• Wrapping a Sailplane?

    From Nicholas Kennedy@21:1/5 to All on Sun Jan 15 08:10:31 2023
    Gents
    I was at Oshkosh in '22 and saw many dozens of airplanes finished with a / the wrap system. They looked fantastic.
    Have pilots had success with doing this on sailplanes?
    What are the pros and con's?
    Nick
    T

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  • From Mark Mocho@21:1/5 to nickkennedy...@gmail.com on Sun Jan 15 08:27:55 2023
    On Sunday, January 15, 2023 at 9:10:33 AM UTC-7, nickkennedy...@gmail.com wrote:
    Gents
    I was at Oshkosh in '22 and saw many dozens of airplanes finished with a / the wrap system. They looked fantastic.
    Have pilots had success with doing this on sailplanes?
    What are the pros and con's?
    Nick
    T
    From a previous thread:


    TangoPapa
    Oct 5, 2018, 8:43:48 PM
    to
    Hi all,
    I am just starting to sand my wings this week. I work in a sign shop and would cost me almost nothing to wrap my wings. However, I will paint the wings instead the vinyl wrap and I tell you why. Even if you use best car vinyl it will crack soon if you
    did not use the best UV protection film, like the 3M 8508 or Trigon 3mil gloss laminate. At work we have new car wraps daily. Before we can start we have to take off the old wrap. If the wrap was less than 3 years old it will come off easily long as the
    installer did not use additional glue/cement at the edges or on sharp curves. We had cars that did not have UV protector laminates and we had to sand off the whole car, it wasn’t pretty sight, the vinyl almost bakes to the surface. Normally during the
    installation, we heat up the vinyl to F 350-400 with a heat gun as we lay down the vinyl. With that we can stretch and form the vinyl. This could over heat the skin. If you still decide to use a car wrap on the wings make sure to tell the installer not
    to use excessive heat! It is possible to install the wrap cold, with soap and alcohol mixture but I never tried in on a wing.
    The other problem that I can see that the vinyl cracks in cold if flexes, good example would be the wing. We are losing wraps on plastic bumpers all the time. I am also questioning that the FAA would let you wrap legally a glider with a standard
    airworthiness certificate.
    Good look experimenting, but please remove the wrap in every tree years.

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  • From Jj@21:1/5 to All on Sun Jan 15 10:52:28 2023
    Unless you've got data that supports the installation of wrap on your ship, you will most likely have trouble getting your annual or conditional inspection accomplished.

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  • From andy l@21:1/5 to Mark Mocho on Mon Jan 16 08:18:03 2023
    On Sunday, 15 January 2023 at 16:27:58 UTC, Mark Mocho wrote:
    On Sunday, January 15, 2023 at 9:10:33 AM UTC-7, nickkennedy...@gmail.com wrote:
    Gents
    I was at Oshkosh in '22 and saw many dozens of airplanes finished with a / the wrap system. They looked fantastic.
    Have pilots had success with doing this on sailplanes?
    What are the pros and con's?
    Nick
    T
    From a previous thread:


    TangoPapa
    Oct 5, 2018, 8:43:48 PM
    to
    Hi all,
    I am just starting to sand my wings this week. I work in a sign shop and would cost me almost nothing to wrap my wings. However, I will paint the wings instead the vinyl wrap and I tell you why. Even if you use best car vinyl it will crack soon if you
    did not use the best UV protection film, like the 3M 8508 or Trigon 3mil gloss laminate. At work we have new car wraps daily. Before we can start we have to take off the old wrap. If the wrap was less than 3 years old it will come off easily long as the
    installer did not use additional glue/cement at the edges or on sharp curves. We had cars that did not have UV protector laminates and we had to sand off the whole car, it wasn’t pretty sight, the vinyl almost bakes to the surface. Normally during the
    installation, we heat up the vinyl to F 350-400 with a heat gun as we lay down the vinyl. With that we can stretch and form the vinyl. This could over heat the skin. If you still decide to use a car wrap on the wings make sure to tell the installer not
    to use excessive heat! It is possible to install the wrap cold, with soap and alcohol mixture but I never tried in on a wing.
    The other problem that I can see that the vinyl cracks in cold if flexes, good example would be the wing. We are losing wraps on plastic bumpers all the time. I am also questioning that the FAA would let you wrap legally a glider with a standard
    airworthiness certificate.
    Good look experimenting, but please remove the wrap in every tree years.

    Looks like a comprehensively detailed version of no

    I've heard rumour, possibly apocryphal, haven't seen any, of white vinyl on control surfaces that are very marginal on mass balance, after the paint is sanded away to a bit thin

    If there are any like that, I'd take a guess at Pegasus or ASW20f as the type

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  • From Hank Nixon@21:1/5 to andy l on Mon Jan 16 08:40:49 2023
    On Monday, January 16, 2023 at 11:18:05 AM UTC-5, andy l wrote:
    On Sunday, 15 January 2023 at 16:27:58 UTC, Mark Mocho wrote:
    On Sunday, January 15, 2023 at 9:10:33 AM UTC-7, nickkennedy...@gmail.com wrote:
    Gents
    I was at Oshkosh in '22 and saw many dozens of airplanes finished with a / the wrap system. They looked fantastic.
    Have pilots had success with doing this on sailplanes?
    What are the pros and con's?
    Nick
    T
    From a previous thread:


    TangoPapa
    Oct 5, 2018, 8:43:48 PM
    to
    Hi all,
    I am just starting to sand my wings this week. I work in a sign shop and would cost me almost nothing to wrap my wings. However, I will paint the wings instead the vinyl wrap and I tell you why. Even if you use best car vinyl it will crack soon if
    you did not use the best UV protection film, like the 3M 8508 or Trigon 3mil gloss laminate. At work we have new car wraps daily. Before we can start we have to take off the old wrap. If the wrap was less than 3 years old it will come off easily long as
    the installer did not use additional glue/cement at the edges or on sharp curves. We had cars that did not have UV protector laminates and we had to sand off the whole car, it wasn’t pretty sight, the vinyl almost bakes to the surface. Normally during
    the installation, we heat up the vinyl to F 350-400 with a heat gun as we lay down the vinyl. With that we can stretch and form the vinyl. This could over heat the skin. If you still decide to use a car wrap on the wings make sure to tell the installer
    not to use excessive heat! It is possible to install the wrap cold, with soap and alcohol mixture but I never tried in on a wing.
    The other problem that I can see that the vinyl cracks in cold if flexes, good example would be the wing. We are losing wraps on plastic bumpers all the time. I am also questioning that the FAA would let you wrap legally a glider with a standard
    airworthiness certificate.
    Good look experimenting, but please remove the wrap in every tree years.
    Looks like a comprehensively detailed version of no

    I've heard rumour, possibly apocryphal, haven't seen any, of white vinyl on control surfaces that are very marginal on mass balance, after the paint is sanded away to a bit thin

    If there are any like that, I'd take a guess at Pegasus or ASW20f as the type

    Model airplane trim film was used on Concordia control surfaces. I suggested this to the builder because we thought it would be the lightest finish that could be implemented. I'm not sure how it compares with wrap material.
    FWIW
    UH

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  • From Frank Whiteley@21:1/5 to All on Mon Jan 16 11:27:07 2023
    On Sunday, January 15, 2023 at 11:52:31 AM UTC-7, Jj wrote:
    Unless you've got data that supports the installation of wrap on your ship, you will most likely have trouble getting your annual or conditional inspection accomplished.
    The was a G-103 wrapped in Oregon a few years ago. I thought it was up for sale some time later. No clue about where it is.

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