Painting a boat

S

sprayerman

Been doing a bit of research on the forum here and on other sites, spoke to a few tech guys at various paint suppliers, and would like to get your guys' thoughts on things please.

I've got an older bass boat that has oxidized beyond the cut n' buff stage. This last cut n' buff I burned through a little flake that went from blue to silver. Not real annoying to me since it's an old boat, but I have the carpet out and am redoing it and am also in the process of repairing the vinyl seats and spraying them with a vinyl paint.

I read about guys here giving the gel coat a 320 scratch and then clearing. I have a dark black stripe down the side that I'd like to do a little patch work on, mask n' spray black and replace the decals on her. I also thought of maybe shooting an oriental blue candy over the entire job (top cap only not touching anything below the rub rail) to even everything out, but candy and 320 isn't going to jive well. My better judgement is saying to scratch 320, lay down some 2100 clear first, scuff her, and then do the paint work, and shoot a final clear so I get the best tooth I can get away with. Am I trying to shoot the moon here? Or should I just clear the darn boat and be happy I have some new clear to preserve things?

 
I think your plan to clear first would work great. You might decide you can live with it afterwords, but if not, you have a good base to do whatever you want over.
 
I probably did it wrong but I posted on this- if I remember correctly I sanded with something like 800 then painted the candy and cleared - then I find out that I should have used 320 - funny thing is it was 5 years ago and no delamination problem and the boat sits outside - maybe got lucky
 
Painted a boat similar couple years ago. Stripped to aluminum, put SPI epoxy on it. Then basecoat, sprayed metalflake stripes, then cleared it. Flake stripes had left an edge so it had to be sanded down then recleared again where stripes were. Good thing I had a breaking line so I didn't have to reclear entire boat.
 
I think your plan to clear first would work great. You might decide you can live with it afterwords, but if not, you have a good base to do whatever you want over.

I think this may be the way to go for piece of mind. After the first clear session what would you recommend for a candy? 600 let off gas for a day then shoot?

I probably did it wrong but I posted on this- if I remember correctly I sanded with something like 800 then painted the candy and cleared - then I find out that I should have used 320 - funny thing is it was 5 years ago and no delamination problem and the boat sits outside - maybe got lucky

That's awesome. Post some pics if you can.

Painted a boat similar couple years ago. Stripped to aluminum, put SPI epoxy on it. Then basecoat, sprayed metalflake stripes, then cleared it. Flake stripes had left an edge so it had to be sanded down then recleared again where stripes were. Good thing I had a breaking line so I didn't have to reclear entire boat.

My first thought was to just mix up a nice dark grey SPI epoxy, clear it, and Line X the inside bottom ha.. unfortunately
the hull is a bear to get to unless I fabricate a support/lift. And then that means I need to shoot the trailer. I've got some fish to pull on!
 
Yep, to paint the bottom you're prob looking at pulling the motor, flipping the boat on the ground using a tall a-frame hoist etc...
I would clear from the chine up and go fishing. Experience talking here...
 
I was gonna just go from the rub rail up.. I may have to do from the chine up haha hmm...

Spoke to a tech at House of Kolor today. Nice guy. He said for the ultimate adhesion to scratch 400, shoot clear, scuff, paint, clear, and clear again.

To save on time he said I could scuff w/400, shoot a coat of sg150 that I have on hand (flake carrier as a midcoat), see how things look and then proceed with my black striping, then mix kandy concentrate 8:1 with sg150, shoot a few coats to desired effect, clear, scuff, then clear.

What are your guys' thoughts? Sg150 midcoat over gel coat feels like I may be pushing my luck a bit.
 
Spoke to a tech at House of Kolor today. Nice guy. He said for the ultimate adhesion to scratch 400, shoot clear, scuff, paint, clear, and clear again.

I see no problem with using the SG150 in this application, and his above advice is the most important advice he gave you.
With gel coat, you get nothing other than mechanical adhesion, thus the 400 grit recommendation. Using a finer grit begins to compromise adhesion of the epoxy primer, and using a more course grit would leave visual scratches.
Be sure to not miss ANY small spot you intend to prime and paint. Any part of the gel coat that is left shiny is going to peel later on.

I started my body repair career in a shop that also had a sub-shop of doing boat repair. I cut my teeth on boats first, and my first and worst recollection of my first day on the job was to be put inside the closed deck of a boat and having to use a two-handed grinder to prep a 4 ft x 4 ft area for fiberglass lay up. Anyone who has ever stood in a cloud of fiberglass dust knows the hell I experienced until I could get into a shower and scrub myself down with lots of hot water and a pair of pantyhose.
That said, I found my time in the boat shop to be and invaluable experience once I was transferred over to the body shop side to work on Corvettes.
 
Sprayerman, I just saw the pic in your first post. Cool old boats I outfitted many of those when new in the 70's.

Lux, I shower with scotchbrite now after grinding glass! Honest :)
 
Well finally got past some honey do's and got some good weather to clear in. Did some fiber glass flake repair, masked off the black striping and reshot it, and then shot two coats with a 30 min break between coats on the cap down to the chine then shot the trailer. The 2100 layed out pretty nice with the small gun I had to use.

Few questions.

Would you guys do another clear session (two coats) for added protection or just cut and buff in a week or so?

I have mixed feelings there are a few curtains below the cap that should cut n buff but would probably look better sanded and recleared.

Appreciate any input you guys can offer!
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Can't have too much clear over flake, don't want to look back and wish you'd put more...

Btw... That looks like a new boat! Good job.
 
Ah there wasn't too much flake repair luckily! Thanks tho the old flake really pops now.

Up in the air on hitting it now VS waiting a week or two and letting it really harden to get at the few runs there are then shoot a couple more coats.
 
To paint a bottom part of boat you can use boat trailer. Using Boat trailer you can easily clean boat and do paint. Painting boat on boat trailer won't harm your boat even it protects the Hull. Before doing paint firstly clean the bottom part of your boat then apply primer. Using fine-grit sandpaper make surface even then do painting task. This will give your boat an accurate finishing and an amazing look.
 
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