Stewarts System Painting- Ecopoly Premium
9/1/18, 70 degrees, 35% humidity
10x10x20 plastic sheet paint booth. Pressure venting from 3 box fans with filters.

Setup: 5hp 30 gallon Sears compressor (110v), 5 gallon accumulator tank with water trap, 1/2” hose between all implements, npt fittings throughout, coiled hose in large water bucket filled with cold water and frozen jugs of water prior to accumulator, pressure regulator, 2- particle filters, Binks desiccant snake, 25’ 3/8”Flexilla hose, high flow disconnect only at gun.
DeVilbiss Finishline Gun- 1.3 mm nozzle

Painted boot cowl- upper and lower, both doors, upper cabin window cover fwd and aft, battery access door, aft h-stab access panels and tailwheel attach/rudder post access panels.

Did 2 fog coats and one final wet coat.
1- Fog coat(with cross coat) 3/4 turn open fluid needle(moving fast)
2- Fog coat(with cross coat) 1/8 turn more open(moving fast)
1- Wet coat- 1/2 turn more open(moving slower)

Was confused with exactly how to apply the paint as I watched the early videos from 10 years ago. There’s not as much info on the new application procedure. So I modified the old with the new. Did 2 fog coats and one final wet coat.
Fog coats went on nicely. Pretty easy to do and get good coverage. Took longer to tack up to the post-it note tackiness than I expected. Probably 10-15 minutes. No problems with the paint in the gun while waiting or when mixing the additional that was needed. Final wet coat went on easily and got a nice gloss behind the gun. Went back over a couple of areas that needed more paint and the added spray blended in to what was laid down previously. Most of the panels were laid flat. Some were vertical and there were no runs. A bit more trash in the paint than I wanted as my paint booth filters and fans probably distributed it onto the paint. Will need to clean them before next session.

Overspray is super tacky and won’t come off anything so make sure to cover what you don’t want it on. Definitely want to wear a paint suit.

Coverage:
Mixed 900 grams of total product mixed per directions.
542g base+135.5g catalyst+ 135.5g water= 813g

Then needed to mix 80g more to finish the wet coat on the upper boot cowl.

Total Area Painted:
Estimating 15 sqft of parts. There’s a lot of wasted overspray doing the small panels so coverage would be more if a larger part.

Having done acrylic-enamel, lacquer and solvent based polyurethane I didn’t think the Stewart System process was difficult or that much different. You have to trust in the directions. It takes a bit of faith to look at the rough fog coats and know that the wet coat(s) are going to cover it up.

Painting is 95% preparation. After masking, cleaning, scuffing and cleaning again I did a dry run of how I was going to spray with the gun and hose in hand. Getting to all sides, seeing how the lighting looked. I don’t know how many times I have bumped or dragged the hose across a part.

Water clean up is fantastic. It cleans very easily. And isopropyl alcohol will remove any residual within 20 minutes after spraying. My air system worked fine and kept 75psi in the hose as recommended by DeVilbiss.

Checked parts this morning and they look very nice. No orange peel, no solvent pops, and no runs. Very glossy.