Posted for "F. Barry Knotts" <bknotts@buckeye-express.com>:

I've been researching a painting system and got a copy of a brochure
called: Flight Gloss; A Better Composite Finishing Sytem, Now
Simplified! By Jon Goldenbaum.  It's a good, brief look at the PolyFiber
system (for a complete newbie to composite finishing.)  Anyway here's a
paragraph from their introduction chapter (page 5, item 6):

"Composite airplanes need to be light colored, preferably white.  High
skin temperature does two bad things: (1) it can cause epoxies to shrink
more than normal; and (2) it can overheat foam cores.

In 90 degree ambient temperature white paint has a skin temperature of
140 degrees, green 190 degrees, and black 210 degrees.  That's a lot of
heat.  At 110 degrees, black paint can get as high as 240 degrees.
Choose any color you wish for your predominate color as long as it's a
white or a shade of white.  Or fly only at night."

I don't really think that the author has an axe to grind, since
PolyFiber makes all kinds of color paints.  There also is no reference
as to the source of the above numbers.

Guess it's just another opinion.

Barry Knotts
LIV-P, Conti TSIO-550, 20%, Toledo, Ohio