How to paint planes

It's nice to see bright, sparkling planes in the sky. But for safety reasons and so that the paint does not fade, the aircraft paintwork should be updated every 5-6 years. This is done by specialized enterprises. One of these S7 ENGINEERING paint hangars is located in Mineralnye Vody. It serves aircraft of Russia and the CIS.

Painting begins with preparatory work - separate surface elements, antennas and hatches are removed from the plane, all cracks and hatches are covered.

Then the plane is washed with water under pressure using a detergent composition. After drying, uneven surfaces are sanded or putty is applied on top. Sanding is an extreme measure, applied only to old multilayer coatings.

Before applying soil, paint or varnish, the details of the aircraft are wiped and degreased. All the work of the painter is carried out in special protective clothing and respiratory masks.

In the paint shop in Mineralnye Vody, they are painted according to the “base + varnish” scheme: first, the soil is mordant, then the soil is transitional, then the paint and varnish. This increases the shelf life of the coating and its brightness. But the work can take more than 5 hours - an hour to apply the first soil, an hour to apply the second. Only after another hour, they start applying the first color of the paint and after another couple of hours - the second.

Layered forests allow you to get to any part of the plane. The upper tiers can only be walked with a safety belt. The application of color begins simultaneously on both sides, gradually the workers move from the keel to the nose. The most difficult thing is the application of text and images. To reproduce the famous green men of S7, stencils are cut from the film, which are glued to the fuselage over the base color.

Two tubes with paint and air are brought to the spray gun. The principle is the same as when painting a car - enamel diluted with a solvent is supplied together with compressed air to the spray gun. After spraying, the solvent evaporates and the paint remains.

About 200 kg of paint can go on a Boeing 737-800, and the whole process costs about 6 million rubles and takes an average of 6 days.

All windows, openings and protruding elements are carefully insulated with film, paper and tape. Then apply the main color of the fuselage.

In applying paint helps and electrostatics. A negative charge is brought to the fuselage of the aircraft, and a positive charge to the can of paint. Then the paint is immediately attracted to the surface.

After drying the next layer and removing the film, you can do smaller work.

Once the paint has dried, all the stencils are removed.

Handwork - tinting small parts and fine-tuning contours.

Airplanes are painted in workshops around the clock by shift crews. Stops happen only when the next layer dries.

After painting, informational posters and location indicators for voice and parametric recorders are glued to the fuselage. Each poster or sticker has an additional sheet with a detailed layout. Typically, these schemes come up with advertising agencies, but only certain organizations that have a special EASA certificate are entitled to develop the final documentation for foreign aircraft.

To arrange them in strictly designated places, use the laser level. Drawing all the inscriptions and signs increases the total time of work with the aircraft and its cost.

The final stage is the coating of the aircraft with PPG synthetic airborne enamel. She fixes all blemishes of painting, polishing or tinting them before applying the final layer of varnish.

Before applying varnish, the humidity level is specially raised in the room by spraying water from the hoses.

After applying varnish and ten hours of drying, the entire protective film and adhesive tape are removed from the aircraft.

The thickness of the entire coating on the plane is less than 0.3 mm, it is only 3-4 times thicker than a human hair. But it is impossible to be thicker - the layer must be elastic, otherwise the paint will crack in flight.

Measurement of the thickness of the coating is carried out by a special device. After this, the plane is again degreased and two layers of varnish are applied to protect and shine.

After all the procedures, the plane goes to the Technical Service Center - everything that was removed before painting is installed on it and a control weighing is carried out. The results are entered in the passport.

The whole range of paint work takes no more than one week. The term depends on the complexity of the livery (color scheme). At S7, it is medium in complexity.

There are not so many paint shops, so customers are often forced to wait in line.

In Russia, the aircraft is also painted by Spectrum Aviation in Ulyanovsk - the country's largest hangar, containing An-124. Often planes are sent for painting in Europe.

After the main work in the paint shop, the aircraft enters the neighboring shop, where S7 ENGINEERING specialists carry out finishing work on it to install previously removed elements and finish cleaning.

The new Boeing 737-800 NG (Next Generation) aircraft after painting.

Watch the video: REASON WHY PLANES ARE PAINTED WHITE! Explained by CAPTAIN JOE (April 2024).