Bespoke colors and expert technical advice from AkzoNobel Aerospace Coatings have played a key role in bringing a 10th anniversary livery to life for Volotea, the airline of Europe’s medium-sized cities.
The airline, which commenced operations in April 2022, was looking for a partner to help deliver a striking, one-off livery to celebrate a decade in business and to mark the beginning of a new chapter in the company’s history. The livery uses a metallic color scheme as a symbol to reflect the next 10 years of the business.
Color technicians from AkzoNobel worked closely with Volotea’s engineering and branding department and the paint team at MAAS Aviation to create three special effect colors and two solid colors that form the basis of the design.
The color gradient was achieved using five colors. Volotea Red, Tabasco Red, a Satin Beige and two further metallic colors were created with reference to AkzoNobel’s Inspirational Color Elements card and delivered from start to finish within eight weeks. The design has been applied to one of Volotea’s A320 aircraft and features the name of one of the airline’s co-founders beneath the cockpit, Lazaro Ros.
AkzoNobel is also delivering ‘business as usual’ coatings for Volotea as part of the entry into service repaint program for their newly introduced A320s. The coating system it uses is Airbus approved, and includes its Primer LV2114 and its Aerobase three-component base coat/clear coat system to provide uniform coverage and appearance in one coat application for most of the colors.
For Volotea, Aerobase is being used with the specified polyurethane clear topcoat, Aviox Clearcoat UVR, to provide a durable long lasting, protective and decorative finish that exceeds typical OEM requirements for exterior aircraft performance.
Jordi Mercadé, Akzo Nobel Aerospace Coatings, says: “We are proud to have played our part is helping Volotea celebrate its 10th Anniversary with such a striking livery. It was a challenge to meet the deadline, especially in creating new colors from scratch, but the results speak for themselves. We look forward to continuing our partnership for many years to come.”
Marc Noguera, Reliability Manager at Volotea, says he is delighted to have chosen AkzoNobel for such an important project: “We trust the finish and durability of their paint products, which are already proven in our fleet, and we are grateful for their support which has been crucial on making it happen in a very short time, from delivery of the aircraft to its entry into service.”
In addition to the one-off livery, 33 Volotea aircraft have already been protected and enhanced using AkzoNobel coatings across the fleet of A319 and A320 aircraft.
Featured image credited to Volotea
