i bought a boat a few days ago bob lush's ostar modified shark 24. its a rad boat and i love it. I will be painting the deck shortly, and im curious whether you all have any expirience advice or what have you. I dont think itd be practical to do the best sortof yacht quality interlux paint job, price wise for the boat, but simply something that looks nice and clean. Ive painted the deck of a laser so I imagine along the same lines as that. aswell, there are stress cracks in the gelcoat, would giving those a very thin coat of epoxy be a good idea. thanks very much.
peter
Sharks are VERY fast off the wind....VERY fast ;D Try 'easypoxy' for your decks...it's a good paint and simple too. Taken from the Shark 24 site...
"The Shark's prompt success was due in no small part to its early racing
record. In 1960, Hinterholler crewed for George Steffan, later President
of Mirage Yachts, in the Freeman Cup. They cleaned up with three 1sts
using brisk 18-knot winds to put a leg between them and their nearest competitor
in the race. In the 1963 Freeman Cup the Shark did it again. For small
boats, the course was from Niagara-on-the-Lake to Rochester NY, 80
nautical miles along the south shore of Lake Ontario. There were no
spinnakers and no genoas on Sharks in those days and the race was
sailed with main and working jib only.
"We thought our biggest competition would be the "Thunderbirds,"
Hinterholler said "but after the first surf, we knew that there would be no
contest. We barreled down the course in seven hours and 44 minutes."
In 1963, using a spinnaker on a close reach across Lake Ontario, Sid
Dakin, one of the first to own a Shark, sailed the blockhouse Bay race
from Toronto to Olcott, NY, with an adrenaline pumping average speed
of 10.2 knots, beating the 56-footer Innisfree on a boat-for-boat basis.
That sort of speed boggled the minds of sailors unaccustomed to
semi-displacement hulls.
http://www.kiwigrip.com/index.html
Take a look at this product....
I believe it's what I'll be using when I re-do our Cape Dory's deck.
At $109. a gal. it ain't cheap. But, if it lives up to the billing it sounds good. Has anyone used it?
Okay, after having my boat in the backyard since May 3 of 07 and have done alot of sanding, epocy, well I'm sure you guys know what I mean. I think that I'm ready to paint! Originally I was going to roll and tip, but after doing my hatches, lazarette cove and pop top cover I decided to sray it. I have never done this before, but actually went out and bought a sprayer to go with my air compressor. How do I know when th paint is thin enough to spray? It is an epoxy paint made by Top Secret Coatings. I have a 4 day weathher window to do this I can't get ahold of the manufacturer. What do I do? Marc
I would highly recommend rolling and tipping... it is probably going to come out much better...also, some paints are fairly poisonous to spray, especially the two-part LPU paints which have a cyanide-based compound in them.
I agree with Dan, Marc at this point you will probably be better off rolling and tipping it. Two part epoxy is quite toxic and to spray it you will need a fullface respirator. Your spray equipment will have to be up to the task also, otherwise it will hard to do a decent job.
This is a one part epoxy, the same that is used by the USN and USAF