Method for Removal of Airfield Paint Markings and Aircraft Tire Rubber Build-up from Installed AM2 Mat Surfaces

Portable landing strips in the field have non-skid coated mats (AM-2) that must connect to one another and coated with reflective traffic paint in order to simulate an airport runway. Removal of the traffic paint must be done periodically for maintenance, as well as when moving these AM-2 mats from one location to another. The main difficulty in removing this reflective top-coat is in not harming the underlying non-skid coating necessary for the aircraft to land safely. Current technologies are slow and/or non-selective. TRI/Austin proposes the use of blasting Sponge-Jet media consisting of typical grit blast media encased in polyurethane foam coating to solve this problem. The media can be applied relatively dust free, and when combined with a vacuum system, create little to know extraneous particulate on the runway surface. TRI/Austin will develop application processes that allow for optimum removal of typical military reflective top coats from non-skid surfaces. Testing will be conducted on non-skid, painted non-skid, and various surface contaminated with typical fluids found in the field. We propose to analyze varying sponge media, test and optimize the physical properties and application properties to provide NAVAIR with a broadly applicable new technology for the maintenance of their AM-2 mats.