Paint Recommendations please

[Bruce 2nd]

Looking for recommendations on repainting some red on my boat. Would you use brush on paint or spray on? Any in particular you guys have experience with? Anything to stay away from? What about car paint and clear? If so I’m familiar with that process. Boat will be in fresh water only. As always thank you guys!

 

[Emerger]

Looking for recommendations on repainting some red on my boat. Would you use brush on paint or spray on? Any in particular you guys have experience with? Anything to stay away from? What about car paint and clear? If so I’m familiar with that process. Boat will be in fresh water only. As always thank you guys!

You'll find that most any paint will work for a boat. It depends mainly on your budget and how much time you want to put into it. On the low end, plain old Rustoleum gloss paint applied with either a brush or a roller is fine. On the high end, Awlgrip or Imron are good too. If you're familiar with car paint, any good quality car paint will work also.

I've known people to paint an entire boat with cheap gloss spray paint from Dollar General, but they prepped the surface well and buffed it to a gloss afterwards.

 

[tpenfield]

Dupont Imron or Awlgrip are probably the best 'above the water line' paints you can use. Interlux topside paints are fairly good . . .Rustoleum has a boat paint as well.

You will want to use a 2-part paint so that the paint hardens rather than dries.

Spray is best, but a "roll 'n tip" application can yield good results. Use the best masking tape you can get to make sure you get crisp/clean lines at any edges.

Show us a picture of what you are painting . . .

 

[matt167]

If it were mine, pick the shade of red from rustoleum that you like and spray that. If you have a respirator and many fresh cartridges or are willing to get one, then mix in some acrylic enamel hardener you can get at Napa or even Advance Auto. It's isocynate so you have to be careful with it

Only difference between rustoleum topsides paint and the regular paint is the color formulations, the label and the price

 

[Bruce 2nd]

Gonna be sprucing up the old 1992 wellcraft while I’m waiting to receive my engine replacement. Not sure if I’m touching the white body just thought about the faded red that won’t shine back up.

 

[f_inscreenname]

If you use Rustoleum or any oil based paint be sure to add so Valspar enamel hardener to it so it will dry in a hour.

 

[AShipShow]

I've seen way worse/oxidized gel coat than that... Are you sure it won't clean up? You would probably need to wet sand the entire hull starting at 320 or 400 grit depending on how bad it actually is and work up to 1000 or so and then compound and buff... You'd be shocked how well it will shine... The only reason I would repaint is if you want to go to a new color, or there is damage that needs repaired.

 

[kcon]

I've seen way worse/oxidized gel coat than that... Are you sure it won't clean up? You would probably need to wet sand the entire hull starting at 320 or 400 grit depending on how bad it actually is and work up to 1000 or so and then compound and buff... You'd be shocked how well it will shine... The only reason I would repaint is if you want to go to a new color, or there is damage that needs repaired.

This. If you gave it a good bath (maybe use a proper boat acid wash mix on the stains) then wet sand and polish - that boat will shine pretty well with results probably better than your average quality paint job, but with far less effort.

 

[Chris1956]

Use a lambswool pad and a rotary polisher, plus some liquid rubbing compound. She will buff up real nice. Then coat it with some good wax to hold the shine as long as possible.

You will need to repeat every season.

Painting will really screw it up. Leave it as a last resort.

 

[Bruce 2nd]

I may try to do that on the white gel coat. There is no damage to repair. I tried buffing and shining the red and it's still about just as dull. Maybe I'll repaint the red stripe only and rework that white. That would save me time and money especially if the white comes back to life.

 

[AShipShow]

I may try to do that on the white gel coat. There is no damage to repair. I tried buffing and shining the red and it's still about just as dull. Maybe I'll repaint the red stripe only and rework that white. That would save me time and money especially if the white comes back to life.

You can't just "buff" old oxidized gel coat and expect it to really shine... The oxidation is basically a bunch of pits in the surface of the gelcoat. You need to physically remove the top layer of gelcoat with sanding... Again, start with like 400grit and work up to 1000 then compound, and then wax...

I would try doing the above procedure on a small area so you don't spend a full day or two doing it, and see how it looks... Again, I suspect it will shine up like new.

My preference for the compounding stage is Meguiar's oxidation remover... it starts out kinda gritty but as you buff it, it breaks down into a finer and finer grit... It really works well... Then clean it off and follow up with a marine polish...

 

[Bruce 2nd]

You can't just "buff" old oxidized gel coat and expect it to really shine... The oxidation is basically a bunch of pits in the surface of the gelcoat. You need to physically remove the top layer of gelcoat with sanding... Again, start with like 400grit and work up to 1000 then compound, and then wax...

I would try doing the above procedure on a small area so you don't spend a full day or two doing it, and see how it looks... Again, I suspect it will shine up like new.

My preference for the compounding stage is Meguiar's oxidation remover... it starts out kinda gritty but as you buff it, it breaks down into a finer and finer grit... It really works well... Then clean it off and follow up with a marine polish...

Will try that and post results. Thanks again.

 

[Bruce 2nd]

Buffing that white only once and painting that burgandy stripe sure made a difference! Still have to go back over the white again to polish it up but I'm sure happy I didn't pay the 5K-7K to get the gel coat completely redone. I think it turned out pretty darn good.