Oshkosh Homebuilt Award

[JohnB]

As if flying a plane we built ourselves to Oshkosh for the first time wasn't enough of a thrill, imagine finding out that we won a Kit Built Outstanding Workmanship Plaque as well. We left on Friday before they announced the awards, so didn't find out until we got home.

Just wanted to say thanks to all on this forum for the tips, tricks and inspiration as well as Kitfox Aircraft for making a great kit. You all played a big part in making this possible.

[Av8r3400]

Congratulations, John!! Well deserved.

[DesertFox4]

Beautiful Kitfox John. Congrats on the award.

[jrevens]

That's wonderful, John! I saw that a Kitfox had won an award, but wasn't sure if it was someone on this forum. It's a great honor, and it's good to see a Kitfox in that group!

[jmodguy]

Very good sir! All those hours of toil, frustration, happy times and success paid off in an unexpected way!
Well Done!

[kmach]

Good job. I do need some pictures now

[efwd]

Nice Job John,
wish I had an opportunity to meet you. I took several pics of your masterpiece. For those who asked, here is a couple. These were things I was very interested in as I am working on these areas currently.
John, If you could, do you mind telling us the paint you used and how in the world did you achieve the flawless paint job?

[JohnB]

Good job. I do need some pictures now

Thanks everybody. Here are a few pics that we took last fall.

[dholly]

Love that last pic. Beautiful plane JohnB, and congrats on your award!

[JohnB]

Nice Job John,
wish I had an opportunity to meet you. I took several pics of your masterpiece. For those who asked, here is a couple. These were things I was very interested in as I am working on these areas currently.
John, If you could, do you mind telling us the paint you used and how in the world did you achieve the flawless paint job?

Sorry we missed you. We got to meet several Kitfox owners/builders and thoroughly enjoyed it.

I can guarantee you that there are flaws in my paint, but overall I was very happy with the way it turned out. Especially since it was my first airplane build and first time painting anything like that.

They say that painting is 90% preparation and 10% application and I now believe them. All the time spent heat smoothing with the iron will pay off in the end. Just don't linger too long with the iron over the plastic leading edge (one of my flaws) (maybe the judges missed that one?) I also spent quite a bit of time thinking about where to start and stop reinforcing and finishing tapes so that they would blend nicely into their surroundings.
We attended the Polyfiber workshop at Oshkosh as well as Jim Miller's advanced fabric covering forum before we started building and that was a great help in getting us started on the right track. Another good reference I used is the book "How to paint your own airplane" by Ron Alexander.
I used the polyfiber process and the paint is Aerothane (Santa Fe Red.) I used a Citation HVLP sprayer that has a second blower for fresh air to your mask which is a necessity with Aerothane.
One of the best things I did was building rotisseries for both the wings and fuselage. That allowed me to paint horizontally which allowed me to apply enough paint for it to flow out nicely without having to worry about runs. I found vertical surfaces (like the cowling) to be much more challenging as there is a fine line between enough paint to flow out and running. I got a little practice sanding and repainting on those.
Overall I was very impressed with the Aerothane. It's kind of like magic how it flows out and looks like glass after being sprayed.

Happy Building