Decks Painted

This was one of those projects we wished we'd done years ago when we first got our boat.

Spent Saturday washing, scrubbing, and stripping any wax and oil residue, and today painting the decks (both the flybridge and main level). Old paint was was beige, and really worn:



We decided to switch the color up, and went with "Battleship Gray". In preparation work, I remembered reading an old post here about paint, and following a suggestion on that thread we went with Rustoleum Topsides. It seemed to work just fine, and at $13/qt I think it was great!. We didn't add any anti-slip additives, as we felt the texture on the existing decks was still aggressive enough.

It worked out great as a two-person job. I taped and removed the tape while my wife painted. With the detail work such as radius curves and other deck attachments, I was never able to get too far ahead of her.





7 hours of painting, 5 quarts of paint, three rollers, two roller trays, and three bags of garbage later, and we think the boat looks great. It's a bold color, but I think with the wood trim, the white paint, the blue canvas the grey fits the color scheme well.

Looks great! It's on my to do list, but I'm nervous about making the curves with the tape. Did you cut it out to make the curve?

Looks good...I think a color like that would get too hot down here on the gulf coast.

I'm still stripping and sanding.....sigh.

Looks good!

No sanding, priming or other prep?
Would love to see an update a year from now on how this has worked out after some use and exposure. Thanks!

clynn said:

Did you cut it out to make the curve?

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I did.. thankfully a 50-cent piece was the correct diameter. I Just held it down with my thumb and cut around it with a razor blade.

caltexflanc said:

No sanding, priming or other prep?
Would love to see an update a year from now on how this has worked out after some use and exposure.

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No sanding, I didn't want to knock down the anti-skid texture.

No primer.

I did a complete washdown with boat soap, followed by a second washdown with simple green to degrease the day before. Then, the day of painting, we wiped down with mineral spirits before laying the tape down.

I'm curious to know how well it holds up as well.... From the Amazon reviews, it seems to be very resistant to application errors.

Here's the TDS (yes, I read it), and their suggested surface preparation is exactly what I did:
http://www.rustoleumibg.com/images/tds/CBG_TDS%20Marine%20Paint%201207.pdf

Hey Star your boat looks nice. DW and I walked the docks this morning and yours is nice, at least from the dock....10' rule works great.

For anyone contemplating this, I suggest you do it. I won't hesitate to do it again, and in fact, I plan to go back down in the next few weeks and paint some of the white sections. It's just a few hours of labor if it needs to be re-done.

I think we tend to overthink this; I know I did. In the end it's just paint.

We painted our gunnels with the Rustolem paint 3 yrs ago. We loved the look. The first year it worked great. Year 2, lots of cracks and flaking. We are now looking to wire brush it all off and put on Kiwi Grip.

We did the prep with soap, degreaser and some wire brushing before application. We applied primer before top coat. We did not want to knock down the non-skid from the original gelcoat.

mattkab,
I like the grey. And I like the contrast to the white. I saw a boat at the marina today w a stripe about 8" wide the full length of the hull of about a 38' boat. it was the same shade as your deck and it looked great. Seen some NT's and AT's w grey hulls (a bit lighter (at least the NT)) and they looked great too. Grey is'nt a very yachty color but used tastefully it has class.
I just put deck paint on our cabin top and used white to reflect the suns heat. At one time our Willard had so much grey on her she was named Grey Whale. I think all 30' Willards had grey trim when new.

This is on my to-do list as well, like it has been for three years. I keep re-thinking the process, but the truth is, no amount of thinking is gonna replace the work that needs to be done. I hope you have great results and we all hear about it. Now excuse me while I go re-think the previous re-thinking about painting my deck.

My MWB had so many shades of gray I was about to name it after a certain recent movie based on a racy novel. I like the look on your boat!

mattkab said:

For anyone contemplating this, I suggest you do it. I won't hesitate to do it again, and in fact, I plan to go back down in the next few weeks and paint some of the white sections. It's just a few hours of labor if it needs to be re-done.

I think we tend to overthink this; I know I did. In the end it's just paint.

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I'm definitely guilty of overthinking the whole thing!

folivier said:

Hey Star your boat looks nice. DW and I walked the docks this morning and yours is nice, at least from the dock....10' rule works great.

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Haha thanks....when you get up close its a whole other story!
We just moved it this weekend to the slip it's in now. We're hoping the tree will provide a bit of shade and keep it from getting quite so hot.