I can't begin to tell you how much work has gone into spray painting my boat This End Up with the Perfection paint. I have sanded off more paint working through the challenges of this stuff until I finally got the right setup. But now I have it sorted it out and the paint is stunning. There are some super small imperfections and I'm not sure what caused them, maybe dust, maybe something happening in the spray gun, who knows, but they are tiny and relatively few. You have to put your face right up to the hull to see them.

Interlux does not recommend that mere mortals spray this stuff and I can understand why. It is the most tricky paint I have ever encountered, ever. It is also toxic as all get out. But when it works this stuff is crazy glossy. I found that spraying the hulls on their sides was one of the key things that started making the finish work, but mainly because with the lighting in my shop I could finally see when I was spraying too much or too little and the difference between those two conditions is microscopic with this paint. Too much and it looks good for a while and then creeps into a run. Too little and the surface is dry and looks like crap. I can attest to all of these conditions after sanding all of them off. This has been one very expensive learning session and I will admit that I about gave up and took the hulls to a body shop, then tried one last little setup change and struck pay dirt.

I have just one more side to spray and then it will be time to assemble the boat. One hull is finished and is ready for assembly now. The Awlgrip 2000 gray on the aluminum stuff looks fantastic with this dark blue. Soon some wild tangerine sails are going to show up and this will be a show stopper of a boat. What a way to spend a summer, sanding, sanding some more, more sanding and on and on.

Here is what it looks like a few minutes after spraying:



Having fun in Scappoose, Oregon

I also know what my next project has to be, painting the dang shop floor, dark blue does not get it.

dg

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dg
NACRA 5.2 #400
This End Up
Original owner since 1975
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That's looking really nice. Can't wait to see the boat all put back together. Good job!!!!

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Marty
1984 Hobie 16 Redline Yellow Nationals, "Yellow Fever"
Opelika, Al / Lake Martin
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Oh my! You win! What size batches did you end up making to spray? What was the spray equipment and nozzle opening?

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Tom
NACRA 5.7 (1984 Sail 181)
Pennsylvania
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With the spray reducer it worked out to about 17 oz. total, 8 oz. of blue, 4 oz. of catalyst and 4-5 oz. of reducer. Which was enough for one side of the hull and the deck, or the boards depending on what was up. I had less runs with the 1.2 mm tip and then set the paint volume very very lightly. As I mentioned the biggest breakthrough was lighting. When I had the light right you could see the build and could tell what speed to sweep. When I first started I had the hulls hanging like you had, but with my shop lighting you couldn't see the critical build process this goofy paint needs. I think spraying out in the daylight would be easier than inside, but then you have to sort out a shelter to keep the dust out.

I have a 5 hp. two stage compressor, the gun is an Eastwood HVLP in the mid price range that has worked really well for the furniture projects I normally do. I was messing with every possible setting to get this stuff to work, pressure at the end of the hose line, pressure at the gun, paint volume, pattern you name it, I did it and then got to sand it off. I could get to this result faster the next time, but I seriously doubt most people would be willing to buy all the paint I did, or to do all the sanding to get back to the starting point. If you want the super smooth surface, pay your favorite autobody guy to do it and then go sailing. This turned out to be the project from h.... I seriously almost gave up. I started thinking that maybe the pressurized systems that the pros use could better atomize the paint and I think that is probably true, but the HVLP system will work, it is just much slower.

I am going to wait two days before I turn the hull over and finish this crazy project. The paint is hard to the touch in 24 hours, but I noticed that it did pick up a little hazing where it contacted the sawhorse on the first hull when it was turned over.

dg

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dg
NACRA 5.2 #400
This End Up
Original owner since 1975
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Very impressive work. I recall when we first discussed Perfection in June, you were pretty excited about it, and thought it might be a shortcut compared to sanding gel coat. That certainly was not either of our experience. It does end up with a very nice finish, but I think I would have to sand to bare fiberglass and start over to get the results you got.

Here is a tip...Be sure to cover your tiller stick with something soft and grippy near the end like neoprene. The carbon stick is the biggest source of scratches so far for me.

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Tom
NACRA 5.7 (1984 Sail 181)
Pennsylvania
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I liked the concept of being able to roll and tip the finish and then get the super high gloss finish. Clearly for that technique to work well the brush is critical and maybe if I had used the strongly suggested badger hair brush the results might have been more acceptable. But in retrospect it seems impossible to me that using a brush, no matter how good, could result in the super flat surface that this extreme high gloss really needs. No doubt that the dark blue I'm using makes the slight unevenness show up. I really wanted that technique to work well so that others would be willing to try it. I think that most people that want to change the color of their boat in a DIY project should consider the much easier to use one part polyurethane. Going that route means maybe a couple of weekends of work to get a pretty good result. But I did want that super high gloss finish and now have it and the bulked up arms from an incredible amount of sanding working out the steps to get it right.

I will take note of the tiller scratching the hulls. The now super smooth and glossy decks I have now don't need to get all scratched up. It seriously has a kind of hot rod look to it now. I wonder if wrapping the stick with friction tape would do the trick to stop the tiller from scratching?

dg

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dg
NACRA 5.2 #400
This End Up
Original owner since 1975
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On the roll and tip, I used a decent quality foam brush...no bristles at all. It was able to move the paint around using firm strokes, and leveled the finish with no brush strokes. They wore out doing about one side of one hull, so I should have bought stock in foam brush company. These are laminated foam with a stiffening piece of plastic between the layers, and tapered end.

I don't care what you use on your tiller, wrap it with something comfortable and non-scratching. You can thank me later. After spending that kind of time and effort to get your finish, you don't want the tiller rubbing over it on the very visible gunwales.

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Tom
NACRA 5.7 (1984 Sail 181)
Pennsylvania
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I use Tennis racket tape about 2' to 3' down the stick and a rubber handle of some sort over the end, this seems to work well.

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Jeff O
N5.0
solcat 18(sold),
N5.2,
H16
Camarillo CA
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