Will fellow coupers, my fuel tank repairs are finally complete. I re-fueled my plane on Sunday and there are "No More Weeping Rivets!" At least for now. Time will be the real test of this repair method.
For those of you who have the same problem I had, I'll recap the repair procedure for you. Just so you know, I define weeping as a condition were the fuel evaporates before it leaves the airframe. Your only clue to weeping is a slight die stain around the base of a few rivets. Leaking, on the other hand, I define as dripping fuel that actually leaves the airframe with insufficient time to evaporate. If you have "leaks" you have a more serious problem and should take more drastic measures to repair your tanks. i.e... tank rebuild(s). Please note, have an A.P. review your work. This is not an easy fix, it's also not a long term solution. However, if you take your time you should have good results with this process and be able to postpone that tank rebuild for between 2 to 4 years. Important: Be sure to completely drain the fuel system before you start the process and leave all three gas caps off for a week or so to let any remaining fuel completely evaporate. Once the fuel system was completely drained and dry, I stripped all the paint off the tanks. Nasty job! I then roughed the surface around each rivet with sand paper. It's not necessary to remove the tanks if your careful. I then taped off about a two inch stripe down each of the three rows of rivets. If I remember correctly there are 54 rivets on each tank (Alons only). Apply three heavy coats of miracle paint to the area you taped off. Black miracle paint is said to be stronger, so I used black. Apply all three coats allowing 30 to 60 minutes between coats to let the paint get good and tacky before applying the next coat. 60 minutes or so after the last coat is applied carefully remove the masking tape. If you don't remove the tape now you'll have to cut the tape off with an exacto knife. This stuff gets really hard! Don't get it on your hands either. If you do it'll take days/weeks to wear off. The paint is shipped with disposable gloves included. I didn't use the gloves and I wished I had for about a week... Let the paint set up for a few days and then rough the miracle paint surface "very" lightly with sand paper. Repaint your tanks with aviation/zink primer and then apply your finish color coat. I found a custom paint store that matched my paint and put it in aerosol cans for me. It took three cans to apply two good coats of paint to everything. The entire process took about 12 full days over a two month period. You may be able to do the same repairs in a couple weeks or less but, I could only work on my plane one, maybe two days each week. I also did other minor repairs, like fixing small dings while the tanks were stripped, that added a few days to the process. The best advise I can give you is take your time. You don't want to do this twice. While the fuel system is completely drained, check the header tank for weeping rivets too. I found three stains indicating weeping on my header tank. Again there are at least 15 rivets on the under side of the header tank. Seal them all while your at it. I used clear miracle paint for this tank and it seems to have done the trick. Miracle paint is available through JC Whitney Catalog. You can order it via the web at http://www.jcwhitney.com The product number(s) are: 12ZX1079R Black 12ZX1080R White 12ZX1081R Clear It costs about $35 a quart. Hope this helps others with the same problem I had. -- I started out with nothing, and I still have most of it. Bill DuCharme N6554Q __________________________________________________________________________ ______ To unsubscribe from this list please send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] _____________________________________________________________ Keep up with breaking news! Join our Hot Topics list. http://www.topica.com/lists/breakingnews/t/12
<<attachment: winmail.dat>>
