Refinishing Ventus b Fuselage

On Wednesday, October 24, 2018 at 8:39:19 PM UTC-4, Nick Kennedy wrote:
27K to 35K for a refinish?!
Jeez the Fleet is in trouble, who's got that kind of money?

Ya think?
That is why I have helped one local club to get up to speed on refinishing their ships as club projects. They are on their third project this year.
Our club refinished our '21 a few years ago..
Another club in our area is going to give it a shot this year with support from P3 and myself.
UH

On Thursday, October 25, 2018 at 7:03:44 AM UTC-6, wrote:
On Wednesday, October 24, 2018 at 8:39:19 PM UTC-4, Nick Kennedy wrote:
27K to 35K for a refinish?!
Jeez the Fleet is in trouble, who's got that kind of money?

Ya think?
That is why I have helped one local club to get up to speed on refinishing their ships as club projects. They are on their third project this year.
Our club refinished our '21 a few years ago..
Another club in our area is going to give it a shot this year with support from P3 and myself.
UH

One club member (ACA) expressed this as a rewarding club experience at the Focus on Clubs luncheon a couple of SSA Conventions ago. Other clubs have done similar projects. I recall one (SSB) that polished a 1-34 to gain a bunch of payload. Another (TBSS) where, at one time, the entire fleet was insurance salvage returned to service. And others that have built facilities.. I would suggest that projects that put gliders and keep gliders in the air are the best as club activities.

Frank Whiteley

On Thursday, October 25, 2018 at 9:25:48 AM UTC-4, Frank Whiteley wrote:
On Thursday, October 25, 2018 at 7:03:44 AM UTC-6, wrote:
On Wednesday, October 24, 2018 at 8:39:19 PM UTC-4, Nick Kennedy wrote:
27K to 35K for a refinish?!
Jeez the Fleet is in trouble, who's got that kind of money?

Ya think?
That is why I have helped one local club to get up to speed on refinishing their ships as club projects. They are on their third project this year..
Our club refinished our '21 a few years ago..
Another club in our area is going to give it a shot this year with support from P3 and myself.
UH

One club member (ACA) expressed this as a rewarding club experience at the Focus on Clubs luncheon a couple of SSA Conventions ago. Other clubs have done similar projects. I recall one (SSB) that polished a 1-34 to gain a bunch of payload. Another (TBSS) where, at one time, the entire fleet was insurance salvage returned to service. And others that have built facilities. I would suggest that projects that put gliders and keep gliders in the air are the best as club activities.

Frank Whiteley

ACA Chief Refinishing Officer here... A lot of us agree that refinishing and restoring our gliders is one of the best team-building exercises out there. Over the years the enthusiasm ebbs and flows, but there are two constants.

One, you need a prime motivator. Back in the day, ACA had Jack Greene. You could bring in a 1-26 that had been balled up to the size of a VW Bug, and 6 months later a 1-26 would emerge (more or less :-))

20 years ago one of our guys caught the bug and refinished our 1-26 and 2-33 in matching livery.

Second, you need a shop. The biggest hurdle for a while was the lack of a consistent workspace. We migrated from garage to barn to shed. Finally, two years back we started renting a shop at the airport, and we now have the infrastructure we need.

In the last 7 or so years we've refinished and restored a Grob Twin Astir, LS4, 2-33 fuselage, Komet Trailer (now far and away the nicest Komet in the country), and started on an LS3. Also, we've done way more preventative maintenance than we did in the past. I'd say over 50 members have had their hands in various parts of this work.

P3

UH and P3 should give a presentation on how to manage refinishing projects using inexperienced staff (e.g., club members). I suspect M&H could contribute as they've taken a lot of young helpers from neophyte to expert stage over the years. The point is that you don't need a club full of expert repair people if you have a few experienced hands and good management. The latter is critical: turning a newbie loose with an 80-grit random orbital sander on the trailing edge of a wing or control surface without oversight can be disastrous.

Newcomers also need to be prepared to check their egos at the door. There are just so many ways you can (and almost certainly will) screw up with only a few seconds of inattention. I could give a presentation on that based on helping maestro UH refinish my ASW 24 the past two winters!

Chip Bearden

Le jeudi 25 octobre 2018 02:39:19 UTC+2, Nick Kennedy a écritÂ*:
27K to 35K for a refinish?!
Jeez the Fleet is in trouble, who's got that kind of money?

We've just got back one of our LS4 from Slovenia. PU + interior + €3000 of repair come up to €18000.

On Thursday, October 25, 2018 at 9:24:14 AM UTC-4, Tango Whisky wrote:
Le jeudi 25 octobre 2018 02:39:19 UTC+2, Nick Kennedy a écritÂ*:
27K to 35K for a refinish?!
Jeez the Fleet is in trouble, who's got that kind of money?

We've just got back one of our LS4 from Slovenia. PU + interior + €3000 of repair come up to €18000.

For those of us who speak USD... that's roughly $17K (excluding the repair component). Now, getting the ship there and back including insurance, brokers, transport to/from port etc. from the US is another $4K conservatively assuming you are on or near the east coast. Add a few thousand more if you're west of the Mississippi. We're back to somewhere in the "low $20K" levels somewhat optimistically.

If only it was this easy...

https://youtu.be/gr9ZAsySaD0

https://youtu.be/nx_ta3rABeY

PA

On Thursday, October 25, 2018 at 12:44:20 PM UTC-4, Papa3 wrote:
On Thursday, October 25, 2018 at 9:24:14 AM UTC-4, Tango Whisky wrote:
Le jeudi 25 octobre 2018 02:39:19 UTC+2, Nick Kennedy a écritÂ*:
27K to 35K for a refinish?!
Jeez the Fleet is in trouble, who's got that kind of money?

We've just got back one of our LS4 from Slovenia. PU + interior + €3000 of repair come up to €18000.

For those of us who speak USD... that's roughly $17K (excluding the repair component). Now, getting the ship there and back including insurance, brokers, transport to/from port etc. from the US is another $4K conservatively assuming you are on or near the east coast. Add a few thousand more if you're west of the Mississippi. We're back to somewhere in the "low $20K" levels somewhat optimistically.

Don't know where you buy your euros but I'd say the conversion of 21000 euro comes closer to $25k. And they all need some level of repair during the process.
That said, there are more resources there than here.
I turn down a dozen a year. Heinz many times that.
UH

I suspect that another part of the problem is that the return on investment for refinishing is not dollar for dollar. In my experience, a quality refinish (and I have seen some good ones from both domestic and foreign shops) only adds about 60% or so of the cost to the sale value of the glider. So using Hank's figures of $27K for a refinish of a beat out 15m glider - if you start with a $20K glider you spend $27K to get a glider worth about $35K when done. Unless it's a glider that you really love, it doesn't make sense to pay to have it done. A lower cost option would really help the fleet.
ROY (who refinished a 20m glider at home - and is, of course, now divorced)

On Thursday, October 25, 2018 at 9:34:34 AM UTC-4, Roy B. wrote:
I suspect that another part of the problem is that the return on investment for refinishing is not dollar for dollar. In my experience, a quality refinish (and I have seen some good ones from both domestic and foreign shops) only adds about 60% or so of the cost to the sale value of the glider. So using Hank's figures of $27K for a refinish of a beat out 15m glider - if you start with a $20K glider you spend $27K to get a glider worth about $35K when done. Unless it's a glider that you really love, it doesn't make sense to pay to have it done. A lower cost option would really help the fleet.
ROY (who refinished a 20m glider at home - and is, of course, now divorced)

I think your numbers are pretty much spot on. I don't completely agree with the conclusion. If one buys an older glider at about the right price and has it refinished, it will cost more than it will draw on the market, but the owner has a nice glider to use for a long time to come without worrying about it becoming a complete rat. There is real value in that. The only way we have gotten our money out of refinishes was by doing them on project gliders that start as owner modified from the insurance company.
If it were possible to just buy old gliders, pay somebody to refinish them, and sell them for more than you have in them, everybody would be doing that.