Jim Hillman
11-11-2005, 03:33 PM
Posted by Ed Neal (Member # 2536) on 12-15-2000, 10:16 AM:
OK, here's some heresy. In Thomas Firth Jones's book, Low Resistence Boats, he recommends painting the hull with a high quality latex house paint. I believe his explanation was that latex allows water vapor migration and does not trap moisture between the wood and the paint. Any experience out there with such an approach?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted by Chad Smith (Member # 2043) on 12-15-2000, 10:32 AM:
Ed, There was recently a discussion on using latex house paints on boats on the Back Yard Yacht Builder fourm.
Here is the link to that discussion
http://www.webcdi.com/cgi-bin/byyb_bbs.pl?read=15808
Here is the article that started that thread.
http://home.att.net/~DaveCarnell/articles.html#A1
Is this the same Dave Carnell that post here?
Chad
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted by CaseyJones (Member # 2212) on 12-15-2000, 03:04 PM:
While shopping for some paint for a honey-do, I asked Sherwin-Williams if they manufactured a Marine paint. They said yes, and it is $29/gal. Anyone ever use this "Marine" paint? It is supposed to be an oil-based polyurethane.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted by Bruce Hooke (Member # 1507) on 12-15-2000, 03:14 PM:
Since boats that stay in the water for the season would presumably still need to be painted below the waterline with bottom paint I assume we are talking here only about paint on surfaces that are normally above the waterline (e.g. topsides and deck) or about paint anywhere on dry-sailed boats. With that in mind the argument about trapping water vapor sounds backwards to me. What the paint should be doing is keeping excess water OUT of the wood by sealing the exterior surface. As for water getting into the planks from the inside of the boat, if you have standing water against the inside of the topsides planks (or the underside of the deck) you have much bigger problems that your paint and you should probably be looking for a bucket to bail with in a hurry. If you have standing water sitting inside your dry-sailed boat while it is sitting in your yard it is going to take an awfully long time for the breath-ability of latex paint to allow the water to migrate out of the boat by going through the planks...
Then there are the issues of the hardness of the paint (how well it stands up to dings and bumps).
So my conclusion would be that for a real quick & dirty boat of course you use whatever paint you have lying around or whatever is cheap at the paint store (or skip the paint all-together), but for a boat intended to last I would not at all recommend latex paint. If cost is the issue take a break from the boat-building and get a job for a few days on a roofing crew that is short a person, or wait and save up a bit of dough from you current job, but it just doesn't make sense to me to skimp on paint after spending months or years building the boat.
If gloss is the issue get in touch with George Kirby, Jr. Paint Co., 163 Mt. Vernon St., New Bedford, MA 02740 and get yourself some proper marine paint that is low-gloss.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted by Dave Carnell (Member # 1696) on 12-15-2000, 04:43 PM:
WARNING: Warning this article contains material that may be offensive if you think painting is more fun
than boating.
When I bought my first yacht (27’ auxiliary sloop) for $300 in 1951 I quickly learned that if its for a boat,the same material costs several times as much as if it is for your house. Oakum was $1/lb. at the marine supply store;five pounds for a dollar at the plumbing supply store. Marine paint cost several times as much as house paint of
similar composition. I worked for a major chemical company that also made paint and knew that their paint that made the most money and on which they spent the most on research was house paint. Houses are out in the weather all year-no winter cover or inside storage. Their owners expect to repaint them infrequently, such as every ten years or so. They also expect a good paint job will require little preparation before repainting. Back then the only house
paints were oil paints, so my yacht was painted with top quality oil-based house paint.
All paints consist of binders or resins, pigments, solvents, and additives. The binder forms the film thatsticks to the boat and holds the pigment there. The pigments color the paint, make it opaque and have a good deal to do with UV resistance. Solvents keep the binder dispersed or dissolved and the pigments dispersed in an easy to
apply state. They allow the paint to be applied in the correct thickness and then evaporate from the paint film as it
dries. Mineral spirits, a petroleum distillate fraction, is the most common solvent in oil-based paints. In latex paints, water is the major fluid. It does not dissolve the latex particles, but disperses them in suspension. Small amounts of special solvents are present to control the coalescence of the latex particles into a tough, tenacious film and to slow down the drying of the latex paint.
Through the years latex paints have developed to the point where 100% acrylic latex paints are better than oil paints on all counts. They are more durable and tougher. They resist chalking and fading, retaining their color especially well when exposed to bright sun. They are easier to apply, going on more smoothly and with less brush drag. They have less tendency to grow mildew. They have almost no odor and no fire hazard. Cleanup is with water. They can be recoated in as little as one hour.
The 100% acrylic latex is the key to the outstanding latex primers and paints now available. The weather resistance of these polymers parallels that of the acrylic molding powders that make red automobile taillight and stoplight lenses that last forever without fading. I checked out all the top quality exterior primers, paints, and porch and deck paints at both Lowe’s and Home Depot-they are all 100% acrylic latex products. All of the products are available as custom colors mixed to your desire.
A posting on the rec.boats.building newsgroup on the Internet asked if latex paint was good below the waterline, as if it was going to wash off. Look around your neighborhood. All those houses painted with latex paint
sit out in the weather all the time. My boats live in the water with their latex paint jobs. Platt Monfort recommends
for waterproofing the Dacron® skins of his Geodesic Airolite boats “...the simplest method being a good quality exterior latex house paint.”
How long is the latex paint job going to last? The 16-year old Uncle Gabe’s Flattie Skiff (Sam Rabl) built of ¼” fir plywood was painted when new and then about 9 years ago. It looks pretty scroungy, but the interesting thing is that while the paint on the wood has
been scoured off by hurricane winds and general wear the paint on the epoxy-fiberglass joints in the sides is perfectly intact and looks great.
When I rebuilt my 1964 Simmons Sea-Skiff 20 I used a heat gun and a wide chisel to remove about a dozen layers of old oil paint. To repaint I used latex primer and then two coats of Lowe’s “Severe Weather” 15-year
guarantee semigloss latex exterior paint custom colored to match the “Simmons blue” that was next to the wood. It has been three years and three hurricanes ridden out on the mooring since the boat was launched. Except where the boat has rubbed fenders or the edge of the float and on the cockpit floorboards the paint is in first class shape. I do
need to repaint the floorboards. In my survey I found that Lowe’s has an exterior 100% acrylic latex skid resistant paint (Skid-Not®) that can be custom colored. I believe I will try it.
I am not alone in appreciating the outstanding performance of 100% acrylic latex paints for boats. Thomas Firth Jones, boat designer, boatbuilder, and author of Boats To Go wrote in Boatbuilder several years ago that he preferred latex paint over oil paint for boats for all of the reasons cited above. He did comment that he paints his tiller with oil-based paint because the latex paint stains there.
I was talking with “Dynamite” Payson one May weekend a couple of years ago and he told me he was going to repaint his skiff with latex paint that weekend.
Jim Michalak, boat designer and builder, uses latex paint on his boats.
Phil Bolger reported in Messing About in BOATS that his personal outboard boat is painted with semigloss
latex house paint.
Boatbuilders are traditionalists and it has been a hard sell to get them to accept plywood, stitch-and-glue construction, epoxy adhesives, and other similar innovations. Don’t let tradition keep you from benefitting from the ease of application and outstanding performance of 100% acrylic latex paints.
[This message has been edited by Dave Carnell (edited 12-15-2000).]
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted by Mark Van (Member # 2443) on 12-15-2000, 06:04 PM:
I used semi-gloss latex house paint for my last boat. (epoxy-fiberglass covered)
I cruised and lived aboard for 2 1/2 years, and being lazy, never re-painted.
The surface was looking pretty dingy, but the paint was still intact.
I will use nasty chemicals where needed,(epoxy, I'm too much of a wood-butcher to build a wooden boat traditionally), but it is nice to use a paint that can be cleaned with water and doesn't require a resparator.
I will be painting my next boat with latex.
Mark
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted by Steve McMahon (Member # 2476) on 12-16-2000, 08:16 AM:
Dave: I appreciate you logic and explaination. Where I am it is a fact that one needs to paint their boat every year if stored outside, and probably every two years if put in a shed for the winter. The ability to do a good job with latex is a huge advantage from a time, toxicity, and ease points of view. A couple of issues that will be raising their heads sooner than later are environment and health, and they are directly related to each other. Society is rightly becoming more concerned about the long term effects of everything we do. Environmental illness is a real issue. Toxin build up from "small" contributors is an issue. Maybe we're dropping 5 pounds of paint chips and sanding dust on the shore every year when we repaint, flushing a bit of chlorine down our sinks, or overusing antibiotics. Everything is a compromise between what we need now and what the long term costs are. Of course I'm saying this while getting set to go outside and have a smoke and start the car (an let it run for a while to warm up), and I should get another pot of coffee on to help shake the bugs from last nights Bushmills.... Oh well, I painted the house with latex paint, used latex insulating foam, removed all the carpet, and use natural cleaners.
OK, here's some heresy. In Thomas Firth Jones's book, Low Resistence Boats, he recommends painting the hull with a high quality latex house paint. I believe his explanation was that latex allows water vapor migration and does not trap moisture between the wood and the paint. Any experience out there with such an approach?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted by Chad Smith (Member # 2043) on 12-15-2000, 10:32 AM:
Ed, There was recently a discussion on using latex house paints on boats on the Back Yard Yacht Builder fourm.
Here is the link to that discussion
http://www.webcdi.com/cgi-bin/byyb_bbs.pl?read=15808
Here is the article that started that thread.
http://home.att.net/~DaveCarnell/articles.html#A1
Is this the same Dave Carnell that post here?
Chad
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted by CaseyJones (Member # 2212) on 12-15-2000, 03:04 PM:
While shopping for some paint for a honey-do, I asked Sherwin-Williams if they manufactured a Marine paint. They said yes, and it is $29/gal. Anyone ever use this "Marine" paint? It is supposed to be an oil-based polyurethane.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted by Bruce Hooke (Member # 1507) on 12-15-2000, 03:14 PM:
Since boats that stay in the water for the season would presumably still need to be painted below the waterline with bottom paint I assume we are talking here only about paint on surfaces that are normally above the waterline (e.g. topsides and deck) or about paint anywhere on dry-sailed boats. With that in mind the argument about trapping water vapor sounds backwards to me. What the paint should be doing is keeping excess water OUT of the wood by sealing the exterior surface. As for water getting into the planks from the inside of the boat, if you have standing water against the inside of the topsides planks (or the underside of the deck) you have much bigger problems that your paint and you should probably be looking for a bucket to bail with in a hurry. If you have standing water sitting inside your dry-sailed boat while it is sitting in your yard it is going to take an awfully long time for the breath-ability of latex paint to allow the water to migrate out of the boat by going through the planks...
Then there are the issues of the hardness of the paint (how well it stands up to dings and bumps).
So my conclusion would be that for a real quick & dirty boat of course you use whatever paint you have lying around or whatever is cheap at the paint store (or skip the paint all-together), but for a boat intended to last I would not at all recommend latex paint. If cost is the issue take a break from the boat-building and get a job for a few days on a roofing crew that is short a person, or wait and save up a bit of dough from you current job, but it just doesn't make sense to me to skimp on paint after spending months or years building the boat.
If gloss is the issue get in touch with George Kirby, Jr. Paint Co., 163 Mt. Vernon St., New Bedford, MA 02740 and get yourself some proper marine paint that is low-gloss.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted by Dave Carnell (Member # 1696) on 12-15-2000, 04:43 PM:
WARNING: Warning this article contains material that may be offensive if you think painting is more fun
than boating.
When I bought my first yacht (27’ auxiliary sloop) for $300 in 1951 I quickly learned that if its for a boat,the same material costs several times as much as if it is for your house. Oakum was $1/lb. at the marine supply store;five pounds for a dollar at the plumbing supply store. Marine paint cost several times as much as house paint of
similar composition. I worked for a major chemical company that also made paint and knew that their paint that made the most money and on which they spent the most on research was house paint. Houses are out in the weather all year-no winter cover or inside storage. Their owners expect to repaint them infrequently, such as every ten years or so. They also expect a good paint job will require little preparation before repainting. Back then the only house
paints were oil paints, so my yacht was painted with top quality oil-based house paint.
All paints consist of binders or resins, pigments, solvents, and additives. The binder forms the film thatsticks to the boat and holds the pigment there. The pigments color the paint, make it opaque and have a good deal to do with UV resistance. Solvents keep the binder dispersed or dissolved and the pigments dispersed in an easy to
apply state. They allow the paint to be applied in the correct thickness and then evaporate from the paint film as it
dries. Mineral spirits, a petroleum distillate fraction, is the most common solvent in oil-based paints. In latex paints, water is the major fluid. It does not dissolve the latex particles, but disperses them in suspension. Small amounts of special solvents are present to control the coalescence of the latex particles into a tough, tenacious film and to slow down the drying of the latex paint.
Through the years latex paints have developed to the point where 100% acrylic latex paints are better than oil paints on all counts. They are more durable and tougher. They resist chalking and fading, retaining their color especially well when exposed to bright sun. They are easier to apply, going on more smoothly and with less brush drag. They have less tendency to grow mildew. They have almost no odor and no fire hazard. Cleanup is with water. They can be recoated in as little as one hour.
The 100% acrylic latex is the key to the outstanding latex primers and paints now available. The weather resistance of these polymers parallels that of the acrylic molding powders that make red automobile taillight and stoplight lenses that last forever without fading. I checked out all the top quality exterior primers, paints, and porch and deck paints at both Lowe’s and Home Depot-they are all 100% acrylic latex products. All of the products are available as custom colors mixed to your desire.
A posting on the rec.boats.building newsgroup on the Internet asked if latex paint was good below the waterline, as if it was going to wash off. Look around your neighborhood. All those houses painted with latex paint
sit out in the weather all the time. My boats live in the water with their latex paint jobs. Platt Monfort recommends
for waterproofing the Dacron® skins of his Geodesic Airolite boats “...the simplest method being a good quality exterior latex house paint.”
How long is the latex paint job going to last? The 16-year old Uncle Gabe’s Flattie Skiff (Sam Rabl) built of ¼” fir plywood was painted when new and then about 9 years ago. It looks pretty scroungy, but the interesting thing is that while the paint on the wood has
been scoured off by hurricane winds and general wear the paint on the epoxy-fiberglass joints in the sides is perfectly intact and looks great.
When I rebuilt my 1964 Simmons Sea-Skiff 20 I used a heat gun and a wide chisel to remove about a dozen layers of old oil paint. To repaint I used latex primer and then two coats of Lowe’s “Severe Weather” 15-year
guarantee semigloss latex exterior paint custom colored to match the “Simmons blue” that was next to the wood. It has been three years and three hurricanes ridden out on the mooring since the boat was launched. Except where the boat has rubbed fenders or the edge of the float and on the cockpit floorboards the paint is in first class shape. I do
need to repaint the floorboards. In my survey I found that Lowe’s has an exterior 100% acrylic latex skid resistant paint (Skid-Not®) that can be custom colored. I believe I will try it.
I am not alone in appreciating the outstanding performance of 100% acrylic latex paints for boats. Thomas Firth Jones, boat designer, boatbuilder, and author of Boats To Go wrote in Boatbuilder several years ago that he preferred latex paint over oil paint for boats for all of the reasons cited above. He did comment that he paints his tiller with oil-based paint because the latex paint stains there.
I was talking with “Dynamite” Payson one May weekend a couple of years ago and he told me he was going to repaint his skiff with latex paint that weekend.
Jim Michalak, boat designer and builder, uses latex paint on his boats.
Phil Bolger reported in Messing About in BOATS that his personal outboard boat is painted with semigloss
latex house paint.
Boatbuilders are traditionalists and it has been a hard sell to get them to accept plywood, stitch-and-glue construction, epoxy adhesives, and other similar innovations. Don’t let tradition keep you from benefitting from the ease of application and outstanding performance of 100% acrylic latex paints.
[This message has been edited by Dave Carnell (edited 12-15-2000).]
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted by Mark Van (Member # 2443) on 12-15-2000, 06:04 PM:
I used semi-gloss latex house paint for my last boat. (epoxy-fiberglass covered)
I cruised and lived aboard for 2 1/2 years, and being lazy, never re-painted.
The surface was looking pretty dingy, but the paint was still intact.
I will use nasty chemicals where needed,(epoxy, I'm too much of a wood-butcher to build a wooden boat traditionally), but it is nice to use a paint that can be cleaned with water and doesn't require a resparator.
I will be painting my next boat with latex.
Mark
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted by Steve McMahon (Member # 2476) on 12-16-2000, 08:16 AM:
Dave: I appreciate you logic and explaination. Where I am it is a fact that one needs to paint their boat every year if stored outside, and probably every two years if put in a shed for the winter. The ability to do a good job with latex is a huge advantage from a time, toxicity, and ease points of view. A couple of issues that will be raising their heads sooner than later are environment and health, and they are directly related to each other. Society is rightly becoming more concerned about the long term effects of everything we do. Environmental illness is a real issue. Toxin build up from "small" contributors is an issue. Maybe we're dropping 5 pounds of paint chips and sanding dust on the shore every year when we repaint, flushing a bit of chlorine down our sinks, or overusing antibiotics. Everything is a compromise between what we need now and what the long term costs are. Of course I'm saying this while getting set to go outside and have a smoke and start the car (an let it run for a while to warm up), and I should get another pot of coffee on to help shake the bugs from last nights Bushmills.... Oh well, I painted the house with latex paint, used latex insulating foam, removed all the carpet, and use natural cleaners.