Anyone have any experience? I realize I am OCD, but I have some paint chips falling off my Warthog stick despite the fact I am very careful not to wear rings or have dirt on my hands when handling.

Baring that, anyone know if someone has either made or an idea on how one might make a neoprene handle cover for the sticks? I own both a Cougar FSSB and a Warthog and use both depending on the situation (and even use the Cougar handle on the Warthog as well) but the paint chipping is irritating me to no end.

I'd send the Warthog in for warranty work but Its over two years old so I think it's out of warranty.

Aren't you spending your flight time looking at the screen rather than on your chipped-paint Warthog?

Sorry but if the paint is coming off, then I don't think any DIY techniques will "restore" it to looking new, in fact, it might not even blend well with the current paint and just look out of place even more!

Yes, but I'm weird about keeping mystuff nice looking.

I figured it wouldnt blend. But it need not if I paint the whole handle.

That being said, I'm looking into the neoprene route...there must be some way to form fit / sew one that would look nice.

If it were me, I'd completely disassemble and have it powder coated.

I actually had the same OCD, took apart the grip completely. Stripped, primed and spray painted with Rustoleum Professional series. It was glossy and due to the thickness of the spray (to make it durable), so it felt a little plastiky.

If/when I do it again, i'd go with powder coat...

Thread necromancy....

I found this old Cougar handle in my garage and would like to use it with my FSSB R3. Electronically, it's rock solid. But it's, as they say, well-used.

Any suggestions on what type paint to use? I'd probably have to strip and sand what's there, but I wouldn't want to affect the top of the stick where the labels are.

Do you really want to mess with that "well-used" look?

Either way, please post what you end up doing with that stick!

I had forgotten this about the Cougar, but after dismantling it, I can see that in order to get all the switches out, I'd have to desolder or cut (and later on splice) the hat switch wires. Uggggh.... I'm not sure about this. I've never been great at solder splices. I tended to rely on scotch-locks, and I don't think there's enough room inside that stick handle for that many of them.

So if I'm going to do this, it means either doing that work, or trying to strip/sand and repaint while the switches are still installed.

The most durable finish would be to have the parts powdercoated, which you can probably get done for less than the cost of proper supplies would be if you can piggyback your parts with others being done the same color at a shop and black is pretty easy.

If you can shoot real paints then a proper etching primer followed by a Polyerethane (professional car/boat/aircraft paint) topcoat would be best, which luckily these days are available in rattlecan form (you bash on the ground to release the catalyst and shake it up and have an hour to use it all) which cost ~$25 if you don't have real spray gear though keep in mind the fumes from polyester paint are deadly. Short of that and slightly less toxic would be using some kind of catalyzed polyester, though that is not available in disposable can form though a Preval disposable sprayer can be used if you reduce the paint enough.

If you just paint it with regular hardware store primer/rattlecan it will wear off pretty quickly though, zinc and paint are not very good of friends so it takes extreme measures when something is constantly exposed to oily acids, heat and moisture.