Shear Laziness

[Gdavid]

Last spring, I was running behind on my list of repairs and maintenance and tried a shortcut on my bottom paint prep. The short story is that I wiped it down with acetone and rolled a new coat on. Well, results are in and it held up just fine. Full details below but that is the condensed version.

I plan to pull my boat annually, shrinkwrap for storage, knock out at least one significant repair or upgrade and have the annual maintenance done by mid April for the opening of our fishing season. This has generally been the practice with my parents' boat, which I had the good fortune to use and I would try and have it launched prior to their return from working in Park City each winter.

So while this boat is still new to me and the first boat I have owned and kept in the water, I am not brand new to annual maintenance. In the fall of 2021, I pulled the boat relatively early with plans to get a jump on projects, namely replacement of thru hulls above the waterline (as recommended by purchase survey), installation of a bow pulpit with a new windlass and fiberglass repairs along the gunnel. The thru-hull project grew in scope and I ran past my optimistic launch goal. I had short hauled the boat in the summer (2021) for more urgent survey recommendations and bottom paint, so my ablative bottom paint was looking decent after being pressure washed at haul out, so I decided to wipe the surface with acetone to aid in adhesion and just roll on a single, fresh coat. The following pics are how it stood up after being hauled last week and pressure washed.

There are a few small barnacles to scrape, and I'll sand where they are but otherwise, I'm going to take the shortcut again (maybe put the saved time towards fixing my bootstripe).

 

[jagates10]

An inspiration to us all!

 

[O C Diver]

Last spring, I was running behind on my list of repairs and maintenance and tried a shortcut on my bottom paint prep. The short story is that I wiped it down with acetone and rolled a new coat on. Well, results are in and it held up just fine. Full details below but that is the condensed version.

There are a few small barnacles to scrape, and I'll sand where they are but otherwise, I'm going to take the shortcut again (maybe put the saved time towards fixing my bootstripe).

It will be interesting to see how many times that works. My charter boat had numerous coats of hard bottom paint. Scuff the bottom with a sander and roll on another coat.

Then the paint buildup started cracking and pieces fell off. When we painted and refaired the hull, we sand blasted the hull down to gelcoat, then barrier coated, and finally bottom painted.

Bottom line: layers of ablative paint don't have the same adhesive strength as gelcoat.

Ted

 

[psneeld]

With some ablative bottom paints and others, not even an acetone wipe is necessary, just a good pressure wash after haul out.

Dozens of boats.... both mine and commercial and never an issue...only like Ted said....where buildup gets too much (often between chine and boot stripe) it tends to flake off...but not the most recent layer.

 

[Gdavid]

It will be interesting to see how many times that works. My charter boat had numerous coats of hard bottom paint. Scuff the bottom with a sander and roll on another coat.

Then the paint buildup started cracking and pieces fell off. When we painted and refaired the hull, we sand blasted the hull down to gelcoat, then barrier coated, and finally bottom painted.

Bottom line: layers of ablative paint don't have the same adhesive strength as gelcoat.

Ted

I was curious how it would work this season, and while I'm not shocked, I'm pleasantly surprised just how well it worked. The fact that it has held up to 1.5 seasons and 2 rounds of pressure washing without flaking off in mass. I'm fully expecting to need to soda blast down to gel, barrier coat and start fresh at some point, but as long as it keeps hanging in there, I'll ride my luck.

The old paint really isn't built up very thick, I've replaced a couple of seacocks (ok, we all know that mainship doesn't use real seacocks). If I stick to a single layer each year, between the self-polishing and what is removed via pressure washing, it really isn't going to build up quickly.

 

[rslifkin]

If the paint is ablative, I wouldn't necessarily bother to paint every year (to avoid buildup). Just touch up any wear spots and if the rest still looks good, leave it alone. When enough of it is showing wear after power washing, then it's time for a new coat or 2 of paint.

 

[jleonard]

I used to thin my bottom paint with acetone to keep it from building up. It worked for me in Mystic, CT water.
I could do my Mainship 34 with less than a gallon.

 

[RT Firefly]

Greetings,
Mr. G. Work smarter, not harder.