painting light

[ADW 123]

how do you get a good looking paint job but also get it to fly without puting too much weight on it?

[SteveM]

If going for rubber power you pretty much have to use tissue pieces of different colors to get the effect that you want. I've also seen people use chalk to color the tissue or even run tissue through a printer. Neither of these is something I have any significant experience with except perhaps the first.

If under powered flight you have a little more weight to play with and can use a spray gun or even brush on acrylic paints. But you have to go easy on the smaller planes or you'll get too heavy in a hurry. I believe spraying gives the least weight add with good coverage.

Setting paint aside for a moment, you can also get a good effect with plastic films. I used silver Solite on my 400 Series P-51 with good effect. I was doing electric RC but the film is so lite (haha) that it would have been fine for rubber powered flight had I built it for that.