Plane cleaning and waxing

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Aviana Detailing

Edit: Ok, the forum is a behaving a bit drunk this morning. Linking a single video failed.

Trying a channel now

[ you cannot do a live link to a youtube or vimeo video because the text processor identifies these specifically and converts the links into players; one solution if you really want that is to use tinyurl etc ]

Several months back there was a thread sort of related to this (and Snoopy posting to this guy, which made compelling viewing). I decided to write a long post about what I learned about washing and polishing airplanes, hoping both to help others, and also get some of my unanswered questions answered. Hope it was or will be useful to somebody, and still waiting for some enlightenment on things i dont know about.

Copied from my old post:

I had a look at the youtube link from Snoopy above. This makes me think we need a thread on washing & polishing airplanes.

I have a late model Saratoga with factory Imron paint. When I bought it 4 years ago, the paint was OK, but could do with improvement.

When I started researching what the options were, the amount of snake oil and old wives tales I came across was unbelievable, including the mythical “teflon polishing”.
I also looked here on Euroga, but not much information available – to paraphrase, “I use dishwashing liquid and my main spar has not corroded all the way through yet”

The interior of the airplane is an entirely different subject with another load of snake oil possibilities.

In the end, and after some trial and error, i found there is actually an easy, low risk way to get the maximum effect with the minimum risk (i.e. not breaking anything that will cost even more to have somebody fix it), and minimum spend (and without any power tools). It will require a bit of work though.

Note this is only for the painted parts of the airframe – windows are something else.

1. Wash properly, with a quality automotive shampoo. Just the shampoo, no fast wax or anything. Use two buckets (one for the suds, the other to rinse). Use a microfibre or lambswool wash mitt. Dry afterwards. I use Meguiers NXT wash – i chose this brand because they also do some aviation specific products, so hoping that this would be completely safe as well (or am i wrong?). This step is easy.

2. The next step is the important one – the one with the most work and biggest impact. Clay bar the airplane. If you haven’t heard about this, you take a piece of special clay, and rub it over the painted surface you want to clean. Apparently, one of the biggest killers of your paint are the various contaminants floating around the atmosphere, which end up settling on your paint. After you clay bar something (properly) the effect is amazing – paint that felt like fine grit sandpaper before is like glass after. Don’t start on your plane, try it first on your car – not because you might wreck your plane, but so you can get a feel for how long you need to clay something and to perfect your technique. Your plane will likely take a LOT longer than your car, mostly because of rivets and edges. After trying a lot of different clay, I found Bilt Hamber was the best (because you dont need a special clay lubricant to use it). After practicing on some of the family cars, it took 6-8 hours to clay the Saratoga.

3. Next step is easier – polish the airplane. Again a huge amount of misinformation about polish, sealant, wax, etc. Polish smooths down the top layer of paint to make it smoother and shinier. I used Autoglym Super Resin Polish. A big bottle will do your plane and cars many times. I also learned it is worth paying a lot of money for the Autoglym special foam applicator pad, it does make things easier if you have a big surface like a wing.

4. Last step is wax. I used Meguiers NXT synthetic wax. Maybe not the best wax (you wont believe the snake oil in the wax market alone) but very easy on and easy off. Polish makes the plane shiny. Wax protects the polished layer. These are very different things.

Now when people see my plane they asked if I spent a lot of money to get it “teflon polished”.

Back to the video – this guy uses ceramic coating. I also looked into this. Another bunch of snake oil, but if you do it right, with the right stuff, it will take everything to the next level. But you have to do it right – for an airplane, this will take many, many, many hours of prep. Look at the video – it looks like he spends a few 18 hour days (often with a helper) prepping a plane for this.

Comments? What do you do? Anything better?

And what do you use to clean windows? They best stuff I found is Aeroshell Plexicoat for cleaning. What about waxing windows to protect them? I used to use the liquid Turtle Wax for this, but I looked at the bottle and saw “petroleum distillate” on it – which I think is not so good for Plexiglass. Carnauba wax is natural and should be better, but most of it is very hard (or in some petroleum based carrier to soften it). I also tried Clearview but was not impressed.

paint on metal I can’t see why decent automotive stuff would be of any issue. There’s a lot of good stuff out there.

Hi Hammer, you have written quite a lot of information for people to absorb and many will find very useful.
Obviously a lot of it is personal choice, but for anyone lacking in knowledge, personal choice is a bit more difficult and research into write up’s like yours helps.
I need to correct point 3.
Unfortunately Autoglym resin polymer polish is not a polish……thats BS from Autoglym. I have no idea why they did that.
You are correct that the generic term ‘Polishing’ used by the masses is actually waxing.
Ie dad is polishing the car.
However,
‘He’ is not usually out there with 3 grades of product and 3 different machines.
Autoglym resin polymer polish is fantastic stuff, but best used after real Polishing, as it’s effectively a ‘wax’

However just for clarity, it’s unlikely that a regular ‘spam can’ is painted in anything other than 2kAcrylic (car paint).

Despite varing compositions Imron being one, prettymuch anything usable on a car can be used on the aircraft paint. It’s just the ‘doing’ that matters, ie aircraft specific items such as damaging parts that are more physically delicate than a car.

I don’t know anything about this since my plane has not seen “wax” or “polish” since I bought it, but I am pretty sure that 2K paint is not used in GA, either during original manufacture or during resprays. AFAIK most paint used during both is 2-pack polyuethane.

2K paint probably delivers the most durable finish but is very toxic. It used to be used in the car body repairs business but from what I see (I work above one such shop) they stopped using it a few years ago.

If you want to take it to the highest level, go at it with 2000 grit sandpaper and get it right. Lots of videos of car guys going at brand new BMWs with sandpaper to get the paint 100%…. In terms of correcting paintwork there are three main approaches

1) Polish Only (Like Autoglym SRP)
2) Compound (Like Meguirs 105) then Polish
3) Wet sand, Compound, then Polish

Wax is only to seal paint, that’s it’s job but it may impart a shine also. Aeroplane paint can be either two pack or base and clear. Base and clear is like your average metallic car so you are only removing clear lacquer with each approach. Things can get cleaned on a valeting level, or on a detailing level. I generally pay guys to do it for me, I’ve come to the conclusion an aeroplane is like doing 3 cars at once. Aeroplane paint jobs are actually cheap compared to high end cars, I know a guy who ran a bodyshop in Scotland and they did 80-90k Porsche jobs.

Aeroshine and Propwash have done great jobs for me in the UK. I like to recommend them to people.

I was refering mainly to repaint work and am fairly sure they all use 2k acrylic.
I’d like to know from an ’it’s my day job’ expert but AFAIK 1k polyurethane takes too much skill to produce a glass like finish, and too long to dry 2k polyurethane compared to 2k acrylic to me is like arguing over lycoming vs continental. Yes there’s variables but all in all……
That said 2k acrylic is actually slightly superior.
It was ‘environmentally’ outlawed in most vehicle scenarios except mainly commercial trucks and large items, for a water based product with much cost and hassle to all in the industry. But that was BS because all the top coats were still isocyanate.
Afaik they have almost all gone back to standard 2k again.
I’m desperate for a repaint but it’s too big a job for me to take on, and I don’t have the funds for one to be done properly.
With regard to anything cleaning polishing waxing it won’t make much difference between poly and acrylic. Or even fibreglass (gelcoat) for that matter, just make sure if it’s white gelcoat you don’t use anything with amonia in it.

Apparently, for plexiglass this is a good restoring solution: http://www.parasolinc.com/index.php/polishes-cleaners/plexiglass-cleaner-scratch-remover-cklear707/

When I said polyurethane I meant 2-pack. But there are so many paint systems. One 2K system I used was 2-pack high build primer, 1-pack base, and 2-pack UV lacquer. Socata use paint from a very uncommunicative French firm called MAPAERO and this is all 2-pack. That link digs out various past paint threads.