Dear friends,welcome back to my website, today we'll talk about why most commercial airplanes are painted in shiny white colours and the question arises. Why paint airplanes in the first place?
That, and a few more interesting facts about airplane paint jobs in today's blog, so let's get painting!
When a brand new plane rolls out of the factory, they are very often painted in a greenish, anti-corrosive paint so that the plane can be flown or moved to the final assembly line and paint shop. Therefore, they are nicknamed the green jets and are a rare sight for plane spotters.
But once the plane arrives at the paint shop - let's take an Airbus A380 as an example - it takes approximately 34 painters working three shifts, each day for 15 days to wash, prepare, and paint the plane.
After six thousand working hours they've roughly applied 1,100 kilograms of paint onto the plane.And that procedure needs to be repeated every seven to eight years depending on the use of the plane and cleaning schedule.
So after applying a minimum of two layers the plane gains a few more pounds to its dry operating weight and even more if a third, more colourful layer is sprayed onto it such as the company logo etc.
Therefore putting fancy detailed liveries onto the planes is not only costly at first but also increases the operating costs.
For example:- A Boeing 737 paint job can be as heavy as 500 kilograms, which equals six passengers Who aren't paying for their flight and increasing the fuel consumption.
The question arises, so why even bother painting the planes at all? So far it's just expensive!
After the second world war paintless planes were very common. American Airlines was particularly famous for their shiny aluminum look.
- But while it saves money it left the aircraft exposed and unprotected especially in harsh weather conditions. Subsequently the money they saved on fuel they had to use to frequently polish the surface otherwise it would have degraded and become tarnished and besides that passengers getting on board complained that the reflected glare hurt their eyes, first world problems.
So very often airlines choose to maintain a clean, white look for their airplanes.
- A white paint, job unveils oil or other fluid leaks more easily, dents and cracks can also be located quickly.
The price for a colourful, paint job can vary from $50,000 to $200,000 depending on size and detail.
- Furthermore, airlines often end up selling the aircraft to other carriers and they will find it harder to do so if the colour scheme is anything but white.
And sometimes you spot these airline hybrids Meaning you see the remains of a previous livery mixed together with a new logo. uhh, it just looks horrible.
- More reason for white airplanes are reports by search rescue teams Who find it easier to identify white airplane debris after a crash.
- White airplanes are less prone to bird strikes as they are higher in contrast compared to planes with colourful paint jobs. Therefore, birds have more time to react and can so avoid the approaching plane.
Which means military airplanes, which are painted in darker colours or camouflage colours would encounter more bird strikes than commercial airliners.
May be a military pilot can comment on that please, I highly doubt that rumour, by the way.
- But the primary reason why commercial jet airplanes are painted white is :-
- Using a laser temperature instrument were if we measure the surface temperature of a black painted car indicating 162 Fahrenheit.
- Comparing that to a white car parked right next to it shows 120 Fahrenheit. A temperature difference of nearly 50 Fahrenheit. How is that possible?
- White paint is 12 times more reflective than darker colours. Consider the temperature changes an airplane's surface has to undergo during each flight.
Cruising temperatures can be as low as minus 57 degrees, and on landing it can be as hot as 45 degrees. Plus the ascending heat of black apron surfaces warms up the plane even more, and all this can create a temperature difference up to a 100 degrees.
Adding another 20 degrees due to black paint will cause a lot of thermal expansion stress on the metal and paint.
- With time that will create tiny hair cracks. And today's modern airliners, Which are partly built out of composite materials.Have real problems compensating for thermal stress.
So you could say that the airplane wears sun block rather than a black t-shirt to protect itself from the sun.
- And, as always, Concorde hits it out of the ballpark. Engineers had to develop a unique paint especially for Concorde because the wings heated up to 127 degrees during cruise flight. Talking about thermal expansion right there.
- Side-note, ever thought about why countries near the equator prefer driving around in white cars? Think about it.
That's it for today thank you very much, for your time and don't forget a enthusiastic is always learning.
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