August 17, 2008 - Tip Prep

Originally I was going to paint the entire empennage gloss black.  But after looking through my pictures of polished aluminum RVs, I decided I like the ones with polished empennages better.  I have also decided to paint the leading edges of the wings, vertical stab and horizontal stab. 

There was still some work on the fiberglass tips left to do as well.  I put the VS and rudder together and discovered the VS tip wouldn't even fit on!
 
I did some trimming on the VS tip.  I got it so it would fit on.  And then I trimmed to get my 1/8" gap between the VS and Rudder.
 
Then I was ready to polish the VS:  both sides. 
 
The VS after polishing -- nice and shiny.  The Rudder will get painted so no polishing for it.
 
The HS and Elevator tips needed some final trimming and sanding as well.  You may recall that I had to build the left HS tip up with epoxy and micro balloons to get it to match the left elevator tip.  I had to sand the left HS tip down a little.
 
The epoxy on the left HS tip has lot of pinholes which will need filling. 
 
The elevator tips needed sanding in some areas also. 
 
The left side is looking MUCH better now.
 
I broke out the Rage Gold filler to fill in some depressions and pinholes.  Good stuff.  Dries in 15 minutes.  Sands easily.  I bought way too much of the stuff.  I have a gallon and maybe will end up using 1/1000 of it. 
 
I tried using my Loehle pinhole filler for the first time.  I had to spend a few minutes mixing it up well.  It's like a thick slurry.  You wipe it on first, then "polish" it in.  Dries in a few minutes.  You don't sand it.   I won't know how well it works until after priming. 
 
HS tip after applying the Loehle pinhole filler. 
 
I sanded the two wingtips to remove the gloss off the gloss-coat.  
 
 
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