I seem to recall asking Fidel about silicone in waxes.Â* He said not to
worry about it.

On 3/3/2019 2:59 PM, BobW wrote:
On 3/3/2019 12:08 PM, Martin Gregorie wrote:

Snip...

I've been told to never use silicone based polish because it is said
to make repairs to fibreglass or carbon structures very difficult or
impossible to repair.

In fact I remember reading that here, so it must be true!

OTOH I've not seen any publications that mention the effect of
silicone contamination on repairability. The only article on
repairing FRP structures I've seen, in a search I just carried out,
that even mentions contamination in any detail is:

https://compositesuk.co.uk/system/files/documents/
repairoffrpstructures.pdf

It has a short section about contamination (half a page in a 33 page
PDF document) that mentions "fuel, oil, hydraulic fluid, etc" and
moisture, but
says nothing about the perils of silicone-based polishes.

The other 2-3 publications my search turned up that didn't turn out
to be pushing supplier's products either did not mention
contamination at all, or
gave no details apart from describing how to sand through surface
finish.

So, what's the deal?

Are silicone-containing polishes etc to be shunned?

Can anybody recommend an FRP repair publication that gives any more
details
about dealing with contamination than the one I quoted above?

Lordy, it must be winter in the northern hemisphere!

Certainly there's no harm in avoiding 'silicone-ingrediented' waxes,
but IMO 'commonly-held views' on the subject border on religious
arguments in that 'proof of one's beliefs' is rarely part of the
discussion.

So while we're polling, let's not forget including FRP repair shops'
inputs. My own direct shop-input querying-experience - *not* repairs,
sardonic chuckle - includes a mere 3 (4 counting a long-ago RAS post
by JJ Sinclair), and, so far, each puts "Silicone = Bad!" into the
urban myth category. Further, who can point me toward an accident
report involving structural failure of a repaired FRP glider, that has
'fingered' silicone as a contributing factor?

N.B. For the disputatiously-inclined, I am NOT recommending spraying
every accessible surface of your bird with silicone spray (a little
common sense can go a long way), but rather positing that 'fretting
over its presence in wax,' arguably falls into the
urban-myth/anally-self-inflicted worry category.

YMMV, of course...

Bob - last night's low -1 deg F. here - W.

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--
Dan, 5J