repairing a clear coat?

[duckin]

I bought a used boat that has had sometype of clear coat sprayed on it and it is flaking off. Is there anyway that I can repair this myself???Thanks

[North Texas Fiberglass]

, OH NOOOOOOO... Someone sprayed the boat with poly urathane.

Here is my "standard" responce to poly urathane. This is such a common issue, when someone email me about it, I have a standardized reply to them.

In your case, you must sand off all the poly urathane, and then address the boat and decide how much you are willing to spend. To redo the metal flake and clear gelcote on the top cap, you are looking at more than what the boat is worth.

Poly urethane paint or Gelcote?

Poly urethane is the paint used on automobiles. It will make the boat look ok for the first 1-3 years. However, at some point it will start cracking and peeling off the boat. Poly urethane is not compatible with the chemical that gelcote is made out of. Gelcote is made from poly ester. The two chemicals do not get a good chemical bond with each other and will eventually separate. A good shop will not do poly urethane since they know the outcome it will have. If you spend $2000- $4000, and it starts to peel off in two years, who are you going to be mad at? You will be mad at the shop, thinking it is their paint job that doesn’t work. However, it is actually the product that is the problem. It just isn’t compatible with the boat.

Gelcote is poly ester based as mentioned. It is the same chemical base as fiberglass and the resin in virtually all boats is a poly ester based resin. The only down side to gelcote is the labor hours it requires once you have sprayed it on the boat. Once gelcote is sprayed on the boat, it must be sanded back down due to the “Orange Peel” it leaves when sprayed.

For an example, for gelcote, it takes about 80 labor hours to do an 18-20 foot bass boat from the rub rail up. 80 X $80/hr = $6400.00 plus materials. It will take $7500 to do the top cap of your boat. Ski and pleasure boats are even more expensive due to the larger coverage area. So you can see why most people do not elect to refinish their boats. It is just too expensive. To completely redo a boat it can easily exceed $20,000-$25,000.

And if paint was such a good option for boats, why don’t the boat companies put it on the boat when they are building it? They know what will happen to it.

For poly urathane, I could do 20 boats a month at $2000.00 per boat. That would be $40,000 a month and I could have one painter, and one assistant be doing the work.. At the end of the year, that would be 140 boats and $480,000 in business. That number sounds amazing. However, at the end of three years, I would have 420 VERY UNHAPPY CUSTOMERS! It wouldn’t take long at all for that kind of work to ruin a small business.

Please don’t go with the poly urethane paint route. It would just be a complete waste of money after 2-3 years.

There are a few types of applications that can get away with poly urathane. But those are very few and certainly not a metal flake finish.




Modified by North Texas Fiberglass at 9:10 AM 1/9/2007

[Rollo331]

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by North Texas Fiberglass &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">

For an example, it takes about 80 labor hours to do an 18-20 foot bass boat from the rub rail up. 80 X $80/hr = $6400.00 plus materials. It will take $7500 to do the top cap of your boat.

I could do 20 boats a month at $2000.00 per boat.

</TD></TR></TABLE>

something is not adding up.......

[North Texas Fiberglass]

Rollo,

What I was refering too was shooting poly urathane on boats. If it was such a good thing to do to a boat. I could have a paint booth, have 1 guy stripping boats down, one shooting paint, and one putting them back together. I could run about 20 boats through the shop a month doing poly urathane. However, I know what is going to happen after 2-4 years. It will simply start to peel off.

Hope that clarifies the ??

[AMS BOATS]

$$$$ verses Expectations---- OPTION 1) If you only fix a few affected areas,you might try auto paint supply store for spot repair supplies and recommended application-quick and cheapest route.OPTION 2)Complete refinish,remove hardware down to and including rubrail,strip clear(air pressure& sand)and respray with auto paint(not recommended,but certainly less expensive then next option).OPTION3)Refinish with flake and clear gelcoat,strip boat as above,sand coarse to remove as much material as possible,reflake,clear multiple coats,block sand to desired finish.The first 2 options,can be done with little or no experience,following suggested instructions.The third should be left to the pro's,because you can get into big trouble in a hurry with cure times,and you think it was hard to prep the first time!!!!!Good Luck!!

[otis44]

Have any of you all had any experience with any of the strippers (aqua-strip) in particular to remove bad clear. I read an older post and a guy says he used it and it worked. I've got a boat basically like the one the fellow is referring to in the main topic of this boat. My flake is good, and I believe I can carefully sand it off and not damage the flake, but it's all over the boat and I am just looking for an easier way. Thanks in advance BTW the best I can tell this stuff isn't gelcoat, it's car clear or maybe minwax polyurethane who knows

[AMS BOATS]

I have used paint stripper years ago.I don't remember the brand,but I believe it contained methalene cloride? which actually soften the gelcoat under the paint.Definitly sample on a small area and use very sparingly.Good Luck!