Dinghy Restoration

[M Prod]

I wish I had more before pics, but I don’t. Our dinghy was in rough shape however functional. It’s a quality dinghy made by Aquapro in New Zealand (before they moved production to China) and so I thought no reason to replace it and rather I’d restore it. I ended up cleaning it with MEK (I know the manufacturers say not to, but it was the only thing that would remove the ground in dirt on the hypalon and I don’t see any damage caused) then painted the hypalon with several coats of white top coat inflatable paint. All the rubber trim I re-skinned with grey liquid rubber, and then painted all aluminum surfaces with grey aluma-hawk aluminum boat hull paint. Final touch was to apply our boat name to the bottom. I’ll post more pics once I get the engine on and mount the dinghy on the boat.

Before:

And after:

 

[Ezsteps]

Looks awesome. Nice touch adding the name.

 

[KevinC]

Looks great! Love that you used the same font on the hull of the RIB.

-Kevin

 

[Jimmy Buoy]

Ive got what appears to be the same dinghy, but it was from a Canadian Company from British Columbia - Titan. Aluminum hull/transom, its a great dinghy but the rub rail has gotten quite sticky so all kinds of bugs and dirt get stuck to it and if it rubs against the hull, sticky marks are left. The only thing that I've found that will clean the sticky mess is brake cleaner on a rag and elbow grease. Still sticky, but clean for a bit anyway.

I'll have to try coating it with the grey liquid rubber you mentioned. What exactly was the brand?

 

[M Prod]

Thanks guys! I had no idea how this would turn out as I've never done anything like this, but a bunch of YouTube videos later, and I'm pretty happy with the results. My pockets are much happier too ... ($6k for a new one made in China)

I'll have to try coating it with the grey liquid rubber you mentioned. What exactly was the brand?

Hey Jimmy ...I bought this stuff from this vendor. (This is the best price I found) Apparently you can use it on the whole boat, but after I cleaned it with MEK, I didn't feel the entire dinghy needed re-skinning. Just painting. The trim (rubrails, etc) were in really bad shape though. Had what I can best describe as 100's of mini craters throughout and was all badly faded and discolored from the sun. This stuff made it look brand new though:

http://shop.inflatableboatparts.com...or-hypalon-pvc-inflatable-boats-qt-white.html

 

[M Prod]

And here she is on the boat. Thinking I maybe should have painted the rub rail with black liquid rubber to match the canvas. Ah well I’ll need some projects for next year I suppose!

 

[Strecker25]

Looks awesome. Nice touch adding the name.

And smart having it on the bottom, I read somewhere that long distance cruisers don’t name their dinghy the same as the big boat (and put it on the dinghy to be visible) because it tells the would be thieves that the mothership is vacant while the dinghy is ashore

 

[M Prod]

And smart having it on the bottom, I read somewhere that long distance cruisers don’t name their dinghy the same as the big boat (and put it on the dinghy to be visible) because it tells the would be thieves that the mothership is vacant while the dinghy is ashore

Interesting and good point. I was actually thinking more on legal lines as the name of the boat has to be clearly legible from stern for hailing purposes. And since the dinghy covers the name on the transom, it needs to be visible from the dinghy. At least that’s the law up here ...not sure if that’s necessary in the states or not?