Fernando's Logbook
I fly a plane called Saoirse to places most people drive past, and I bring back the thing the view was hiding. Not the postcard. The story underneath it, the one most people walk straight past. Some of it will make you want to go. Some of it will stay with you for reasons you won't expect. You don't need a plane. You just need to wonder what you've been driving past.
Fernando's Logbook
All About Cleaning your Aircraft
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
Welcome back to The Pilot’s Logbook - a podcast companion for private pilots in the UK and Europe.
In this episode, Luke Dale explains why cleaning your aeroplane is a vital maintenance task, shares the best techniques, the products that actually work (and the ones that don’t), and why the CAA is starting to regulate this industry.
He's the man to teach us all about cleaning our aircraft.
Pilot's Tip of the Day - Night Flying
Night flying is breathtaking, but when the lights go down, the visual tricks begin. In this episode, Philippe Polman delves into the mental traps and essential techniques required to stay safe when flying at night.
Link and companies mentioned in this episode
Get our newsletter for free here.
We believe the best adventures are shared from one human to another. That’s why everything in Fernando’s Logbook is created entirely by talented people and artists. We do not use Generative AI at any stage.
Intro
SPEAKER_01Welcome to the Pilot's Love Book, a podcast companion for private pilots in the UK and Europe. Each episode is packed with practical tips, inspiring chats with pilots and members of our community, gear reviews, and will reveal exciting destinations you can fly directly to. Whether you're a seasoned aviator or just starting your journey, we hope you find our show as informative as it is inspirational. I'm Joy, your co-pilot for the Pilot's Logbook.
SPEAKER_04And I'm Fernando, your host and fellow pilot. Hi, I'm Luke Dale from Vertico Aviation Detailing, and today we're gonna talk about how to clean your aircraft.
SPEAKER_03We are recording this episode in November, and it's that time of the year where days are shorter, temperatures are starting to drop, and the weather can be more challenging. But regardless of all of that, I hope you are managing to get some flying. And if you are not, well, we are here to keep you well informed and share ideas of where to fly next time you get into your plane. In today's show, we are going to share everything you need to know about cleaning your airplane. And to help us, we brought in the expert in aircraft cleaning and detailing. And you'll learn great tips and techniques. But first, the inspiring Philip Pullman brings us the pilot tip of the day. And this time it's all about the necessary humility and respect we owe to night flying.
Tip of the day by Echelon Air
SPEAKER_01Pilot's Tip of the Day presented by Achelon Air Flying at night has a certain allure.
SPEAKER_02The calm air, the quiet frequencies, the shimmering city lights below. But behind that beauty lies a series of hazards that can challenge even the most experienced aviator. Let's talk about the cautions of flying at night. Our eyes play tricks on us in low light. What we think we see or don't see can be deadly. During the day we rely on clear visual references, the horizon, terrain, color, shadows. At night, those cues fade. Depth perception is distorted, and geometric perspective, things like runway or city lights, can appear to converge or shift in ways that make us misjudge distance and altitude. To add to this, the farther an object is, the hazier it becomes. Details blur, shadows disappear, and our brains struggle to calculate distance. Then come the illusions, the mental traps that can lure a pilot into danger. There's autokinesis where a single light in the distance seems to move on its own after you stare at it too long. The cure? Keep your eyes scanning, never fixate on one light source. The false horizon illusion is another one. When the real horizon disappears into darkness or cloud or haze, pilots might line up their aircraft with sloping terrain or city lights, unknowingly flying at a dangerous attitude. Ever seen another aircraft's lights and couldn't tell if it was coming or going? Well that's the reversible perspective illusion. Brightness can deceive. A light that seems stationary might actually be an aircraft flying straight toward you. And then there's flicker vertigo, particularly for those of us in uh flying propeller airplanes. The lights flickering off a propeller can act as a strobe, and this can induce nausea, disorientation, and even momentary loss of consciousness. Let's talk for a moment about landing. Landing at night can be even trickier. Over dark, featureless terrain, pilots tend to fly a lower than normal approach. A brightly lit runway, on the other hand, can make the aircraft seem closer than it is, prompting a high and unstable descent. Roads, highways, and even moving trains can often be mistaken for runways. Use the PAPI or VASI, or if none are installed, set up a visual approach in your avionics to follow a standard three-degree glide if that's suitable at your airfield with terrain. And remember, you can always go around. Fortunately, modern technology is helping. Synthetic vision or enhanced flight vision systems, EVS, give pilots a digital or infrared view of the terrain ahead, making invisible obstacles visible. But truthfully, there's no system that replaces good judgment. Before taking off at night, pilots should study their route in daylight, know their minimum safe altitudes, and always have an alternate plan. If the weather drops below your safe limits, turn around and do it early. And one last tip, even when not required, consider using supplemental oxygen. Night vision is especially sensitive to even mild hypoxia. And after you've studied all the books and theories of flying at night, remember there are still currency requirements to fly with passengers after hours. Even a pilot who holds a night rating in the UK or has recency in the US can find their skills degraded if they stop night operations for extended periods. Most regulations enforce a short recency window of 90 days with three takeoffs and landings, so that the pilot has recent hands-on experience with night takeoffs and full stop landings, which are the operations most affected by darkness. This would be the bare minimum. If you fall out of currency, you must regain it, typically by doing the required takeoffs and landings, either solo or bring a current flight instructor with you, logging them appropriately before carrying passengers again. Flying at night is breathtaking. I love it. But it demands a bit of humility, lots of preparation, and respect for these illusions.
Cleaning your Airplane
SPEAKER_01He's a textbook example of someone who was flying before he could drive. His pursuit of perfection started with gliders. He was flying solo at 16 and quickly became an instructor. He achieved international status, representing Great Britain at two world gliding championships, completing epic cross-country flights up to 400 miles, all without an engine. That obsessive attention to aerodynamic perfection is the foundation of his career. After his competitive flying days, Luke moved into high-stakes corporate aviation maintenance, serving as a commercial manager who project-managed Boeing base maintenance. Luke is the co-founder and director of Vertigo Aviation Detailing. For nearly 10 years, his company has set the standard for premium aircraft detailing. His clients include pilots like you and me, but also the elite of the aviation world, including the jets of current and ex-Formula One drivers and other high-profile owners who demand flawless presentation and uncompromising safety. Away from work, Luke is a family man who enjoys flying with his wife and two daughters, cycling and racing his home-built kit car. Luke is here today to explain why cleaning is a vital maintenance task. Share the best techniques, the products that actually work, and the ones that don't, and why the CAA is starting to regulate this industry. He's the man to teach us all about cleaning our aircraft.
SPEAKER_03Luke Dale, welcome to the show.
SPEAKER_04Hello, Fernande. Thank you for the welcome. It's uh good to be here.
SPEAKER_03Thank you, thank you very much. And what we didn't say in your intro is that you are now so popular that you even clean and take care of celebrities' private jets. That even includes uh X Formula One driver. Is that correct?
SPEAKER_04Uh yes, that is correct. Uh, we're on uh an X Formula One drivers today, but we also do some of the current teams as well. Um, as a fan myself, it's quite exciting.
SPEAKER_03I I can imagine. I really can imagine. You have an incredible career and you run one of the most popular companies in the aircraft cleaning and detailing industry here in the United Kingdom. So when our listeners uh asked for an episode about aircraft detailing and cleaning, everyone I talked to mentioned you. So today we are going to share with our listeners a lot of very useful and important information about how they can clean their own airplane, the best techniques, the products that really work, and if you need one, how to choose a really good aircraft cleaning company. We also share some horror stories so you can avoid them from happening to you. Now, look, before we start, and as you know, you have a tradition here on the show where we start things off with a quick fire round of questions. And we have some strict rules. You can only answer with a yes or a no, or if you absolutely have to, a one-sentence answer. Are you ready?
SPEAKER_04I'm ready. Okay.
SPEAKER_03Aircraft washing is a maintenance procedure. Yes or no? Yes. Can anyone wash an airplane on a budget? Yes. Is ceramic counting for everyone? No. The best way to clean your aircraft is from top to bottom. Yes. Can anyone buy the products you use to clean aircraft professionally?
SPEAKER_04No.
SPEAKER_03And we are done? Thank you very much. Luke, we have quite a lot from back there, and we will circle back to these questions in a moment.
SPEAKER_04Okay.
SPEAKER_03Am I right to say that cleaning our airplanes isn't just about appearance?
SPEAKER_04It's not just about appearance. It is more of a maintenance task, and uh you can protect your asset.
SPEAKER_03Why is that necessary, Luke?
SPEAKER_04That is that is a great question. Um, predominantly aircraft cleaning, a lot of people have had a go. Um, you you see a lot of pilots or aircraft owners giving the windscreen a clean. The techniques aren't perhaps the most efficient. You don't want to damage the surfaces that you're working on. There have been a few incidents with aircraft cleaning, and at the end of the day, it is a maintenance task. It's part of the ground handling uh remit within aviation, and because of that, it is going to become regulated. I mean, we're we've been thinking of just your general aviation aircraft, but there's a lot of corporate jets, commercial airliners that also get cleaned, and it all falls under the same category. Everyone likes to have a shiny aircraft. Um, and part of that, yes, it's a maintenance task, but also you have aircraft cleaning, aircraft valeting, and aircraft detailing has really been brought in as that next level of uh attention to detail. And in fact, I describe it to my customers as it's a detailed aircraft clean, not just aircraft detailing. So a lot of people think, oh, is that a new graphic or a new pinstripe down the aircraft? As we all would have known detailing to be.
SPEAKER_03Am I right to say that a good clean, a good detailing process is also part of a safety aspect of flying?
SPEAKER_04Hugely. If you never had your aircraft cleaned and it got covered in the oils, greases, flight deposits, it's very hard to spot if you have a new oil leak or if the fuel tank's leaking slightly. If the aircraft is always in an impeccable condition, it's easy when you do your pre-flight inspection, you can see anything different. And also on that same note, the amount of aircraft defects that we as aircraft trained aircraft detailers have found and then reported to the aircraft owner or the maintenance organization that have gone forward to help with the airworthiness of an aircraft going forward. Last week I found evidence of a bird strike. It was on a corporate jet and it was on the tailplane. Um, the tailplane is what, 10, 11 metres from the ground, so the the flight crew aren't going to find this. It's us going round in uh lift access equipment, finding this damage on the leading edge of the tailplane. Instantly reported to the um we were working under an aircraft maintenance organization for that service, so it was encapsulated within their providing to the customer, and they handled a repair. But um, it's having those trained eyes, those calibrated fingers, as it were, to know what is and isn't right.
SPEAKER_03And to me, that makes it clear that experience matters here.
SPEAKER_04Experience is key. Um loads of people can clean, but it's knowing how to clean with the correct procedure that you're going to protect the aircraft and enhance its appearance and longevity.
SPEAKER_03A lot of colleagues say, Oh, try this product or try the other product. And I said, No, I'm sorry, I'm not going to try this product on my own airplane. It's like I want to know that it works. Absolutely.
SPEAKER_04My uh fleet of vans and my cars had uh quite a few test patches performed. But you're right, you shouldn't just try something unknown on your aircraft. In fact, the aircraft manufacturer would normally list what they would allow to be approved. Um, you'll probably find in your pilot's operating handbook a section on aircraft cleaning. Um, it is good to use the correct products, but a lot of it also comes down to the correct technique. Um, and some products are transferable, if shouldn't strictly say this, but if it's okay for a Cessna, it's probably okay for a Piper. I mean, at the end of the day, these are all um aircraft. It gets more technical uh on things like the TKS panels that uh some Cirruses and Diamonds have. Um, you really need to follow the manufacturer's recommendations for those.
SPEAKER_03The other day someone recommended a product to clean my windscreens. It was really difficult to get a product in the UK. I eventually managed to find a supplier. I got the product, I started to read the back of the spray, and the first thing that I noticed was be aware these products can cause cancer. And I was like, How on earth did I manage to buy a product in UK that says this on the back? I was pretty shocked, and it's an extremely popular product.
SPEAKER_04The cost and the the control of those substances that are hazard to health are it's a very important task. Um, wearing the correct PPE. You go flying, you wear um headphones to obviously so you can hear your radio, but also noise cancelling to cancel out some of the engine sounds. Exactly the same. If you're cleaning your aircraft, you should probably be wearing gloves. A lot of aircraft operate with Avgas fuel. Um, is that tetraethylene, I think, in the in the fuel there, the the lead. Again, that is hazardous to your health. So when you're cleaning your aircraft, there is quite a lot of hazards around. You can have magnetos that fail live. So if you're working around the propeller, you need to treat that as live so you don't lose an arm. Um, that the skin and your eyes. If you're working under the aircraft, you could have dirt falling in your eyes. So all of these things, in addition to working at height, these aircraft aren't small. You could be on um on a tailplane quite a few meters um off the ground using a ladder or a step ladder.
SPEAKER_03I never saw this process of washing my plane as something that would require me to be protected, if this makes sense. I just thought, okay, I'll get a bucket full with water, a sponge, and I clean my plane. And the more I learn and the more I see these products available in the market, the more I realize that actually I should be paying more attention to this, and I should be either protecting myself or hire someone to do it properly.
SPEAKER_04And protecting your plane.
SPEAKER_03Yes, absolutely.
SPEAKER_04Yes. No, you're absolutely right. It's um just about operating correctly, just like it would be when you get in the aircraft to go flying.
SPEAKER_03And the aircraft are are not cars, right?
SPEAKER_04They're not cars. It's a common misconception. A lot of people, and you've mentioned bucket and sponge. Actually using a wet cleaning procedure, we call it wet washing, where you would use a bucket and sponge and a hose pipe, isn't always the best way to clean your aircraft. There's environmental fallout concerns, some airfields and airports won't allow it. And also, you don't want to drive water into certain areas of the aircraft, the static ports, some panel gaps. 95% of the work we do is dry washing. Um, so that's where you would have a spray bottle and say microfiber cloth. It's a more detailed approach. You only clean the areas that you're working on. It's slightly easier to do outside in direct sunlight because you don't have panels that are drying prematurely behind you. And it's it's a controlled method. But wet washing, we can talk a bit more about the risks involved in that later on.
SPEAKER_03You mentioned the POH, and that's exactly what I went the first time I wanted to wash my plane. And the first thing I realized is that it's it says mostly water. It's just use water. You're right. And uh and I said, there's no way I can clean this just with water. So I confess the few times I cleaned my airplane, and and if our listeners are not aware, I I own a Cirrus. It's mostly built with fiberglass, and it does have the TKS panels on the wings. I I was slightly anxious about going with with a bucket of of water and and doing it myself. As a result, what happens is that now I tend not to wash it at all and leave it for when the airplane goes to a maintenance service and I ask the maintenance shop to do it for me.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, see that's unfortunate because that's in a way scared you away from looking after your aircraft.
SPEAKER_03Exactly. So let's use the example of summertime. During the summer, for some reason, you you might know the answer. My plane is constantly covered in this very thin dust layer. In Duxford, where I am based, uh, we have a few birds, and the birds love to use the planes as a toilet first, and then if you combine the birds with the layer of dust, you will see like their paws printed into the fuselage of the airplane. So after a flight, after a few days, I get to the airport, I see the plane in this state. Can you please walk me through what we should be doing in this situation?
SPEAKER_04You're not alone with that. I think we're all experiencing the same thing. In fact, my aircraft's hangered, open the hangar doors, and it's completely covered in dust. A lot of the times being parked outside, it's probably a pollen, uh, some sort of uh atmospheric sand, perhaps, that has come up from the south. It's really important to get that off, especially the bird deposits you've mentioned. The acidity within that will literally eat through your paintwork. So best to clean off any of uh bird presence as soon as you can. Um, you can just use water for that. And in fact, with the polls the sands, rinse it, get it off, and once you've rinsed it, you can then clean it um with more of a conventional method.
SPEAKER_03Okay, so what you're saying is that I should straight away remove the droppings. For that, I can use water and a wet wipe or uh cloth. What should I use for that?
SPEAKER_04Good question. We should all be carrying a pack of microfiber cloths in the aircraft. I've seen a lot of people use sponges, traditional yellow dusters, an old t-shirt, old pair of socks perhaps, but microfibres really are the best. You can get uh luxury ones, edgeless ones, to be honest. The quality of it is important, but less important than the maintaining the actual cloth itself, using it, taking it home and washing it. If you're using a dirtied microfiber or oh, I need to clean the windscreen, rummage around in the back as we all do, here's a microfiber, it's got some grit in there, and you've just gone a whoed it gone ahead and scratched the windscreen. So use a microfiber cloth, use some water, get rid of those bird deposits straight away, and then go flying.
SPEAKER_03That's the first step. But then if I have the plane covered in dust and I want to remove that too, what shall I do?
SPEAKER_04What we would do would potentially rinse that area just with some fresh water, just to take the worst of it off. And then we work through a selection of microfiber cloths, we'll fold them into quarters, therefore, you've got uh eight sterile sections of the cloth to use. So you don't go through a whole pack of 30. You could probably clean the whole plane with five if you were clever. So you'd work this lubricated with your chosen dry washing product. We can talk more about products later, but using your dry washing product, spray it on, and then work your cloth in a grid like fashion, left to right, down. Half the cloth and just work along in the grid around the plane. And it's good to have a good flow. You don't want to be doing the left wing tip to the tail plane, back to the nose. This is just chaotic. You're going to miss things. Start at the front and work your way down one side, down one wing, and just do a just do a lap around the aircraft completely. And then you know you've you've covered all your surfaces.
SPEAKER_03So I rinse the plane with water. And I can do that with like with a bucket of water first.
SPEAKER_04If it's super dusty, as you're as you're mentioning. Okay.
SPEAKER_03Then I will use a fibercloth folded in in a few sections so I can make the most of the area available. Yeah. And I will use a product that we'll talk about in a moment to walk around the plane and clean it in a logical sequence so I don't I'm not running around the airplane back and forwards and up and down. Is there any logical orientation? Should I start from the bottom to the top or top to the bottom?
SPEAKER_04Is there any logical so I find it important to clean the aircraft top down and then working around the aircraft as we've discussed? If you're using a spray bottle and a microfiber, you're going to get overspray. So if you do the panel at the top, clean that panel, and then the panel directly beneath it, you're then not covering the work that you've already done. So you can do the top cowling, the bottom cowling, move along to the right, the window sides, and just keep working around the aircraft that way. Okay.
SPEAKER_03So top, let's say let's say I start by the door of the paladin command. So I start with the window, and then I'll do the panel below the window. That's right. And then I will, for example, start with the wing. Yep. From inside to the outside of the wing.
SPEAKER_04You've got to do in a way what works best for you. If you're cleaning your own aircraft, you're a fully qualified pilot, you're used to doing the pre-flight checks on the aircraft. Highly competent people doing this, just work in a way that's suitable for you that you can remember. I mean, I always start near the spinner because you want, I find cleaning the bugs off is part of the hardest job. If they're not done the sort of the day that they arrive on the surface, they harden, and even the the bugs can be etched into the paint with the sunlight and the heat. If you've got a dark coloured aircraft, um, those bug deposits will etch and damage your paint, which sometimes even require machine polishing to remove. Yeah, so I would start at the front. Uh, you can use your product to soften some of the bug debris working from around the sort of air intakes on the cowling to then the the lower cowling and then moving around the side.
SPEAKER_03Do you know those situations where the bugs are solid rock stuck in shape?
SPEAKER_04I do indeed. Yes.
SPEAKER_03Should I apply the product and wait a few minutes? Or is there any other way to help?
SPEAKER_04Yes, you can do that. But what's really important is when you imply the product is to not let the product run. Because if you let a run or a long drip of the product, it's going to come round the leading edge, say, say we're doing the leading edges, and onto the bottom of the wing, and it can sit there. And the concentration of some products, maybe it's not pH neutral, maybe you're being a bit naughty, and it can damage the paintwork. So, what I recommend, you can spray up the bugs, use a moistened, uh damp microfiber cloth just to lightly, I describe it as keying it in. You're just lightly smudging some of the product all over the bug debris, and that will then stop the product from running underneath as well. Let that soften up for a bit. Maybe you do that to half of the wing, come back to the root section where you started, then you can start to work the bugs because they've been softening whilst you've been working ahead.
SPEAKER_03So let's go back to the beginning. I removed the bird's droppings, then I rinsed the plane if it is really dusty, then I started to clean top down and around the plane with a product. I also applied a bit more product if there is a bug, there is solid rock in my fuselage. And then I'll go back to it to to clean it. What about the TKS panels?
SPEAKER_04I am aware that those very, very small micro isn't it a million holes per inch or something like that that they quote? It's um laser into the titanium. It's an incredible system, but behind that titanium leading edge, you've got a foam which helps spread your fluids, and behind that there's a there's a rubber uh membrane. Some products have been known to damage that membrane. Um, and if you've used a wax product or anything with polish, you can block those holes, and that means you're not going to get any anti-icing, which of course can be completely catastrophic and expensive on both counts. So if you have a look through, I mean, we could probably include it in your uh note podcast notes. There are specific cleaning instructions released from TKS. And one of the things they say, if you, Fernando, you're about to clean your leading edges, turn your TKS pumps on for a few moments, let some of the fluid come out, and then you can clean those uh leading edges with the TKS fluid, and then when you're done, wipe it off with some water.
SPEAKER_03I didn't know about that. That's that's a very logical tip that I never thought about.
SPEAKER_04And it's good to run those panels as well because it keeps the foams moistened, so then when you fly into known icing, you can uh utilize it quicker.
SPEAKER_03We will add this information to the episode notes so our listeners can find it uh easily. So at this point, my plane is ready to go flying. Is there anything I should be aware of? On we are talking about a very simple clean just to remove dust and and bird droppings. Is there anything else I should be taking care of?
SPEAKER_04A lot of these things in your description here would have been covered in your pre-flight, but um just making sure that you've avoided the pitoes and the statics or any other aircraft sensors involved, highly critical areas. The amount of times I've found pitoes that have had insects driven in. I mean, at the end of the day, you're flying through the air at 80, 90, 100, 150 knots. You're getting these bugs on your leading edges. That hole in the end of your pito is quite small, but they will block that as well. So, as part of your pre-flights, you pull off your your your pito cover and have an inspection. Exactly the same with the clean. Check those fundamental points uh before you effectively return the aircraft back into service.
SPEAKER_03Now, I I am fairly tall, but uh I I still can't reach the top of the tail of my airplane.
SPEAKER_04How do I get there? You will need a small stepladder. So working at height safely, positioning it in a in an area, you don't want to be have it leaning up against the plane, you want a standalone uh hop-up step, perhaps. And then you'll be able to reach the top of the fin. It's fair fairly logical, but again, I never thought about it, and I just realized that some people carry them in their hold anyway, because the oil filler is quite high for some, and you don't want to be filling the oil up at an arm's length and having it dribble all down, which I have done before. Uh so yes, there's usually a pair of steps around, just give them a good pre-use inspection.
SPEAKER_03So I'll go flying and I spend an incredible day away, and I come back and I look to my plane. Exactly. And I land and I look to the plane and I realize, wait a moment, I I I washed the plane this morning, but there's a few scratches in the wing, it's starting to look a bit tired. My uh windows look a bit uh uh uh opaque in a few areas um they don't look like new. My plane is uh nearly 18 years old. So at that point I assume I need to talk with someone like you to get some help. Yeah. And uh what is the kind of of services or what should someone like me be looking into and asking someone like you to help me with?
SPEAKER_04So the key point would be winding the clock back further so your aircraft doesn't get into that situation um with a regular cleaning and polishing uh routine. But you could have just bought the aircraft, it may not have been as well looked after as you had intended. So things can always be done. You can exfoliate parts of the paint with some light machine polishing. For an aircraft like yours, it's super critical to polish it if you're using a machine to use a dual-action machine polisher, because that keeps the temperature of the pad that will be contacting the uh the paintwork of a low temperature. With a composite aircraft, you don't want to get it too hot. Well, in fact, any aircraft, you don't want to get it too hot, because with some of the aluminium panels, you can change the the strength on some of the panel joints.
unknownYes.
SPEAKER_04So a dual action polisher is a safe way of machine polishing and providing a paint restoration. It also doesn't have a hard-driven edge. So if you catch it on the trailing edge, for example, of the wing, it's not going to rip a flight control off. You'll just stall the pad. Using that and a nice cutting polish with uh with your aircraft, you could you really could bring back a beautiful shine. And if you don't mind me asking, what color is your cirrus?
SPEAKER_03It's grey. And in my defense, I I did buy the plane already in that condition a couple of years ago. I would never do that myself. At that point, I would probably contact you to come and do it because I I was too scared of doing it myself and damaging the plane.
SPEAKER_04Absolutely. No, the reason I ask is for some reason I've found that white paint tends to oxidize quicker than some of the colours. And I think that's to do with the the lacquer coating on top.
SPEAKER_03Okay. No, but my my plane is grey. It does have a few scratches on the wing that weren't caused by by me. And that is something that we'll want to tackle. They are fairly close to the walkway, but not on the walkway. They are actually on the on the wing section already, so be beside the the walkway.
SPEAKER_04That's popular.
SPEAKER_03And yeah. And then I have the the issues that I mentioned to you. I have uh a small section of of the windscreen on the passenger side that is slightly opaque. It's it's fairly small. Um, I suspect it was scratched, but it it just doesn't look good. And I see other planes with the same issues. Is that normal that that kind of material over time starts to unfortunately?
SPEAKER_04Yes. Where you're describing you've got an acrylic perspex uh sort of windshield, not a glass windshield. It is a softer material. And if it has been cleaned, um perhaps not with the best techniques, it can induce scratching. I had one helicopter that we worked on. The pilot thought he was being very helpful in giving it a clean. He used paper towel, that sort of blue roll that you find around the workshop. And he might as well have just used sandpaper. We were called in and had to perform a complete perspex restoration, which is incredibly hard. You sand the perspex with multiple grades of paper, and then you end up polishing it. So it was almost a seven-step process. It took it took a couple of days to get it right. And what the risks you have with that, if you're polishing a scratch out of perspex, you can change the vision. If you polish one area slightly thinner than the rest, you can get sort of a visual ripple, which can distort your view and flight. So the best thing I think we can take from this and share is learning a good technique to cleaning your windscreens. I would always recommend removing any watches, jewellery, so you've got a non-scratch environment using a new microfiber cloth with the tag removed, your chosen windscreen cleaner.
SPEAKER_03So many brands out there, but um we'll talk about products in in a moment because I would like to talk about that and get your honest opinion about uh some of them. But but going back to the technique, yes, um, I'm very curious about the technique you're going to just share with us.
SPEAKER_04The windscreen cleaning technique. I'd recommend using a new microfiber cloth or a well-laundered one. Remove the tag and always clean the window with watches and jewelry removed in the direction of the airflow. So if you imagine it will effectively be top to bottom, have it nice and wet. The first thing I would do is use my chosen product just to wet up the screen. Don't let it run. So now I get my microfiber cloth and I very lightly go over the whole screen up and down in the direction of the airflow. We're not really looking to remove any bugs or do any deep cleaning yet. We're looking to remove the surface contaminants. Then once you've done that, you leave the screen slightly damp, spray it again, and now any additional fluid that you're putting on the screen doesn't run off, it clings to the screen.
SPEAKER_03Oh, I didn't know about that.
SPEAKER_04It's just a technique. And then turn your cloth again. So you've got a new sterile cloth, lubricate the cloth with your product, lubricate the screen with your product. This is the key. And now go up and down in the direction of the airflow. Not too fast. You want this controlled, you want to be looking both ahead and then behind your microfiber cloth to see what you're leaving behind, and then you can go, oh, I've missed a bug. I'll come back and just gently work that. What you don't do is put your fingers through the cloth and rub with a high point of pressure. You want to be using the full palm of your hand in your folded microfiber cloth so it's an even pressure distributed across the screen. You're not going to get all the bugs in the first one, two, three wipes. It could take a while. It depends how bad it is. If you're very good and clean it after every flight when the bugs are the softest, it's it would literally take moments. If you've done it maybe a week or two after the flight, it can take a bit longer. But just keep going with that same method, and then as you're working it, you can turn your cloth again to a drier side and buff the screen dry. Basically, keep turning the cloth, keep it sterile, keep it lubricated, and that way you're not going to scratch anything.
SPEAKER_03And now the million-dollar question: which product or products should we be looking into?
SPEAKER_04You want to be using something with an aviation approval that's been designed for the task. I don't really want to mention a load of brand names because there is such a choice out there. There's a lot of aviation pilot stores uh in the UK that stock aircraft cleaning products. So I'd have a look at those. And also have a reference to your aircraft flight manual. I know Cirrus with their new G7 actually released a whole document about cleaning Cirrus. So have a look at the oil manufacturer and also see what they recommend as well.
SPEAKER_03I'm going to ask you a very honest question. The product that I am using currently and was recommended by many, many, many palettes out there, which is quite expensive and hard to get. It's Plexus. Do you have any opinion about it?
SPEAKER_04I actually use Plexus myself. It's um a very good product. It's also got some fillers in there, so if you have any small scratches on the windscreen, it will gradually fill those for you to give a good vision. But there's so many products out there. Um, so it's just nice to hear that you're using a high-quality aviation grade one. But we mentioned earlier, obviously you have to use the right products, but also you have to use them properly as well.
SPEAKER_03And what about for the body of the aircraft? I have a product uh that I can find in any shop really from Aerocosmetics. Is that any good?
SPEAKER_04Aerocosmetics is again another industry-leading product. It's an American product, and you're probably using their blue one. I believe that's washwax all. Um it's great. Yeah, you can't really go wrong with that.
SPEAKER_03So, but that is not a dry product.
SPEAKER_04Yes, you're right. It's a fluid in a bottle. Uh, and it is still known as dry washing, which kind of sounds um counterintuitive because you're using a liquid here, but it's known as a dry wash. You'll spray it with your bottle, work it with a microfiber cloth. And the the term dry wash just means that there's no hose pipes involved.
SPEAKER_03Look, a few moments ago you mentioned the acidity and uh the pH balance of the products and the aircraft. Would you mind to elaborate about uh what's the the risks and how can we avoid to be caught in that kind of situation?
SPEAKER_04Yeah, of course. You'll find usually on the belly or the landing gear of an aircraft, they get the most soiling, whether that's um oil, exhaust deposits, break dust, mud, all these sorts of things need cleaning off. Otherwise, you're going to introduce uh corrosion points. These can get cleaned or would normally need to get cleaned with a form of degreaser, which can be high or low, depending on what you go for on the pH balance. But what we're saying is it's not neutrally safe. So you probably this would be a time to rinse it. So it's really important to have something that's pH neutral. Uh, that way you're not going to introduce any points of corrosion. This we find this mostly around undercarriage and landing gear. They're so exposed to the elements and they get so dirtied that to clean them you end up having to use a degreaser. But it's really important to chase that product with something to neutralize that pH, whether that's a water or an alcohol product, just to get it all neutral again and safe. And then, of course, you can apply some lubricants, some anti-corrosion, ACF-50s, LPS. There's so many products out there. But now we're venturing a little bit more into a maintenance task, but by looking after some of these areas correctly will save you costs uh in the long run.
SPEAKER_03Look, and now that you are talking about maintenance, I think this is the right moment to talk about ceramic coating.
SPEAKER_04Oh, what a controversial topic. I love it.
SPEAKER_03I cannot be in a room where everyone agrees about ceramic coating. So can you please explain to me what it is and why it is so controversial?
SPEAKER_04Uh ceramic coating, it's the latest, uh latest detailing craze. It's essentially SIO2 silicon in a bottle. And you can have it applied to your aircraft, your car in many ways. You can end up buying a ceramic shampoo now. That's not really what we're talking about. It sounds like you're talking about an actual hard coating that's going to protect the paint work going forward. As with all of these things, the work is always in the preparation. So you can't just, sorry Fernando, you can't just get your aircraft, buy some ceramic, and apply it. It's going to look terrible. You need to spend quite some time uh machine polishing, decontaminating, and preparing the painted surface ready for the coating application. And then for a flawless application, you need to be in a pretty sterile environment in a hangar, not in direct sunlight. You've got to control the temperature and the humidity, and it also has to cure afterwards. So quite an involved process. We've done loads before. The experience helps because there's quite a few gotchas that with the with the coating. If you put it on too thick, if you don't buff it all off, if you smudge it. Some of the coatings are so thick that if you leave an area unbuffed or unfinished, as it were, you can feel it with your with your hand, with your with your fingers. It's effectively a very small protective layer on top of the lacquer. Some aircraft manufacturers have chosen to outlaw it completely. They do not approve ceramic coatings for some aircraft. And some manufacturers do approve it. But uh it is it is a good method of protecting the aircraft from UV damage. Bug etching, and also it adds an extra layer of scratch resistance, which is always nice and important, in addition to giving you a really wet-looking glossy finish.
SPEAKER_03So, why why is that not everyone in agreement about it?
SPEAKER_04The hearsay is I don't know this for sure, but there was uh an aircraft that had it was a composite aircraft and it had some P-static issues in flight. There was one or two cases of this years ago with an older ceramic technology. The new ones, we have coated, I'm not going to name names, but we have coated a number of high-end composite aircraft with a ceramic coating with only positive results.
SPEAKER_03As far as I am aware, Cirrus does not recommend ceramic coating. Having said that, I know so many of my colleagues with Cyrus that still do it.
SPEAKER_04So I have many Cirrus owners ask me about ceramic coatings, and I normally advise them to wait until their paint warranty has expired. After that, then let's talk.
SPEAKER_03Okay. So we should talk at some point then. Just by listening to you, you you know so much, and I suspect you have many, many years of of experience and trial and error. I wonder if this was something that you started at the beginning of your flying career and you just carried on over the years.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, that's right. As as with all these things, it normally starts from a a passion or a and a hobby. And for me, I started uh gliding when I was 14. Uh worked that through quite a few years of misspent youth, spent four years on the British team, and that's cross-country competition gliding. And of course, as you can imagine, we don't have an engine. It's really important that the aerofoil of the aircraft is correct. So uh the class I was flying, it was called the club class, and my glider was 38 years old, I think, at the time. So I spent a lot of time reprofiling the wings to effectively blueprint it back to how it should have been out of the factory. Uh, that would involve paint, gel coat repairs, rubbing it back to make sure it's perfectly laminar, polished every time, just for that extra element of performance. That then carried through and found a a niche into aviation where we are now. It's it's something I'm passionate about, and I've really enjoy the transformations that we we get to deliver.
SPEAKER_03I was listening to you talking about your your origins and and and and in in the business, and I remember that I have a few couple of friends that at some point they were starting to become pilots, and they started to wash airplanes just to get some extra cash and uh then fly more and become pilots. Do you see a lot of these happening out there?
SPEAKER_04I see a lot, and in fact, it's really encouraging that any aircraft ground services, whether that's aircraft cleaning, helping at the airports as part of the ground crew, fire crew, and so on, it's a springboard uh for those that choose to into professional aviation, whether they want to be commercial pilots or corporate jet pilots, the lot. It's um it's fantastic to see. I've I've had a number of employees that are now sat in the front seat of your Airbus taking on holiday. Hugely rewarding to see that. Some of the things, though, to maybe look out for is if somebody is cleaning your plane and using it as a springboard, perhaps, how long have they been doing it? What background do they have? Are they from an engineering background? Or are they working for a established professional uh providing company that has liability insurance processes in place to protect your aircraft and effectively the asset value of that?
SPEAKER_03And as we said before, we don't want anyone to be learning on our aircraft.
SPEAKER_04It's a really good point, and it actually that's probably something that often gets overlooked. There's been a number of fatalities, uh, and it's it's a shame to have to bring that up. There was um Aero Peru, uh Boeing 757, it was cleaned overnight. Unfortunately, they left all of the static port covers on. The air it wasn't spotted, the aircraft went flying, and that was a complete loss. And there was also a Airbus in France, I believe it was coming out of a maintenance facility and it was dusty. And they used the firetruck to rinse it off before it went on a handling flight. And that sounds logical, give it a quick rinse. It drove water into the AOA, uh, the angle of attack sensors, which then froze in flight during the test flight. They performed some stalls and unfortunately didn't recover. Again, another total loss. So it is important to consider the safety element uh of both protecting your aircraft, but also protecting yourself when you get in it to go flying.
SPEAKER_03And I suspect these young student pilots trying to do this as a side hustle also need to be careful with the insurance.
SPEAKER_04Yes, you're right. They need to be fully transparent with the aircraft owner. If if you're just doing it to help a friend out, obviously you're not going to be having any professional uh liability insurances. However, if you you're contracting a company in, they need to have a hangar keeper's policy. Effectively, if you're not there, the aircraft's in their custody and control. So if anything happens, it is it is on them. In addition to the airport and airfield wanting them to have a airside liability for anything else that could potentially happen. Unfortunately, it's kind of the world that we live in today that these things need protecting for. And if they're not protected, you as the pilot aircraft owner, you're the one at risk.
SPEAKER_03Look, you co-founded uh Vertigo Aviation Detailing, and today you are the sole owner and and director of the company. And you are based in the south of England. But if someone calls you from, let's say, Midlands, would you go there to help them?
SPEAKER_04Yes, absolutely. We're a mobile company, uh, so we we normally travel to you. Sometimes the pricing needs to be adjusted to cater for longer trips, but we'll always be happy to have a discussion. It's always good to talk to other pilots and aircraft owners. We've also had aircraft fly to us, to some of our local uh airfields, which is Blackbush, and we even had a corporate jet fly all the way from Milan to meet us at Southampton a couple of weeks ago. They'd seen our social media page and they wanted us to perform the brightwork polishing. And it's just so completely overwhelming that someone's seen our skill set and wanted to come all that way for a service. It's brilliant.
SPEAKER_03Look, you've been extremely generous with your time and with your advice. And I think to some extent we are saying that everyone can do it and should try.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, any aircraft owner, any pilot should definitely be cleaning their own aircraft. Um, it's fun. You get to know your aircraft a bit more intimately as opposed to just flying it. And there's so much more to all of aviation than just the flying elements.
SPEAKER_03If there is only one piece of information that you'd like our listeners to take from today's conversation, what that would be?
SPEAKER_04Don't be afraid of doing it yourself. Just act carefully, maybe ask some other people for some techniques, give someone like myself a call, and um read the manuals and and look after your own aircraft.
SPEAKER_03And if someone wants to contact you, what's the best way to do it?
SPEAKER_04Yeah, if someone wants to make contact with us, all the details are available on our website, verticodetailing.co.uk, or um check out our Instagram page.
SPEAKER_03Very good. And I will also add those links on our show notes. Luke, thank you so much for your time. And uh we are going to stop recording now and let's discuss my first booking with you.
SPEAKER_04That's brilliant. No, it's been fantastic to be on the podcast and talking about what some may feel is a mundane task, but it's it's really enjoyable. So um it's been great to talk about it. Thanks.
Links and Resources
SPEAKER_01Thank you, Luke. That was so useful and informative. Well, this brings us to the end of the episode. I hope you've enjoyed it. You can find links to everything we mentioned over at the pilot's logbook podcast.com. Our next episode will be a Christmas special. We're gonna visit one of the most incredible Christmas experiences you can visit, which you can fly directly to. We would love to hear from you. If you'd like to reach out, send us some suggestions, or ask any questions, please use the send us a text option in your podcast app. You can find it in this episode's notes.
SPEAKER_03Also, I am a paste detector at Deadfield, so if you'll visit over the next two weeks, please let me know to have coffee and paste it on me.
SPEAKER_00Hi, Fernando. You and pastries. Alright, that's it from us. Until next time, happy flying.
