RC Helicopter Canopy Painting

Very often, rc heli pilots get the first impression of the heli by it’ s outlook which is mainly determinant by the canopy. Unfortunately, some heli manufacturer seems get used to do the art work by engineers. Let’ s have a look at some state-of-art canopy painting.




Looking at the uncountable scars on your canopy, your hands must feel itchy now, don’ t ask me how I know, time to get them dirty!

Canopy Painting Guide

This canopy painting guide is illustrate on Align Trex 500 with a plastic canopy.

Sand

No matter whether you are using stock plain canopy, canopy should be sanded with dry sand paper (240 grit) first. After flattening any unevenness or surface imperfections, sand it with 800 grit wet sand paper in circular movement. Though modern paint work fine on plastic, this step will lead to a better result.

Then wash the canopy with warm soap water to remove any oils deal to manufacturing process. After letting it dry, rub it all over with de-wax.

Prime

Mix your prime in the ratio of primer : hardener : reducer = 8 : 2 : 1. This is just a recommendation, you may adjust it whatever you want. Now, you can prime the canopy with a handy gravity fed gun and don’ t forget the gloves. Shoot the primer lightly on the canopy, until it was covered evenly. If you found problems like fisheyes (after-paint blank dots) or paint not sticking, you should wash the canopy better. Usually it takes couple of hours to dry the paint, so you have to clean your airbrush and wait.

Masking

Prepare 3mm fine line tape with good adhesion and flexibility on curves. Bound the area you would like to paint first, then mask off the remaining areas which will paint later.

You may also consider Liquid Mask which dried as a latex skin. Then, you can draw lines on it and cut the area for painting step by step.

Spray

Never forget to paint with color from light to dark. If you are working on a transparent canopy, paint the dark color first from inside.

Square pattern

To create a square pattern with trailing shadow effect, you have to cut and paste some square masking film first. Next, tint that part with black, remove the square mask one by one and add the shadow at the same time.

Then mask the finished area before moving to next area.

Details

You may add some word or logo on your rc heli by download it from internet, print it on Testors Decal Paper after editing to the appropriate size. Add some Candy Apple Red, and tint black on the edge of windshield

So, here is the final art work!

Clear Coat

Before spraying your clearcoat over your artwork, must test it to avoid chemical reaction between clearcoat and previous paint. Spray a very thin coat first, then a wet spray 30 minutes later, 3 coats at most.
You may add some pearl into the clear before spray on the canopy, make it sparkle under the sun!

Credit to dj_rpr

Helicopter Canopy Painting Video

If you feel difficulties in following the above guide, you may see the series of video tutorial below: