REFINISHING

Tom!

Are you suggesting hiring labour overseas just so that you can pay them
below the regular rate? I'm sure your local labour market would just love
you to import some Eastern Europeans for 2 months to refinish your
capitalist, elitist toy at a quarter the price of a locally quoted job.

On that basis I'm sure there are several million people worldwide prepared
to pack their bags and leave for Ellis Island tomorrow. Hell, I might even
be one of them!

I can just see it now, factory workers all over the USA down tools and riot
in the streets just because of a bit of Gelcoat!

:-)

Ian

"Tom Seim" wrote in message
om...
This may be totally off the wall, but has anyone thought about
bringing the worker to the glider, rather than vice versa?

Paul, is it possible to reduce the costs by peeling off and replacing
the outer fiber layer instead of sanding down the gel coat? It's
mentioned in my Schleicher manual, but maybe it's not generally applicable?

Paul Gaines wrote:

John is correct. Doing it right is the 'BIGGIE'.
Some people think that 'right' is shiny and flying
again. We do not do refinish work that way. At best,
refinishing a composite ship is grueling, un-healthy,
skilled busy work. Done properly means ALL of the
old cracked/crazed gelcoat is removed CAREFULLY, re-contouring
critical areas of the entire aircraft, and using high-quality
materials. We spend about $2000 alone just in materials
(this includes high qulity polyurethane paints and
fillers, not gelcoat). The only way you can make money
above break-even is by taking short cuts and doing
lower quality work, utilizing cheap enough labor, or
charge more than 99% of the customers would ever dream
of paying. Usually a combination of the first 2 conditions
is the case. I would rather watch Michael Jackson
court proceedings than do break even refinish work.
By the way, if you are paying big money for your refinish,
ask for progress photos to verify that all of the crazed
gelcoat is removed. Better yet, plan a couple of trips
during the process to see what your baby looks like
naked. If you do the math that was discussed in the
first e-mail of this thread, 30k is the number you
come up with on one of our refinishes. The number
probably would not be that high. The last full refinish
we did in the proper fashion outlined here was 15k,
and I said I would not do one for that price again.
20 -25k would be the number. Not much of an alternative,
huh? I think that sending your ship over to the former
eastern block is a viable alternative for many people.
I have recomended this to several customers, and
you can make a mini vacation out of it by visiting
the facility. And wherever you have this done, request
polyurethane. It lasts much longer, and in the hands
of someone that knows what they are doing, it is easier
to blend duiring repairs.

I estimate we will have 1000 hours in my modified/refinished
20C that will be in Atlanta '04, and she will be wearing
Sikkins polyurethane. Crazy amount of labor for any
sailplane, but it keeps me out of bars! And the ASW-20
is the prettiest fiberglass/composite glider made!

--
-----
Replace "SPAM" with "charter" to email me directly

Eric Greenwell
Washington State
USA

U=BFytkownik Nils Hoeimyr w wiadomooci do grup =
dyskusyjnych ...
In Poland you can get a good refinish at a reasonable price.
Check out http://www.avionic.pl for details. (They did an excellent
job with our 55). But you have the problem of shipping the glider
across the Atlantic, which is probably of the order of 1-2k$ one way.

Yes, I agree, not only Avionic, but also few other companies. Last year =
I have heard of few British clubs which brought gliders for refinishing =
here, plus every time I visited one of these repair shops I have always =
seen a lot of gliders wearing foreign registrations repaired or =
refinished there. This can be especially attractive, considering that =
the Euro / Polish Zloty exchange rate is at it's historic peak reaching =
4.70PLN / 1 Euro, as it used to be circa 3.60PLN / 1 Euro which makes =
our work some 30% cheaper. Mentioned above Avionic produces also great =
trailers, and this would be a perfect opportunity to get one using the =
benefits of strong Euro too.

Regards,


--=20
Janusz Kesik

visit www.leszno.pl - home of the www.css-leszno.it.pl

How to Refinish a sailplane for $8500 (US)

1. Hire high school kids (part time)
2. Pay them $10 per hour.
3. provide them with:
A. Walk-Man, CD player (large headset)
B. Dust mask.
C. Gloves.
D. Air-board or DA with ample 36 paper.
E. Give them 10 min break every hour.
F. Free lunch.
4. Supervise your employees.
5. Charge customer $20 per hour.
6. Average refinish should be around 350 hours:
A. 350 x $20 = $7000
B. Materials, sandpaper, fillers, paint, etc = $1500
7. Total (out the door) = $8500
8. Profit 350 x $10 = $3500
JJ Sinclair

So that's how you made your million's ;-)

Pete

"JJ Sinclair" wrote in message
...
How to Refinish a sailplane for $8500 (US)

1. Hire high school kids (part time)
2. Pay them $10 per hour.
3. provide them with:
A. Walk-Man, CD player (large headset)
B. Dust mask.
C. Gloves.
D. Air-board or DA with ample 36 paper.
E. Give them 10 min break every hour.
F. Free lunch.
4. Supervise your employees.
5. Charge customer $20 per hour.
6. Average refinish should be around 350 hours:
A. 350 x $20 = $7000
B. Materials, sandpaper, fillers, paint, etc = $1500
7. Total (out the door) = $8500
8. Profit 350 x $10 = $3500
JJ Sinclair

JJ Sinclair wrote:
How to Refinish a sailplane for $8500 (US)

1. Hire high school kids (part time)
2. Pay them $10 per hour.
3. provide them with:
A. Walk-Man, CD player (large headset)
B. Dust mask.
C. Gloves.
D. Air-board or DA with ample 36 paper.
E. Give them 10 min break every hour.
F. Free lunch.
4. Supervise your employees.
5. Charge customer $20 per hour.
6. Average refinish should be around 350 hours:
A. 350 x $20 = $7000
B. Materials, sandpaper, fillers, paint, etc = $1500
7. Total (out the door) = $8500
8. Profit 350 x $10 = $3500

Can you find kids that will do that for 8 hours a day, 5 days a week,
for the 8 weeks it'd take? How much training does it take to get them to
do it right, and is that included in the 350 hours?

Regardless of who does the work, is there "best time" to have the
refinish done? It seems it would be lot cheaper to do it at the first
sign of crazing, when not so much sanding has to be done. So, do it as
soon as crazing appears, wait until the it starts to flake off, or when?

--
-----
Replace "SPAM" with "charter" to email me directly

Eric Greenwell
Washington State
USA

"Eric Greenwell" wrote in message
...
Regardless of who does the work, is there "best time" to have the
refinish done? It seems it would be lot cheaper to do it at the first
sign of crazing, when not so much sanding has to be done. So, do it as
soon as crazing appears, wait until the it starts to flake off, or when?

The only way to do the job properly is to remove all of the Gel. Surface
sanding cracked Gelcoat and refinishing over that is bound to get a job that
lasts less than 5 years.

Ian

Eric wrote.
Can you find kids that will do that for 8 hours a day, 5 days a week,
for the 8 weeks it'd take?

A couple of hours in the afternoon and weekends, these kids are still in
school. 10 bucks an hour is good money to them.

How much training does it take to get them to
do it right, and is that included in the 350 hours?

On-the-job training. Removing gelcoat is hard, boring and monotonous work. The
supervisor (JJ) must be constantly looking over the shoulder.


Regardless of who does the work, is there "best time" to have the
refinish done?

It's cost less to refinish before the cracks go all the way down to the glass.
My point in posting is there are literally hundreds of 20 year old ships out
there that are in need of refinishing. Some of their owners would pop for a
refinish that cost less than 10K. I would think some enterprising repair shop
would go after this market. I have done refinish jobs for under 10K, when JJ
Glider Repair was in business, but my workers (2 sons) graduated from high
school and pursued more lucrative careers.

Three, part-time high school kids or one good *undocumented* worker would keep
a refinish job in the shop all the time. The owner would have to do the more
technical things, like mixing, spraying and inspecting. After that, it's just a
*gel-coat removing party*, followed by a *contouring party*, followed by a *wet
sanding party*, and then finish up with a *Buffing party*.


JJ Sinclair

"JJ Sinclair" wrote in message
...
Three, part-time high school kids or one good *undocumented* worker would
keep
a refinish job in the shop all the time. The owner would have to do the
more
technical things, like mixing, spraying and inspecting. After that, it's
just a
*gel-coat removing party*, followed by a *contouring party*, followed by a
*wet
sanding party*, and then finish up with a *Buffing party*.


JJ Sinclair



Remind me to ignore any *party* invitations coming from JJ!

Liability is a problem when hiring high school kids. This keeps many
established businesses from providing the summer jobs that were available in
my youth. My company would happily provide summer jobs if there were some
reasonable way to do so. One has to either do it right with payroll taxes,
workers comp, etc or run an unacceptable financial risk in our sue-happy
society.

--
bumper ZZ (reverse all after @)
"Dare to be different . . . circle in sink."

"tango4" wrote in message ...
Tom!

Are you suggesting hiring labour overseas just so that you can pay them
below the regular rate? I'm sure your local labour market would just love
you to import some Eastern Europeans for 2 months to refinish your
capitalist, elitist toy at a quarter the price of a locally quoted job.

On that basis I'm sure there are several million people worldwide prepared
to pack their bags and leave for Ellis Island tomorrow. Hell, I might even
be one of them!

I can just see it now, factory workers all over the USA down tools and riot
in the streets just because of a bit of Gelcoat!

The U.S. has a long history of bringing in foreign "guest" workers, a
good number of them undocumented (i.e. illegal). The documentation
headaches to do this is probably not worth the resultant savings.

Does anybody know what they charge for refinishing in Canada, or if
there is anyone doing it?

Tom