Valmet Tuuli III's fuselage is transported to be painted

Suomeksi

Valmet Tuuli III's body was transported on Friday, April 15, from Finnish Aviation Museum to Hämeenlinna Vocational Collage, Tavastia for painting. Tuuli III's wings had been transported a couple of months earlier. Tuuli III will be painted at Pintakilta in Tavastia. Students at Pintakilta (literally Surface Guild) study surface treatments aiming get professional degree in this trade.

Tuuli III’s restoration project is supervised by Finnish Aviation Museum and Pintakilta is responsible for re-painting. It means mainly removal of old, deteriorated paint and subsequent re-painting. The whole painting job is carried out as student work at Tavastia guided by teachers Jari Välkkynen and Hannu Waltzer. Pintakilta students have welcomed Tuuli III project with great interest.

Tuuli III's fuselage had already seen a lot of preparation work before it was moved to Tavastia. Aviation Museum Society’s Tuesday Club members had removed every part where removing was reasonable. This was to make Pintakilta’s work as convenient as possible.

Fuselage was really stripped-down when it left to Tavastia. It was accompanied with engine cowlings, dorsal fin, vertical stabilizer and rudder. Aviation Museum’s mechanic Antti Laukkanen had welded a metallic rack with wheels on which the fuselage was attached to make moving around and transportation easier.

Now Tuuli III’s fuselage was quite handily loaded into Tavastia’s truck and travel towards Hämeenlinna began. Also this transportation was done as student training at Tavastia. It was provided by Logistics Department students led by their teacher Timo Lahti.

When in Hämeenlinna, the fuselage was brought into Pintakilta workshop by students of this project. Again, it was supervised by Antti Laukkanen and Kimmo Snellman from Finnish Aviation Museum. Tuuli III’s fuselage was now ready for surface treatment.

Pintakilta has already started preparations for surface treatment of fuselage and wings. It has meant testing of various paint removal methods to find the most suitable one. Re-painting can’t be successful without careful removal of old paint. Students tested paint removal with Tuuli’s smaller parts like trim tabs from elevator.

First thing to do was removal of grease and then various solvents were tested starting from mild ones. Finally it was decided that in this project the most suitable solvent is Nitromors paint and varnish remover. With the right processes found, the surface treatment of Tuuli III can now proceed for real at Pintakilta. You can follow Tuuli project progressing at Pintakilta’s project page: http://tuuli3.weebly.com/

Photos: Lassi Karivalo (first) & Antti Laukkanen (other).