Bottom paint in FL

How often do you bottom paint if your boat is kept in Florida salt water?

I'm getting some differences of opinion and curious as to what the norm is. I know a lot depends on condition of the paint and how it wears, but looking for some averages.

Thanks

I don't live in Florida so I won't corrupt your poll but my bottom painting schedule is to wait until my diver starts complaining that the paint is in "poor" condition or is not working. I've painted twice in the eight years I've owned the boat. I use two coats of the highest quality paint I can buy.

Two to three years. We use a hard modified, Trinidad. We clean the bottom regularly and an ablative wouldn't stand up to the regular cleaning.

Larry M said:

Two to three years. We use a hard modified, Trinidad. We clean the bottom regularly and an ablative wouldn't stand up to the regular cleaning.

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We're in South Florida so most frequent. However, we are diligent about bottom cleaning every 3 to 4 weeks depending on season, and never any scraping involved. We use hard paint. We figured we'd paint every two years but we've been able to go three years consistently and not really bad in that length of time. Now, we do have one advantage and that is we inherited no bad practices with new boats.

Poll is closed...after one vote...lol

on the gulf coast nothing worked well except a regular diver service

InterLux and others representatives will be at the Miami Boat show. Go pick their brains. They are very helpful

We used Petit Trinidad, had a diver scrape the hull once a month, and got about three years out of a paint job.

It was pretty bad for growth. Our slip was on the ICW in Sunny Isles.

Where we are now, the Mississippi gulf coast, isn't nearly as bad.

BandB said:

We're in South Florida so most frequent. However, we are diligent about bottom cleaning every 3 to 4 weeks depending on season, and never any scraping involved. We use hard paint. We figured we'd paint every two years but we've been able to go three years consistently and not really bad in that length of time. Now, we do have one advantage and that is we inherited no bad practices with new boats.

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BandB,

Thx, that good info. I clean the bottom every 2.5 to 3 weeks except now when nothing is growing, and the paint s still very good.

I was considering it because I'm hauling it to put in some transducers and the last time it was painted was about a year and a half to two years ago. And just thinking of saving the haul charges.

Think I'll do the transducers by themselves and perhaps bottom paint somewhere along the loop when I want some time off.

I’m in the PNW so no comparison. I went 8 years on Trinidad pro. Unfortunately that paint is no longer available. Does give you a reference between Florida growth and Washington growth.

Switching to hard next time around. Have 1.5 years on the current ablative, but it's wearing badly with scrubbing. Now docked in a mostly fresh water river marina, so expect the paint to last longer.

Ted

BandB said:

We're in South Florida so most frequent. However, we are diligent about bottom cleaning every 3 to 4 weeks depending on season, and never any scraping involved. We use hard paint. We figured we'd paint every two years but we've been able to go three years consistently and not really bad in that length of time. Now, we do have one advantage and that is we inherited no bad practices with new boats.

Click to expand...

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