Bottom Paint

[oumills]

Hello from the new guy.

Assuming all goes well, this time tomorrow I should be the new owner of an 02 SD. I'm set to close tomorrow a.m.

My question pertains to the amount of time a boat can sit in fresh water before it warrants bottom paint? I would like to have it in a slip from June to August. Can I do this w/o having a bottom job?

I'm not new to boating, but am new to having a boat off the trailer for an extended period of time.

Any input would be appreciated.

 

[First Born]

Welcome to CSR and good luck on your SD purchase. I can't really help you with your question but you will find there are alot of great people here who can. Again good luck and welcome to CSR!!! :thumbsup:

Wesley

 

[STIHLBOLTS]

If you leave a boat in fresh water that long you are at the very least going to have a serious scum line. Slim and bottom growth are also a potential problem. It's not be a bad idea to pull the boat at least every couple of weeks and hose and brush off the bottom and relaunch. :grin:

As a Sundeck owner it is a obligation to maintain the highest standards of shininess. :thumbsup:

 

[slack250]

Bottom paint is a must... With only 2 weeks in the water my 250 Dancer's outdrive was covered in gook!

In this month's edition of Powerboat Reports they tested 66 different bottom paints. Interesting reading. If you don't have a subscription to this mag, I'd recommend it. It's a pretty good read and they test marine products and services well. :thumbsup:

Bottom Paint Bonanza
Longtime favorite Interlux Micron Optima and Sea Hawk’s new Biocop TF performed best after six months in a test of 66 paints. In our long-term test (18 months), Interlux coatings come out strong.

If you haven’t picked up bottom paint yet, there still may be time to order some old stock at last year’s prices, but as of early January, when we checked prices for this article, we saw 10- to 15-percent price hikes over 2006.

This month we have two reports to help make sure your money is well spent: This update on our Group B panels after six months in the water, and on pages 8 and 9 we give you a run down of the best and worst Group A paints after 18 months. Next month we’ll look at the results of our freshwater test after six months in Lake Erie. For those looking for single-season coverage, the six-month report will be the most up-to-date guide. Boat owners seeking multi-season protection will want to

Bottom-paint panels in Florida were pulled in December for inspection after six months in a saltwater canal. Before rating the 66 paints, a tester sluices the panels with buckets of sea water.

cross-reference the six-month report with the 18-month report.

The Six Month Report

Today’s anti-fouling paints may be more effective than ever at keeping the bottom of your boat free of marine growth or very close to it but the ever-increasing number of coatings on the market hasn’t made it any easier when it comes time to choose a paint. Last June we dropped a Powerboat Reports record 66 paints in the water in two locations, a dock on Long Island Sound in Connecticut, and another dock in a canal in Tavernier, Fla. Of those 66, 11 are new brand names.

Three trends in the bottom-paint market continue to gain momentum: the use of anti-slime additives, the increasing number of paints available in bright or white colors, and finally, a hunt for an environmentally friendly paint that can match copper paints. This year nearly half of the Group B paints contain a slime-fighting agent. On the white-and-bright colors front, Interlux began marketing two more paints (Micron Extra and Micron CSC) as "Bright Colored Antifoulings," a category where Pettit has seen much success with its Vivid line. Meanwhile, perennial contender Sea Hawk has two new copper-free paints.

The no-copper hunt is driven by more than just good intentions. The rising cost of copper has led to a roughly 10-percent increase overall in pricing from January 2006 to January 2007. Prices of hard paints, which use more copper than ablative/copolymer types, have increased by 13 percent.

So which paints did well after six months? As of December, two high-end paints Interlux Micron Optima and Sea Hawk’s new Biocop TF performed best overall. Best Buy honors went to Pettit Premium for an ablative paint and MarPro SuperKote for a hard coating. Flexdel Aquagard came out as the top water-based paint. But as you see in our 18-month report, fortunes change. We’ll see how these winners hold out after 6 more months in the drink.

How We’re Testing

Testers begin with brand-new polyester/fiberglass panels, wash them with a de-waxing solvent, sand them lightly with fine-grit sandpaper, and wash them again with solvent to remove any wax or mold-release agent. We then apply the bottom paints, following the instructions supplied with each paint. Label instructions for drying time and number of coats required are followed. Each panel is identified by a series of holes drilled in a simple binary code. The holes withstand the attack of marine growth better than any other marker system. The system also keeps us impartial, because we don’t refer to the codes until after we’ve evaluated the panels.

All paints were tested in two locales. One set was dropped into a saltwater canal in the Florida Keys, the other tied to the docks at a boatyard in eastern Long Island Sound (Groton, Conn.). The panels went in the drink in June and were retrieved and rated in December.

Before assigning ratings, testers sluiced the panels with buckets of sea water. An Excellent rating means the paint has allowed virtually no growth hard or soft. Good ratings are relative to the field. Good ratings go to those paints with a minimum of soft growth, and coatings with Fair ratings have allowed soft growth. Poor ratings are given to panels with hard growth, or completely obscured with heavy amounts of softer growth that would have to be scraped off.

Once we have the ratings on paper, editors identify overall winners, as well as the top paints in the various categories, such as ablative, hard, one-season, multi-season, environmentally friendly, and water-based paints. Most of the recommended paints scored Good in both locations or a combination of Excellent and Fair. If some similar paints scored equally in both locales, we gave the nod to the lower-priced product.

Unusual circumstances made it tough to come to definitive conclusions regarding 10 paints on our Connecticut panels. The fiberglass paint panels in both locations are securely affixed to their respective docks. But sometimes Mother Nature has her way. A strong coastal storm that hit Long Island Sound in late fall appeared to have slung one of the panels so that it was lightly scrubbed clean by the back of another panel. Though we do not expect this to affect future updates, we decided not to rate these paints in the Connecticut test. For overall scoring of these paints, we used only the Florida results.

A note about prices: Our editors scoured the web to find the lowest prices for each paint. However, we’ve seen some big price changes in recent weeks, so we encourage readers to double-check pricing before buying.

A Rookie Season

Eight of the 66 paints submerged for the 2006 bottom paint test are new coatings. Two of those Sea Hawk Mission Bay CF (copper free) and Sea Hawk Mission Bay CSF are environmentally friendly ablative/copolymer paints that do not contain copper. Sea Hawk’s Mission Bay CSF earned an Excellent rating in Florida.

Four of the new paints fall in the ablative/copolymer category. Three of those Interlux Epoxycop Ablative, Blue Water Copper Shield 45 Uno, and Pettit Alumacoat SR mustered only Fair ratings. The fourth, Sea Hawk Biocop TF, a multi-season copolymer paint, scored an Excellent in Connecticut and a Good in Florida.

The other two new paints are MarPro SuperKote Gold and Blue Water Coppershield 45 Hard. Both paints earned Good ratings in Florida and Fair in Connecticut. The Coppershield 45 Hard is also sold as MarPro SuperKote Hard, which came out strong in our test, earning Good ratings in both Connecticut and Florida.

Only two other hard paints Pettit Super Premium and Interlux VC 17m Extra earned Goods in both locales.

In addition, we have two paints new to this test that are re-branded versions of previously tested paints MarPro Super B-Ablative (Blue Water Coppershield 45) and West Marine FW-21 (Pettit SR-21).

North vs. South

Comparing our six months’ results in 2005 to those in 2006, it appears that the Florida site was more fertile in 2006, while Connecticut was less. There were fewer Excellent scores in Florida compared to 2005 (March 2006 issue), when Florida notched five top marks. In Connecticut, none of the paints scored Excellent in 2005, but this year, four ablative/copolymer coatings (Interlux Super Ablative, Pettit Premium, Sea Hawk Biocop TF, and Sea Hawk Mission Bay CF) received our highest ratings. Two paints have consistently performed well at the six-month mark in Florida: Interlux Micron Optima and Flexdel Aquagard, both water-based coatings that received the top scores in Florida in the 2005 and 2006 tests. In Connecticut, Sea Hawk Monterey, West Marine CPP, and four Interlux paints Regatta Baltoplate, Bottomkote Aqua, Micron 66, and Micron Optima were consistently Good at the six-month mark in 2005 and 2006.

One surprise in Florida this time was the "thin-film" Interlux VC 17m Extra, which was still holding off hard growth. In 2005, Interlux’s VC 17m and VC 17m Extra and Pettit’s SR-21 all allowed hard growth and were given Poor scores. All three are touted as low-fouling or fresh water, so they never really had a shot...or so we thought.

Conclusions

Top honors go to two paints that earned a combination of Excellent and Good ratings in our two locations. Micron Optima scored an Excellent in Florida and a Good in Connecticut, while Sea Hawk’s new paint, Biocop TF, racked up an Excellent in Connecticut and a Good in Florida.

We have two Best Buy winners in the ablative category: Sea Bowld Ablative 56 (a multi-season paint sold at Boater’s World for $90) scored Goods in both Connecticut and Florida, and Pettit Premium SSA, which earned a Fair in Florida but an Excellent in Connecticut. We found Premium, which is also a multi-season coating, for $70 at www.boatersland.com.

For a single-season hard paint, MarPro SuperKote Hard ($80 through Donovan Marine) garners the Best Buy award.

The other recommended paints (see chart) either scored a combination of Fair and Excellent or Good ratings in both locations.

For a water-based paint, Flexdel’s Aquagard and Pettit Hydrocoat are good choices. Both performed well and can be had for about $100 per gallon. Blue Water’s Kolor and Sea Hawk Monterey did well, too, but are more expensive. If you’re looking for a paint in a bright color, go with either Blue Water’s Kolor for a multiple season ablative, or Pettit Vivid for a multi-season hard paint.

For a copper-free coating, consider Sea Hawk’s new Mission Bay CSF, which was the only environmentally friendly coating to capture an Excellent rating, which came in Connecticut.

Blue Water (MarPro) Paints, 800/628-8422,
bluewatermarinepaint.com

E Paint Co., 800/258-5998,
epaint.net

Flexdel Corp., 888/353-9335,
aquagard-boatpaint.com

Interlux Yacht Finishes, 800/468-7589,
yachtpaint.com

Pettit, 800/221-4466,
pettitpaint.com

New Nautical Coatings, 800/528-0997,
seahawkpaints.com

West Marine, 800/BOATING,
westmarine.com

Boater’s World, 800/826-BOAT,
boatersworld.com

 

[fwebster]

That is a lot of good information.......but how much of it is applicable to a freshwater situation? Many of the products mentioned are saltwater only paints.

 

[slack250]

Yes, Frank. I do agree with you. Both tests were performed in salt water. It is good info and does show a good comparison, and in the magazine there is couple of great charts that help explain the findings, but fresh water would also be nice.

I pose the question if the paints that scored top marks in salt water would also score top in fresh water, and the paints that scored poorly in salt also score poorly in fresh? I don't know.

I couldn't imagine a paint having a high score in salt water having a poor score in fresh water. :huh:

 

[Dave S]

Welcome to the board. :thumbsup:

Bottom paint is a personal choice. Before you make that decison, keep in mind that a SunDeck will be very difficult to resell with bottom paint. On the other hand your boat will, at a minimum, develop a scum line if it's in the water for that length of time without bottom paint. Many sport boats in our lake don't have bottom paint and even though they look pretty bad when they are pulled, they are easily cleaned up in a few short hours. That may be different where you boat since all water is somewhat different in terms of what the bottom will look like after a few months in the water. STIHLBOLTS suggestion of occasionaly cleaning the bottom is a good choice if you can do it in season. That would be my choice.

 

[H2ONUT]

Will this help???

http://www.boatersland.com/scatt.html

 

[fwebster]

On the bottom paint question, I honestly don't know if a paint that works well in salt water works as well in freshwater. I just know that some antifouling paints cannot be used in freshwater. Beyond that, the types of marine growth you get in fresh water is different than what occurs in salt water. Local conditions like water temperature, amount of shade, ph of the water, etc all effect bottom growth. If someone is going to apint for the first time, they really should call a good paint company and get advice specific to their location. Interlux Technical Service guys are great and very accessible.....1-800-468-7589

 

[oumills]

Thanks for all the good info. I don't want to put bottom paint on the boat as it will spend more time out of the water than in and as someone said it will kill the resale value (not to mention the looks).

I think the idea of just pulling it out of the water every couple of weeks or so is the best. I read an arcticle in Boating (I think) on the airplane the other day and they did a product test of some sort of solution that you wipe the bottom of the boat with that makes cleaning much easier. I think its basically the same stuff as the link posted above.

Anyway, thanks for the info. I am indeed the new owner of a Sundeck. :smt038 C'mon warmer weather!

 

[Icarus]

I have a couple of novice questions regarding bottom paint and thought this might be a good thread to post in.

I'm considering the purchase of a Sundancer that will be kept in salt water. It does not come with a colored hull, nor does it appear to come with bottom paint. Is bottom paint something I should plan to do if we buy this boat?

Also, as a cosmetic item, I like the look of the colored hulls, especially the black. Are the colored hulls only done at the factory, or is it possible to add hull color after purchase? Is there any value to the hull color other than cosmetic value?

 

[Bridog]

Icarus, You will certainly need bottom paint on a boat that sits in salt water. A protective paint for the drives as well. Even a few weeks could create a mess of your bottom. You could paint a hull with a good quality paint like Imron (sp?) but it will cost you plenty. Run a search on colored hulls for more info. Good luck and welcome to CSR, Kind regards, Brian

 

[wish2fish]

slack, was that the reader's digest verison?

My buddy kept his in the water for the period your talking and the boat was an absolute mess. The next season he bottom painted it and the boat looks a lot better. Also performs better.

Considering what you are already spending, several hundred more dollars would be well worth it.

 

[dr.j]

Mine sits in fresh water from May till September. Once a month I pull her out, wash the scum off and acid wash the tea stain. I would not paint any hull on a fresh water boat unless I was trying to hide damage repair or blisters. A larger boat that never leaves the water for most of the year; I would consider.

 

[Hampton]

It'll take several gallons for that boat pictured in your avatar.

 

[jacktm]

Mine sits in the River from May till October. I usually pull it out 2 to 3 time During the summer and give it a light acid wash. At the end of the season I acid wash and it looks as good as new.