Requested Blog on N3322G Paint job and Annual

[N3322G]

[ics-12766]

[N3322G]

[Tom Corell]

[Charlie Tripp]

<We spent some time trying to get to the bottom of the JPI left engine reading hotter oil than the right>

Pat,
Did you install new oil coolers with the excellent overhauls from Zephyr? The left cooler could be clogging-up from old age. Zephyr overhauled both my engines in 04 and I used new coolers along with overhauling all accessories. Both engines, evened turbo’ed stay 180 – 185F on the JPI.

[N3322G]

Hi Tom, DESAPI got the sniffle valves from the Piper dealer in Muncie Indiana. Pat Keefer ICS 08899

[N3322G]

Hi Charlie,

Yes, I took Charlie Melot's advice and asked the shop that removed and hung the engines to get two new oil coolers. the oil coolers they installed were not approved for PA-39s. I had kept my old ones and took the expedient route and had them overhauled by Pacific Oil Cooler.

When I was at OSH, I talked with the Pacific Oil Cooler guy, Paul Saurenman. he said first check the baffles, which were new with the overhaul and badly installed at the shop that hung the engines so when I went to the AOPA Tampa convention in 2005, I stopped at LoPresti. LoPresti filled some gaps and promised engines would run 20 degrees cooler and they did.

I checked the baffles again and they are in good shape. Next suggestion was check the vernatherm.

if the engine was really running warmer, I'd expect it to show on my Piper gauges and/or the oil pressure would read lower. That isn't happening. So the next move will be to either test or swap the JPI Oil temp rpobes and see if the problem moves. After the engines were hung we got very weird reading on the right engine ... over 1300 degrees and then it died. At the 2006 annual Bob Weber looked at it, identified the poor installation and fixed it.

Coincidentally in the Sept issue of Light Plane Maintenance, to which DESAPI subscribes, there's a very good article on this exact subject.

When I blog later I'll mention something the shop that hung the engines did well.

oh - we did the Zeftronics stuff you suggested and so far so good. Not enough experience to know if it has solved other anomalies but it was sure fun to see 14V again. Thanks for the recommendation.

Pat Keefer ICS 08899

[N3322G]

[ics-12766]

[N8349P]

[N3322G]

[Dale Vandever]

Pat, a Great Job of reporting the details of your project.

The photos really help.

Thanks,

Dale

[N3322G]

Blog part 5 on paint job and annual

Aug 30, 2008: Hey Dale, always good to hear from you. Thanks for the encouragement. I was taking the photos for my own use and showing Ken what was going on, I’m glad sharing them is helping others.

I was not at the paint shop today, Saturday. I confess to indulging in the Millersport Lions’ Sweet Corn Festival. I’d been there a dozen or so years ago and it tasted just as good today.

One of the benefits of being at the paint shop is to see what is happening to other aircraft that are further along in the paint process. On the day I arrived, a 182 owner from Ft Lauderdale was picking up his plane and I got to hear the departure briefing. First Dick said to be sure and look well at the plane and ask any questions. Dick pointed out some items they had discussed on the phone. He also told him that if there are any problems he notices later – to just give the paint shop a call and they will make it right.

Dick explained that the paint dries from the inside out so the surface is dry but don’t push on it anywhere and it is why VFR flight only is recommended for 3 weeks. Dick also said for him to allow a month and then have it corrosion-proofed again and instructed him on how to get a good corrosion-proofing job.

The fun part about watching this process was how excited the owner was – he could hardly contain himself. I mentioned this to Chris on Friday and he said that owners have burst into tears when they see their plane with the new paint job – those are tears of happiness. I’ll insert the Aviation Consumer article I mentioned here and then add more Keefer experience after it.

The photos did not copy but it is the text that is the best part.
December 24, 2001
Getting Good Paint by Paul Bertorelli

Two top rated shops tell us what separates the average paint job from the exception. As Paul Bertorelli reported in Aviation Consumer, here's what you should expect.
About the Author ... Paul Bertorelli is a professional aviation journalist and editor. He's Editor-in-Chief of The Aviation Consumer and editorial director of AVweb and Belvoir Publications' Aviation Division. He's a 4,500-hour ATP and CFIA/CFII/CFIME. He owns a Mooney 231.

Painting anything well—especially an airplane—is as much art as science. It takes experience and skill to get it right and, in the end, the customer might not appreciate the work because many owners have never seen a good paint job. Yet it doesn't take a trained eye to separate good paint from bad, a well-detailed master work from what one shop owner we visited recently calls a "50-footer;" glossy at a distance, a mess up close. Over the years we've been doing our periodic aircraft paint-shop surveys, a handful of shops consistently draw rave reviews with not so much as the slightest complaint about quality, scheduling, warranty or customer service, the things most owners consider important. Armed with the question: what goes into a good paint job?, we recently decided to visit two of those shops—Dial Eastern States Aircraft Painting in Cadiz, Ohio and Reese Aircraft at Trenton-Robbinsville, New Jersey, just southwest of the New York City area.
Dial Eastern
First, that odd name; not exactly something you'd draw out of a hat. Dial Eastern's Dick Guenther told us that the shop was first established in the late 1980s by another owner under the name Eastern States Aircraft. When Guenther bought it about 12 years ago, he was operating his own aircraft repair facility called Dial Aircraft and merely combined the two into Dial Eastern States. The shop is located at Harrison County Airport, just across the Ohio line from Wheeling, West Virginia. Given the length of the runway and the size of the two-bay hangar—it's small—Dial Eastern handles only singles and twins up to about the size of a Cessna 421. (Even that's a tight fit.)
Over the years, Aviation Consumer readers have heaped praise on Dial Eastern almost to an embarrassing degree. Words like "superb" and "true craftsmen" come frequently to mind. What exactly is Dick Guenther doing out there to merit that sort of adulation? In short, the shop pays attention to detail, lavishes time and effort on prep work, stays on schedule—something owners consider important—and charges a fair price. And that's not to say cheap. For singles, Dial Eastern wants between $7000 and $11,000, putting them on higher side of average. The shop paints twins for between $13,000 and $20,000, quite a bit higher than average, according to our surveys.
We asked Dick Guenther and his shop liaison, Chris Hollis, to walk us through the typical Dial Eastern paint job, from start to finish. (That's Dick on the left and Chris on the right in the above photo.) We were a little surprised to learn the job starts with a detailed inspection and, sometimes, digital photos. We figured the pictures would come later. "Half the time," says Guenther, "the owner is in New York or D.C. or somewhere and he can't come out here to look at what we find." Photos of hidden damage or proposed items to be fixed are e-mailed and the shop consults with the owner. Not every shop does this but a savvy owner might do it for himself, just for reference.
Next comes what Guenther and Hollis say is a must for any paint job, whether premium-priced or not: All control surfaces should be removed, something that's often not done. Indeed, after our shop tour, Hollis inspected the company Mooney and within seconds noted a telltale wedge of overspray behind an aileron, sure proof that the controls hadn't been removed during our last paint job.
Guenther and better shops insist—rightly—that controls be removed, stripped, inspected and, most important, rebalanced after painting. On some controls—Bonanza ruddervators and Mooney ailerons—this is a critical task and shouldn't be skipped. But it should still be standard on all aircraft. Guenther goes so far as to record the balance data in the aircraft logbook, along with the signoff for the paint itself.
Stripping: Chemicals vs. Blasting
Painting an airplane-that is, the actual laying on of the color-is the quickest part of the process; a couple of good spray techs can base coat an airplane in under an hour.
But their work will only be as good as what's under the paint and that's where prep work comes in, specifically stripping, arguably the most tedious and time-consuming aspect of the job. Considering that aircraft paint has to withstand exposure to sunlight, extremes in temperature and the abrasive effects of rain in flight, it's tough stuff and equally tough to remove from aluminum.
Various schemes-mostly chemical-have been tried but these days, most shops rely on either chemical stripping or bead blasting, a mild abrasive method using plastic media blasted onto the surface with compressed air.
When it first emerged nearly two decades ago, we published a couple of horror stories about bead blasting gone bad. Although the process "cuts" the paint off with tiny plastic beads that are softer than both the paint and the underlying metal, the process inevitably creates friction and heat. Since aluminum has a high coefficient of expansion, heating aircraft skin causes it to pucker and once distorted, it doesn't return to its original tautness. Before blasting was refined, a few aircraft were seriously damaged by the process.
A second significant problem with bead blasting is that those little beads-like dust-go everywhere and if the aircraft isn't sufficiently protected, they'll turn up inside the cabin, wing compartments, instruments and everywhere else they don't belong.
Reese Aircraft is unique in that it does both chemical and bead blasting. Reese has two shops, one in Robbinsville and a second at Stewart Airport in Newburgh, New York. The latter paints mostly turboprops and jets and strips via blasting. The Robinsville shop strips chemically.
Ken Reese told us that in the early days, there were problems with bead blasting, mostly related to operator error and a tendency to use too much air pressure. "You heard the horror stories about blasting, no question," Reese says, but it was never as bad some claimed. "There were stories about blasting holes through the skins and that just never happened."
Blasting is a skill akin to painting itself and Reese says it's critical to keep the blast nozzle moving over the painted surface being stripped. Reese actually treats the surface with a chemical stripper first, then clears the paint away with bead blasting, which goes quicker thanks to the paint being loosened first.
At least some blasting media does find its way into the airplane. "Do we keep every little grain of media out of the airplane? No, we can't" says Reese. "We do keep it out of critical areas," he adds. That means the airplane's openings are sealed, the engine is wrapped and the glass and fiberglass are masked before blasting begins.
Not that blasting media is especially damaging if it does get into moving parts. Reese once commissioned a lab test in which increasingly large amounts of blasting beads were injected into greased bearings, which were then spun and measured for wear. Reese says the plastic blasting media caused no wear until so much of the stuff was injected that it displaced the grease, causing the bearing to dry fail.
With proper precautions, Reese says he doesn't stay up nights worrying about blasting media contamination and given the utter lack of complaints we hear about the process, neither, we think, should anyone contemplating having an aircraft bead blasted by a knowledgeable shop.
Stripping
As noted in the sidebar, there are two methods of stripping, chemical and bead blasting. And within chemical stripping, several products are used, some benign and some not so benign. Dial Eastern uses plain industrial methylene chloride mixed with a soap or wax carrier. Although methylene chloride is considered hazmat and requires special disposal methods, it's not corrosive. Guenther tells us he's re-painted his own work on a number of aircraft in which stripper found its way either between lapped skins or inside a structure but wasn't entirely flushed out. In that case, he says, you find a slippery, waxy coating but no corrosion.
That's certain not to be the case if the aircraft was stripped with acid stripper, which some shops still use because it's faster than any other method, including blasting. However, no stripper can be entirely flushed—especially from laps—and if it's not removed, acid stripper will cause corrosion, sometimes enough to cause expensive damage that won't be obvious for years to come.
Guenther says he has no beef with bead blasting and believes it will produce as good a job as chemical stripping in the hands of the right shop. On the other hand, like most shops, he can tell war stories about blowing blasting media out of the airplane years after it was stripped and painted by another shop.
Which led us naturally to this question: How about forgetting stripping and just scuffing up the paint and spraying on a fresh coat? Will Dial Eastern do that as an alternative to an expensive strip and paint? "No," he says, "the controls need to be removed and balanced, that's one thing. The other thing is that when you paint over someone else's work, you're counting on a mechanical bond not a chemical bond between the two paints."
Sand-and-sprays might last but many don't and later, Hollis showed us a Bonanza that had been flown in for an estimate. It had a sand-and-spray and where the paint had worked around the rivets, the top coat was peeling away from the older paint. It was, in short, a mess. It's a warranty issue, too, according to Hollis and Guenther. "Stripping the paint down to bare metal is the only chance we're going to get to see what's under the old paint. If anything needs to be fixed, we'll want to do it before we put color on."
Spotless
Guenther believes that when a paint job has problems, it's often due to what's done—or not done—at the next stage. Following stripping, the airplane has to be exhaustively pressure flushed and cleaned of even the tiniest contaminants, for any foreign material will complicate the laying on of color and may ultimately cause adhesion problems later on. Careful attention is paid to skin laps, so any weeping of stripper or anti-corrosion compound is removed.
Speaking of the latter, this is a sore point with most paint shops, including Dial Eastern. Anti-corrosion compounds such as ACF-50 and Corrosion-X are generally seen as a good thing, unless you run a paint shop. The stuff weeps out of rivet holes and between laps and no matter how careful the shop is, if there's enough of it on the surface, the paint will form little non-adhering craters called fish-eyes.
"If you even think you're going to get your airplane painted, don't have it treated with anti-corrosion compound for at least six months before," says Guenther. A year would be better. And while you're at it, have any engine oil leaks taken care of. A "leaker" can fill the skin laps with oil, causing the same problems. True, it'll be confined mostly to the belly, but the better the paint adheres everywhere, the better the airplane will be protected.
Etching, Priming
Following stripping and flushing, the next operation is etching, treating the surface with a mild solution of phosphoric acid to thoroughly clean the metal deep into its surface structure. At Dial Eastern, Guenther uses stainless brushes and mild, non-corrosive abrasives to do the etching, followed by more flushing.
Contrary to popular belief, airplanes get their share of "body work," even new ones. (Some say especially new ones.) Body work is similar to what goes on in the auto industry, dent and blemish filling and fine sanding. And yes, they use Bondo, albeit a specialized polyester type mixed with an aluminum paste. When it's applied correctly, primed and painted, you'll never know it's there.
After body work, the aircraft is alodined, a so-called chromate conversion process that serves as both a base corrosion protector and an adhesion improver for subsequent coats. We're told that alodining is a routine process by most shops but we've also heard that some shops skip this step. We think it's worth asking about and that it should be done.
Following a short curing period, the shop can move on to the next step, which is priming and painting. As we reported on our paint shop survey article in the November issue of Aviation Consumer, shops tend to pick a paint system they're comfortable with and stick with it. Having heard from hundreds of readers and dozens of shops, we don't see much difference between the quality of the major paint systems.
At Dial Eastern, Guenther uses DuPont products, specifically Imron over Variprime primer and, in demanding applications where oil or corrosion compound seepage might cause adhesion problems, a tough epoxy primer called Corlar.
Three hundred miles to the east at Reese Aircraft in Trenton-Robbinsville, Ken Reese uses JetGlo, late of PPG but recently bought by Sherwin Williams. Each speaks highly of the other product line, leading us to conclude that which one a shop uses revolves more around customer service and convenience than quality issues.
When we bounced that observation by Ken Reese, he agreed, but added this: "If a customer asks and the airplane is going to be outside, I'll recommend AcryGlo over JetGlo." AcryGlo, also in the Sherwin Williams line, is an acrylic urethane with better UV protection than JetGlo. JetGlo, on the other hand, is more resistant to hydraulic fluid and jet fuel and the wide temperature swings jets see in normal operations. To Reese's eye, JetGlo, however, "holds out" better, meaning that it retains the total wet look high gloss of a fresh paint job.
Eyeballs On
Which leads us to ask Reese how he judges a good paint job. "If you really want to examine a paint job, don't do it outside. Bright sunlight will hide every flaw and it'll look great," says Reese. "Get it into a hangar lit with sodium vapor or fluorescent and grab a towel and wipe it down."
Huh? That's right, says Reese, if you really want to see the details of another guy's paint work, eyeball the entire surface of the aircraft as you wipe it down. What are we looking for, exactly? Viewed obliquely, the surface should be evenly glossy and wet looking, with no dull spots. If you see the latter, says Guenther, the shop may have been working with a single spray man who couldn't keep up with the paint, thus the fresh paint wasn't worked into the wet stuff on the surface. Look for crispness around stripping, with no paint built up along the edges or roughness where the rules were masked. If the airplane has curved stripes, they should be fair and smooth, with no quick turns. It goes without saying that you shouldn't see any runs, sags, fish-eyes or orange peel in an otherwise pristine surface. (Nonetheless, we still do.)
As Chris Hollis noted, lift the control surfaces and look around the counterweights, horns and control rod ends. If the control surfaces weren't removed during painting, you'll see it and it's the kiss of death against a quality paint job. Check details such as window glass, moldings and other contrasting surfaces. If there's stripper burn around the window edges, the shop wasn't very good at masking. And every contrasting surface should be free of overspray.
Some paint jobs look good on top or at a distance—what Dick Guenther calls "a 50-footer"—but a quality job should look just as good on the belly, meaning the gear wells should be shipshape-and-bristol and there should be no sign of painted over grease blobs or corrosion, an indication that the shop thought no one would ever look underneath.
The Extras
Most reputable shops—and both Dial Eastern and Reese qualify—will firmly insist on certain details and will recommend others as nice-to-haves. At Dial Eastern, for example, some external fasteners are included in the price of the job but many customers—especially those driving high-zoot singles and twins—opt to replace everything with new stainless steel. On a twin, that can cost a couple of thousand bucks. But if you're spending 10 times that on paint, why put the old, corroded fasteners back on? Guenther also recommends replacing any worn control parts, such as rod ends or the nylon locking nuts. "You've got the controls off, it doesn't make sense to go through all that again just to put in new nuts later," he says.
Both Reese and Guenther advise asking the shop about what exactly the price includes. At Dial Eastern, you get a base color and two stripes; anything beyond that is an extra and extras can add up. Also ask if door jambs, baggage doors and other quasi-interior elements are included in the paintwork. Generally they aren't, but you may want them done so get a price.
Having visited both these shops, we can recommend either without reservation. But whether you go with Dial Eastern, Reese or any other shop, we also recommend a visit for a walkthrough of the shop's process. If nothing else, you'll educate yourself in what goes into a good aircraft paint job.
Contact Dial Eastern States at 740-942-2316 or www.desapi.com.
Reese Aircraft is at 609-586-9283 and www.kdaviation.com.

On Friday I was pointing out that the light was just right and we could see where the race-mandated team names used to be on the door. Chris said that even after the new paint job, ghost images of stripes can sometimes still be seen because they’ve actually ‘etched’ into the aluminum. This is apparently especially true of planes that sit outside. It is called ghosting … so I guess Mom’s ghost really is watching us fly and reminding us to land in the center of the runway.

I’ve included photos of the right outer flap bracket and the new bracket from Webco for comparison. It wasn’t the bottom of the flap bracket that was the problem which indicates we don’t abuse the flaps by lowering them at too high of a speed (at least not often enough to matter) however the top resting place had worn over 38 years. The risk is the flap will rest there when you really want it deployed. Since I’d replaced the outer left flap track last year, I figured it was only a matter of time before I had to do the right one as well and I just carried the part around until it got convenient or it was a requirement. Ironic that when I took my AMEL checkride in 1976 that the right flap stuck down during the first approach to landing and go round at 5,000 feet. It was cold in Chicago and apparently the wrong lubricant had been used. I recycled and went on to pass the test.

Cathie does the clean-up work post paint job. The 182 she’s shown below with sat for another 3 days even though it was finished due to wet weather. When 22G is done I’ll have to really keep a lid on get-home-itis. Now the 182 is on its way to the Ohio interior shop Dick recommends. Dick commented the interior frequently costs more than the paint job. Hmmm. Glad mine is done and we didn’t spend that much – used similar to original Piper materials because we wanted the durability vs the soft leather. Speaking of leather, my open pen inadvertently rubbed against Ken’s lovely leather Lexus light gray seat for the 125.1 mile trip from the paint shop to Columbus. Fortunately the paint shop knew just what to use to fix the problem – gently rub on lacquer thinner. After nearly an hour of quality time with the car, the 2x4” ink scribble was gone. Guess we will be able to stay married. Just kidding.

A few days ago I used my mechanical skill – no not the one to maintain the airplane, the one where I use the phone to find what is needed. The tach drive reverser for the counter-rotated engine was on its last legs and that is what caused the wonky right tach needle at the initial run-up at the paint shop. Last year Bob Weber tightened and mentioned that this may not work in the future. It was nice to have been there in 2007 to know this so it helped isolate the problem this year. I posted in another thread that Piper wanted $795.16 for one in 2005 and now wants $500 just to do a quote. I volunteered to find other options. So what kind of woman packs to live in Ohio for over a month and brings along the Webco parts catalog? – that would be one that owns a Comanche. While I didn’t associate Webco with this kind of part, I did get the catalog out of the car trunk and lo and behold – they listed it in plain sight. Well, I was excited, Dick called and got Phillip and they had one shown in stock and it was really there so ta-da, immediate progress towards a fix.

Another part of the paint shop attention to detail is the fasteners for the fuel doors are removed for painting. They offer any type of new closing mechanism, traditional wing-spring, low profile or Phillips screw. We went with classic wing-spring on left main, auxes and tips, low profile on right main and Phillips screw on nacelle. Darrin noticed that the right aux had to be replaced anyway because it was the wrong size … hmmm another thing I hadn’t noticed. It had been broken and replaced but I hadn’t noticed the size difference. Learn something new every day.

Apex aviation tools may be new news to me but I was on the phone with Kristin Winter and she explained to me exactly why they are so much better – because of the grippy flanges.

We debated the next paint decision because we worried that it would look weird. Dick assured me it would be fine. The gear will be painted metal colored. Since I tow the Twin into the hangar by inserting prongs into the nose gear, I will be the first to damage the paint job. If it is metal colored, it will look less visible. I thought about doing the same thing for the tiedown rings but the tail tiedown is so visible it would look strange so we’re getting rubberized s-hooks and that will lessen paint chipping at those locations. We also vetoed a design by Craig that had lovely curves but they would have gone right over the nacelle and aux fuel doors and we would rather have white there so touch-up, if needed, is easier.

50 hour fuel ADs were required and once done, Chris tucked the drain tubes in the belly and taped the inside of the openings to keep stripper out of that area. Clever. Chris also made the same comment I’ve heard from others – our fuel screens look especially good – not always the case. Since the tanks were vacuumed and we are very good about pre-flight drain of tanks and crossfeeds and end of day drain as well, they’ve been awesome – which is good because I wrote a check to replace one and that will help remind me to drain – for sure.

The first parts went up to the stripping area and I was cautioned that when I go to visit, I would want to limit the time spent inhaling fumes. It varied by person but it can make you lightheaded. I plan to use the zoom on the camera and stay clear because walking through and bringing stripper or paint chips back to sweet husband’s car would not be a good thing.

Friday afternoon all the FedEx and UPS deliveries were for 22G. The overhauled fuel senders were back from Air Parts of Lock Haven and the tach drive reverser came. The fuel senders all look great but the jury is still out on the reverser – it needs to rotate freely and perhaps it needs fresh grease or something but right now, it is not a clear winner. If the fuel senders had been here a day earlier, the plane would have gone for stripping but no one wanted the fuel tanks, covered only by foil tape, to get contaminated so we waited until the fuel senders came back.

A rag with solvent was laid on the wing and the photo shows what I expected. Mom had gone to visit the plane in 1992 when the Miller or integral tanks/wet wings were being added. Ken saw her first after that trip and said she was really upset. The quote I remember hearing is that if she ever won the lottery, she would re-skin the wings. So I know there will be ugly stuff under the paint. I already knew where the wing didn’t look right but many others had not noticed. I guess if you wash and wax it often enough, you notice some stuff – washing and waxing is my contribution to maintenance. The photo shows the first layer of paint removed – the pinkish areas are bondo. Chris also said our paint job will be lighter than the paint that is on there today because the wings had been re-painted right over the old paint when the integral tanks were added. Many people had said, just touch up the paint – this situation is one of the reasons we chose to do the full strip and re-paint job. More tomorrow.

Wishing all Blue Skies and Tailwinds,

Pat Keefer ICS 08899

All rights reserved by RTW, Round the World, A Motivational Company
All photos taken by Patricia Jayne (Pat) Keefer unless otherwise noted.

[Bruce Thumann]

Thanks Again Pat, you are doing a great job documentiing this process. This is valuable and useful infromation that our members can utilize now and into the future.

Have a great holiday,
Bruce

[N3322G]

Blog part 6 on paint job and annual

Aug 31, 2008: Its Sunday and time for a bit of reflection. First, in response to the last post. Hi Bruce thanks for the compliment. One of the many resources we used as we prepared for the paint job was to read internet comments on getting planes painted. The least we can do is to add our own experience.

I’ve been away from home for 15 days now with more to come and it has been absolutely worth the time. I am confident in the annual done at a new-to-me shop, I have contributed to the success of the annual, I’ve learned more about the plane, my knowledge of the plane’s past has helped the paint shop and I got to see inside new areas of the plane. I’ve learned more about the paint process. When I pre-flight I will know better which areas might require special focus before departure. Knowing what I know now, would I leave the Twin in DESAPI hands and have an annual and paint job without my presence? Yes. Would it be as much fun? No.

Last week, a Mooney 201 pilot stopped by as he was out enjoying a gorgeous flying day and saw me washing my windows with my hand, water and all cotton, old T-shirt rags as suggested by LP Aero Plastics as the best way to clean the plastic. He jokingly asked if I’d detail his plane. I said sure, you pay for my paint job and I’ll detail your plane.

A bit later a V-tail Bonanza pilot came to visit his plane for the first time. Evidently he hadn’t toured the shop prior to dropping off the plane. I’d seen it earlier that day. It was entirely stripped and the wings looked gorgeous – I was a bit envious because I know, mine won’t look that good. Well, he had that deer in the headlights look when he came back from seeing his plane. He wasn’t quite prepared to have it be so naked. As he coped with the shock, he teased me that he understood I was staying for the whole process. I joked too, “What’s the sense of working 30 years for IBM, retiring and not being able to do what you want? I choose to spend quality time with my airplane.” I think he might be a bit jealous. the paint shop said some owners visit often and others they never meet because the interior shop flies the plane in and out.

It’s common to have folks think this is ‘my baby’. Again perspective, I nearly lost my husband to an adventure in healthcare a decade ago and he IS ‘my baby’ – were he blogging, he would say he’s the only baby I need.  I can always get another Twin Comanche and with time and money get it to the same shape PA39 #10 is in today. Like the commercial says, “chunk of change for this, chunk of change for that, husband is priceless.” As we balance priorities, he has been helping his younger widowed brother and together they drove to Arkansas to visit their Dad, aunt, cousins and then to Oklahoma to visit a cousin who lost his mother last year. Being so close to Texas, they went to visit our house. Now you know how I’ve been able to spend the time to blog each day. When they get back, blogs will be shorter.

The paint shop has other priorities too. As a business owner Dick got to worry about the OSHA guy that the county sent by – Dick is the airport manager for the county and this is the county’s airport. Dick has been here for 35 years in one capacity or another - including instructor. In the past two weeks Dick also had the fun of worrying about trash pickup and water lines, EAA efforts, payroll, job pricing and computer upgrades. the paint shop is also the FBO since the previous FBO owner died at age 53. All this means days off are few and far between Dick is at the airport today and while Chris left early on Friday, he will staff the airport on Labor Day. Oh, I forgot the dog trainer role. Dog, whose official name is Ducky but mostly he answers to Dog, is a youngster and needs training to sit at the word, Clear. Dog keeps the mouse population down and greets each airport car arrival and is great at alerting folks to any arrival at the airport – including the noisy Cessna Citation arrival – we all came out and watched it arrive and then depart to next day.

That’s the fun from Cadiz, Ohio which I now know has competing pronunciations. I’ve heard Ca-diz form the natives Ca’-diz from other Ohioans and Ca-diz’ from Texans. It’s famous for being the birthplace of Clark Gable but from my perspective, its most important function is to be home to the paint shop. After that I don’t care how you pronounce it. More tomorrow.

Wishing all Blue Skies and Tailwinds,

Pat Keefer ICS 08899

All rights reserved by RTW, Round the World, A Motivational Company
All photos taken by Patricia Jayne (Pat) Keefer unless otherwise noted.