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View Full Version : Painting a boat ?????



WSJR1
07-06-2001, 03:35 PM
I have an 87' hydrostream vector. It is a tan hull with tan and brown stripes. I am intrested in repainting the boat before next season. Is there anyone that has done this before and can offer tips or a website on this knowledge? And what types of paints are being used ? thanks for the help!!

84exciter
07-06-2001, 05:03 PM
i rebuilt an 78 glasstron 2 summers ago.total rebuild,split hull and deck,new floor,transom,everything!painted the boat with acrylic urathane(sp?)as per reccomendations of local paint supplier.it came out great(added a product called "SUPER WET LOOK",IT STILL LOOKS LIKE YOUR AFRAID TO TOUCH IT AND LEAVE FINGERPRINTS!great stuff

Checkmate Mike
07-07-2001, 09:10 PM
I have an '87 Checkmate Exciter, and had it painted by a guy who specialized in painting Corvettes - ie. fibreglass. Polyurethane paint, lots of coats - awesome results. Did it only 2 years ago and it made a world of difference! Wasn't cheap though.

Michael Martin
07-21-2001, 09:04 AM
How much money do you want to invest.

Mine was painted using the cheap stuff - emeron
We actually sprayed about 1.5 gallons on the boat. We'd spray, then sand , then spray, then sand, by taking your time & being patient you can make the cheap stuff look really good.

Will it look good as long as the other paints?
That may be where the trade off is........

check out

http:\\www.sclakes.com\lbbu.html

This was part one of my rebuild of my vector.

Good luck

Mike

Raceman
07-21-2001, 02:24 PM
Wow, I never thought of Imron as being the cheap stuff. Even though its a little dated now, it's still hard to beat for a boat. I've got a 15 Allison that was painted with it almost 25 years ago and the paint underneath is still in excellent condition. Some boat builders have used it OEM in the past. My experience is that it's a lot more durable than the newer urethanes and base coat/clear coat products in marine applications. Actually there's very little similarity between the requirements of a Corvette and a boat except that the fiberglass used in both are distant cousins. First, no Corvette was ever gel coated at the factory. The early ones are made from pure glass and resin, pressed in male and female molds. These parts have a relatively smooth, identical finish back and front and are sanded on the outside with a redish primer that is very hard, much like today's catalized primers, but hard to duplicate previously. This was actually a lot better surface to paint on than the gel coat of a boat. Several people on this board have advocated another product called grip tite or something like that for marine applications, but I've never seen it used. I've never seen a problem with Imron except it's very hard to remove later. We clear Imroned several metalflake Vectors also that had severe sun damage and it mad them look new.

Michael Martin
07-21-2001, 11:27 PM
I didn't check I just assumed a base coat / clear coat job would been more expensive. I had Mike Agnew at Country Marine (www.countrymarine.com) spray the boat. I tried using Gel coat 1st & it didn't work out to good. I had never painted anything & it just didn't have any shine. The web article I had a link to is when I used the gel coat. I had Mike redo it over the winter - artic white & eletric blue. Looks pretty good to me. I'm working on getting the pictures togeather now for a part 2 section.

Mike

FCnLa
07-22-2001, 12:27 AM
Or something like that. Dupont's auto enamel, add a urethane harder and it works well. This has to be what you are refering to. I am with Raceman, Imron is definitely not cheap.

I've used AwlGrip on airplanes and it would stand up to 300mph dust and rain for a while. Held up in the sun well also.

I have Diztler's Durathane on mine. A competiter to Dupont's Imron and AwlGrip's AlumaGrip. I painted it over 6 years ago and never waxed it. It still looks like you dipped it in the paint.

But, the bottom, the paint just blew off. Even on the sides. I used the same proceedure for both the hull and the deck. The guy at the paint store said it was my fault, bla, bla, bla. I told him I did them the same and could not blow off the paint on the deck with a 2500psi preasure washer. He would do nothing.

So, now I will mail order AwlGrip. It flows out like glass. It also holds up well on planes and well out in the sun.

One final note, all three of these paints have two things in common:
1. There is a small window inwhich you can sand and buff, if you wait too long to buff, you might as well as spray it again, because it will become too hard.

2. This very dangerous stuff. The fumes WILL KILL YOU! You must have adequate protective gear or better yet, have a profesional do it for you.

Good Luck!

Bob T.
07-22-2001, 01:49 AM
Try a book called Runabout Renovation by Jim Anderson, McGraw-hill .1-800-262-4729.Lots of info on paints, application etc.