Pro's & Con's of Corrosion Painting

[Auburntsts]

Ahhh, nothing like a good primer discussion. Since you asked, I did a combination. I completely primed my tailcone and emp using the following process:

1. Clean parts (I used Dawn dishwashing detergent to remove oils)
2. Etch parts (scrubbed parts with maroon scotchbrite and alumiprep (aka phosphoric acid))
3. Alodine parts
4. Prime with epoxy primer (I used Stewart Systems water based primer sealer). If you do prime, take a good look at your primer of choice because some are porous and designed to be top coated which bascially defeats the purpose of corrision protection

All of that's a lot of work. For my wings I did all of that for just the ribs and primed only the rivet lines on the skins, For my fuse, I dropped priming altogether except for spots where I scratched the ALCLAD. For that I used rattle can primer.

Personally, if I had to do it all over again I'd only spot prime scratches and the parts Van's specifically calls out to be primed and call it good even if lived on the coast. YMMV.....

As for 2024 vs 6061, the 6061-T6 used in the RV-10 is not corrosion treated and must be primed. My assumption, knowing Van's penchant for keeping costs down, is the same materials are used in the RV-12, but I don't know for sure.