Aircraft Paint Stripping FAQs

Most people are not much aware of aircraft paint stripping operations. For those who would like to know the basics of aircraft paint stripping the following FAQs will very much help them know about the subject in some detail at least.

What is aircraft paint stripping?
Aircraft paint stripping is an operation that is carried out for removing the surface paint on exposed surfaces of aircraft. It involves any of several different methods to strip the paint off the surfaces of various types of aircraft whether commercial, passenger, or military. Sometimes the operation is also known as depainting aircraft.

Why is paint at all used on aircraft surfaces and what is then the need of first painting aircraft and then later removing the paint from its surfaces?
The surfaces of aircraft are painted to provide protection to its base material from environmental elements. Every two years this paint must be stripped off aircraft. The reason for this is to check for stress corrosion in the base material of aircraft surfaces usually made of aluminum alloy. After the customary check is over the aircraft is again painted.

Moreover, through such a check, microscopic structural deformities or weaknesses caused due to aircraft operations can be revealed on detailed examination of the base material. Such deformities if not corrected in time can reduce the life of aircraft substantially and cause accidents.

What are the essential methods of aircraft paint stripping?
The earliest widely implemented and cost effective method of aircraft paint stripping involved the use of methylene chloride. However, this method had to be abandoned after the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) banned its use because of two reasons. One was that methylene chloride harmed the environment on Earth. Secondly, methylene chloride being corrosive proved to be a health hazard for workers involved in aircraft depainting operations.

The search for aircraft paint strippers that were not damaging to the environment and to the health of humans has led to the use of a wide variety of substances. They include wheat starch, sand, corn starch crystals, benzyl alcohol based chemicals, and Dimethylsulfoxide (DMSO). Methods of aircraft paint stripping include physical blasting, chemicals use, and thermal sources. Even robots have been developed for aircraft paint stripping operations to preclude the health hazard to human paint strippers.

What about the cost effectiveness of aircraft paint stripping operations?
The traditional methylene chloride method of aircraft paint stripping was quite cost effective and therefore had been hitherto widely used. However, with human health concerns and environmental awareness becoming watchwords, today the costs of aircraft paint stripping operations have risen steeply because of the need to keep within the norms laid down by the EPA.

Is there no means to check for aircraft base material corrosion or microscopic structural deformities or weaknesses such as through the use of ultrasonic checks without resorting to costly aircraft paint stripping operations followed by repainting?
Much research is going on currently into the use of ultrasonic scanning to obviate the necessity of costly aircraft paint stripping and repainting operations. However, the efficacy of the method on aircraft surfaces using different types of paints is not yet reliably demonstrated. Therefore, aircraft paint stripping and repainting is still not unavoidable, presently at least.
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