew planes. Thanks for taking us along on the build!

    Years ago when working for a reupholsterer my job was to remove the varnish from some old wood work. No idea what the varnish remover contained, but the feeling it gave me was not something I’ve ever wanted to repeat. Why folks “huff” that kind of stuff is beyond me. Ventilation is your friend, as if you didn’t already know. 😀


    1. John M.

      I had the same feeling after being given a pair of Vicodin in the ER after a nasty hand burn on Christmas Day a few years ago. Never mind addiction, who goes back for the second dose?

      -John M.


      1. Torres

        I work in an Emergency Department. A lot of people come in looking for Vicodin, Percocet, Oxycodone, and Dilaudid.

        They are so sad when all they get is Ibuprofen…


        1. DSM

          My wife had to almost drag me into the emergency room one night because my back locked up tighter than a bank vault. To this day I have no idea what I did but I had plenty of time to reflect on it as I lie on the floor waiting for her to get home from work. The doc gave me a shot of dilaudid. Ten minutes later my back didn’t hurt so much but that was the least of my concern as my head was stuck in the trash can so I could make a deposit. Bad business.


          1. redc1c4

            you should have been given an anti-emetic, such as prochlorperazine, along with an anti-histamine, such as diphenhydramine, at the time you got the dilaudid, to avoid such a reaction.

            nausea, vomiting, and itching are all common side effects of opiates…

            (yes, i was a 91Q, too.)


    2. Hognose Post author

      At one time, the US didn’t allow it either. Experimenters had to lobby for it. Nowadays, more kit & experimental planes make their first flight most years than factory ones.

      We didn’t finish today so I will spray tomorrow while bro works. We do work outdoors when wx permits, as it did today.


  8. Cap’n Mike

    “garage stall #3”

    Last time I was driving around the ‘Shire, the wife commented that every second driveway we passed had a Garage at the end of it that was twice as big as the house it was next to.

    Your state immediately took another step closer to being paradise in my mind. 🙂