Hello everybody,I'm back with a new question.I decided to go with ultrakote covering on my latest project . I have covered half the stabilizer with ultrakote with my iron set at 220 degrees per instructions. Film went down great on flat surfaces but on the edges that have different angles it is not looking to good.Do you guys kick the heat up for compound edges or do you do something different. My past experience with monokote is to crank up the heat to glue down and then burn your fingers with the heat gun to stretch the film around the bends. I plan on covering the wings tommorrow and I would like to know how you make a nice looking bend around the wing tip.I have also looked at the tips on hanger 9:s web site on how to use ultrakote.Should I increase the heat above 220 for compound curves per instructions to make this film more pliable.Thanks Scott                                   

I have tried a few heat experiments to see that it does start to conform to compound angles around 300 degrees. I also tried to use the heat gun on a test piece to discover that chrome colored ultracoat turns a dull burnt look, so I"m assuming that using a heat gun on wing tips is out. The other lesson that is becoming obvious is that no matter how much you try to avoid small wrinkles in chrome coating its just going to happen I have noticed that I can limit some wrinkles by trimming the over hang into small ribbons and working with each piece individually.

Chrome either Monokote or Ultrakote or any metallic covering is really tough to do well. For that reason it is usually not put on in large sheets. Too much heat usually distorts the outer finish. In Monokote you get an awful whitish staining that will not disappear when cool so you have to get rid of the piece. Ultrakote does similar when over heated.
I usually do not use a heat gun but use the iron and nibble at it when doing curves. just keep moving in small increments working it and getting it stuck down and it usually can be done without wrinkeling.

Never used the chrome stuff, but with normal U.C. or M.C. I wear a leather drivers glove on the left hand and use the heat gun for wing tips.  I sometimes have to use sandbags (or a helper) to hold the wing or other object, to allow me to stretch the covering around compound curves.

Don't know the temp of the gun, but it's one of the old covering guns (T.F. maybe).  Amazing how much compound curve the covering will stretch over, with the heat-as-you-pull technique.

As usual, YMMV!!

Scott

Its in the T-Rex build thread itself. Just go down til you get to the pics where I start covering it.  You are right, you want to hold it down to let it start to cool. The monocote glove is also handy. Its a lambswool covered glove. When you heat the film for shrinking you can massage it down onto the wood without sratching and it gives a very good finish. You can also use either the iron or the gun for covering compound curves. Just depends on what gives you best milage. Everyone's will differ.

bob branch

Randy's Ultracoat tip#1: The trashcan is in the corner.