What it costs
How much does aircraft paint correction cost?
Paint correction is quoted against the hours of safe machine time an airframe actually needs, and that is decided before anyone touches it — by how much surface there is, how deep the defects go, and how much clear coat is left to spend. Two same-model jets on the same ramp at PDK can be a full crew-day apart. So the useful question is not what correction costs, it is what makes yours expensive. Most of that you can work out from your own paint, before you ask anybody for a quote.
Why there is no number on this page
There is no published number because a published number is a guess dressed as a fact. Correction is subtractive: it removes a controlled amount of clear coat, and how much is available differs by aircraft, by repaint history, and by panel. A figure set before anyone has seen your paint is either wrong for most aircraft or it becomes a ceiling — the crew stops when the money stops rather than when the finish is uniform, and you pay for a partial correction twice. A vendor who quotes over the phone is telling you they will choose the process later. We choose it first, on a corrected test section, and quote against what the paint actually shows.
What actually moves the number
Surface area sets the floor; geometry is the multiplier
A wing is fast. Almost nothing else is. Nacelles, wing root fairings, winglets, tail surfaces and the curve where the fuselage rolls under have to be worked in small sections with a hand-guided machine, and none of them takes a long straight pass. Dimensions on a spec sheet tell you little: two airframes of similar size can sit a crew-day apart on geometry alone. Count the compound curves on yours, not the wingspan.
How deep the defects actually sit
Swirl marks from careless washing usually live in the top of the clear coat and come out in a single refining pass. Oxidation, exhaust etching aft of the nacelles and water spotting baked on through a Georgia summer sit deeper. Deeper means compounding, then refining, then finishing — three passes over every surface instead of one. The defect you can catch with a fingernail is a different job from the one that only shows in direct sun.
The paint system, and how much of it is left
Base-coat and clear-coat schemes give you a clear layer to work inside. Single-stage paint, common on older turboprops and pistons, has no clear at all — pigment transfers to the pad, and color on the pad is where aggression stops. Aircraft schemes are kept as thin as the specification allows, because paint is weight and weight is payload. Repaint history, blended panels and earlier corrections all reduce what remains, so we gauge before committing. A gauge that reads on aluminium will not read on a composite fairing; those panels need a different instrument, which is one more reason the figures are measured rather than assumed.
How many stages the test section says you need
We correct a test section somewhere honest — upper fuselage, or an aft panel in the exhaust track — and read it under lights before anything else is decided. That section fixes the number of stages, the pad and the abrasive, and therefore the hours. It is the one piece of information a correction quote should be built on. If nobody did it, the number in front of you was assumed rather than measured, and a thin reading should change the plan rather than the invoice.
Where the aircraft stands while the work happens
Hangar or open ramp is not a comfort question. Correction wants controlled light, stable panel temperature and no wind carrying grit onto a surface you have just opened up. Paint hot enough to flash the polish will not finish properly, and an open ramp in a Georgia July is hot. Then add power, lighting, stands tall enough to reach a T-tail safely and clearance to work around a winglet. Hangar space is tight at a field like PDK, the second-busiest general aviation airport in the United States, so tell us early what you can hold and for how long.
Your deadline
A compressed window does not reduce the work. It changes how many people do it and when. A large-cabin airframe wanted back for a Friday departure means more crew, overlapping shifts and often night work in the hangar, because the panels have to be finished in sequence and none can be left half-corrected. That premium is legitimate and it should be quoted openly, before the work starts. A rush charge that appears on the invoice without having appeared on the quote is not.
What the last vendor left behind
This is the one owners underestimate. Rotary work in unpractised hands leaves holograms — fine buffer trails visible only in direct sun — which someone then hides under a glaze that washes out a few weeks later. Polish residue dries white in rivet lines, panel seams and around static wicks and comes out by hand. And a single aggressive ungauged pass can leave the clear too thin to correct again. Undoing that work is slower than beginning with honest neglect.
Whether the correction is protected afterwards
Corrected paint is bare and freshly opened. Left unprotected it oxidizes again, and on a high-cycle aircraft parked outside that happens faster than most owners expect. Sealant or a ceramic coating is a separate scope, but it belongs in the same conversation, because a second correction spends clear coat that protecting the first one would have saved. It also drives the sequence: coating goes down on a corrected, panel-wiped surface, in the hangar, before the aircraft flies again.
What the work actually consists of
Correction starts with a wash and full decontamination — chemical fallout removal, then mechanical — because polishing over bonded contamination drags it across the paint. Then masking: brightwork, decals, transparencies, seals, vents and static wicks, all of which polish stains or damages, and the radome, whose coating is specified for radar transmission and is not a polishing surface. Then gauging, then a corrected test section read under lights, and only then is the process fixed. From there it runs panel by panel: compound where the reading demands it, refine, then finish to clear the haze the previous step leaves. It is measured in crew-days, a team working sections in sequence on stands so no panel is left half-corrected overnight. It ends with a panel wipe, inspection under different light, and protection if that is in scope.
Questions to put to any vendor
Including us. If a vendor cannot answer these plainly, that tells you more than the number at the bottom of their quote.
- Will you correct a test section and show me the result before you quote a process? It is the only way to know how many stages the paint needs, and stages are the labour. Without one, the process is the vendor's assumption rather than your aircraft's condition.
- Will you measure film thickness, and at what reading do you stop? Correction spends material that never comes back. A vendor with no threshold at which they refuse to go further is not managing that risk, they are hoping.
- How many stages am I paying for, and what happens if the paint needs another? Hold both quotes side by side and count stages. You want to know now whether a further compounding pass is included, quoted as a written variation, or quietly dropped so the finish comes back uneven.
- What gets masked, what gets left alone, and who does the masking? Brightwork, decals, transparencies, seals, vents and static wicks all suffer from polish, and the radome is not a polishing surface at all. Masking takes real time, which is exactly why a thin quote skips it.
- Rotary, dual-action or both — and who is actually on the stand? Rotary in skilled hands is fast and safe; in unskilled hands it is where holograms and burn-through come from. Ask who does the work, not who wrote the quote.
- Does this assume hangar access, and what changes if I cannot get it? Wind, grit, direct sun and hot panels all degrade a correction. A quote built on hangar time but performed on an open ramp is a different job carrying the same number.
- What is your aviation liability limit, and will you send a COI to my FBO? Stands, lifts and machines move around winglets, probes and antennas. If the certificate does not meet the limit your FBO accepts, the work simply does not happen.
Questions we get
- Why will nobody quote aircraft paint correction over the phone?
- Because the process cannot be chosen until the paint has been read. Film thickness, defect depth, paint system and repaint history all change the number of stages, and stages are the labour. On the phone we can tell you what we would look at and roughly how long it takes. The number follows the test section.
- Why are two quotes for the same aircraft so far apart?
- Because they are rarely for the same work. One may be a single machine pass over the upper surfaces. The other is a gauged, multi-stage correction of the whole airframe, with masking, a test section and protection in sequence. Ask each vendor how many stages, what is masked, whether film thickness is measured and how many crew-days are planned. Written as scopes rather than totals, the gap usually explains itself.
- How many times can an aircraft be corrected?
- A finite number, and nobody can tell you exactly how many. Every correction removes clear coat, and once it is gone the repair is a repaint of the panel rather than a polish. That is the argument for correcting deliberately, protecting afterwards, and washing properly in between so you need it less often.
- Will correction fix chips, scratches through the clear, or corrosion?
- No. Polishing is subtractive — it levels the surface around a defect, it does not put material back. Chips, scratches through the clear coat and filiform corrosion need a paint shop. We will say so and refer you rather than disguise them under a glaze that washes out.
- My scheme is dark and shows everything. Does that take longer?
- Usually yes. Dark, metallic and high-contrast schemes show every swirl and every hologram, so they need a careful multi-stage process and a finishing pass a white airframe can sometimes do without. They are also the schemes where the difference is most obvious once the work is done.
- Is correction worth doing before a sale or pre-buy?
- Usually, and it is the one time the difference is easiest to see. Gloss and uniformity are the first thing a buyer reads as care. Belly, gear and exhaust tracking are the second. Neglect in either place invites questions about maintenance that have nothing to do with paint.
- Can you correct only part of the aircraft?
- Yes, and sometimes that is the sensible scope — a sun-faded upper fuselage, exhaust tracking aft of the nacelles, or the leading-edge area everyone sees on the walk-up. Be aware that a corrected panel beside an uncorrected one shows the difference plainly once the aircraft is in the sun.
Send us the tail number, the airport, the aircraft type and the date you need it back. Photographs in direct sun help more than anything else, because that is where swirls and holograms show. We will tell you what we want to gauge, when we can be there, and what the test section decides, in writing. PDK, RYY, ATL and FTY are routine; we work across Georgia.
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Tail, airport, aircraft type and your deadline. That is enough for a written quote against a written scope.
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