power spray her guts

[Anastasia]

I'm getting ready for a survey and thought I power spray Rose in preparation.

Any advice out there for power spraying the inside/outside my 30 year old 17 ft pitchpine sloop?

1. I understand there are different PSI (1000 -2400) and tips on these machines. Do I spray soft first from a distance and then get closer with a wide tip?

2. I have some soft spots near the forward keel and cracked floor timbers from poor fastening practices. Should I avoid these areas? And only handle them witha scaper and heat gun.

[Bob Cleek]

Easy does it. You'll know soon enough if the pressure is too high/concentrated. You want to clean the surface, not sandblast the paint off of her. Tell your tool rental place what you need it for and they should be able to set you up okay. Actually, while the ease of a power pressure washer is appealing, a hose with some decent pressure is really just as effective. The advantage of the pressure washer is that it uses less water, perhaps, but super high pressure isn't really necessary. A hose will blast (wet) crud off the bottom just as well. You will have to hit the barnacles and such with a scraper either way. Hoses work fine for general cleaning inside the hull. You may not need a sledge hammer to swat a mosquito.

[nedL]

Bob Cleek said it (doesn't he always ;) ) I'd go with a regular garden hose & spray nozzle, could throw in a bucket of soapy water and scrub brush too. There shouldn't be anything in Rose's bilge that this shouldn't easily handle.

[Bob Smalser]

You're gonna have to develop a feel for it so start light and be careful...but my original advice a month ago still stands.

I'd wash it hard enuf to remove loose, flaking paint, but not enuf to erode good wood. If it damages the soft and punky wood...well, that wood's gonna have to be replaced, anyway.

It also gets the crud out of wood-wood contact surfaces so your later heavy application of a strong, clear wood preservative before sanding/repainting will be more effective....make all your mechanical repairs first, so the preservative doesn't interfere with gluing.

[ 09-26-2003, 01:38 PM: Message edited by: Bob Smalser ]

[High C]

You can easily etch into wood with a pressure washer set too tight, and held too close. :eek:

Set the spray wiiide and keep your distance. You'll get the hang of it.

[Anastasia]

I power washed the hull this past weekend. In the process I got down to the wood of the hull in a few placed; however, there is still lots of paint on her. Most of the paint came off in the spraying of the bilge. Maybe 20% of the bilge is down to the wood. In some of these areas some soft wood was sprayed away; but most of the wood and paint appeared to be solidly resistent to the 1500 PSI power spray. In the areas where I say the wood was soft, there is a ridged texture that seems to correspond to the grain.

I guess it now time to use the heat gun and scrape to get paint off her. I'm thinking of focusing on getting paint of the outside of the hull and bilge this year.

I plan to attempt to survey the boat in the next week or two and then take it to a professional and have him check and correct my survey. I'm hoping to get some more paint off the boat before he takes a look, thinking that this might make the survey a bit easier to do.