So one of the people from the Lab who was with me asked how often you have to
depaint a composite airplane.
Tom Sapien, Aircraft Paint/PMB supervisor, explained that "the
depaint process is crucial to the fleet because it's our job to identify corrosion on aircraft and arrest it before the aircraft is repainted and reinducted into the fleet." However, this step can he a challenge due to the amount of paint on the aircraft when they arrive at the depot.
Given that about 10,000 commercial airliners are flying today, the world's airlines are spending hundreds of millions of dollars a year to
depaint and repaint their airplanes.
In fact, the system was originally developed to safely clean and
depaint the Statue of Liberty.
Two of the Petrarchan sonnets which Wyatt chooses to translate occupy most of their length simply listing ways to spot an innamorato: If in my visage each thought
depainted, Or else in my sparkling voice lower or higher Which now fear, now shame, woefully doth tire, If a pale colour which love hath stained [...] Wyatt 13.5-8 (12)