Outside Paint...Finally

Mahogany is taped up and spot
spraying with green hull color.

Time to paint... I mean prep.
Well, I thought that I had filled, sanded and smoothed to the point that all I needed was boat paint and a few days of warm temps... as usual I was overly optimistic.  Reality reared its ugly head after my first coat of paint in the form of hundreds of pinholes.
Okay then, let's step back and lead ourselves up to the pinhole reveal.
The taping up (note green Frog Tape covering the Mahogany trim) was straight forward. We had wiped the boat down with alcohol and proceeded to tape up the mahogany that was to stay masked till the final clear coat. The Frog tape is an extended tape formula that left no residue that I could detect when I wiped it down prior to clear coating.  Speaking of procedure, this would be a good time to quickly cover my evolving paint plan or schedule.


So, the general plan was:
1. tape off areas that needed to be touched up green.
2. mask those off areas off and shoot the Whidbey White.
3. Unmask everything and clearcoat.
I read all of System 3's literature concerning the WR-LPU urethane paint I was using and decided to try to forgo the primer if adhesion and compatibility with my RAKA epoxy was good. I did a small test patch on bare epoxy coated fabric.  It was extremely tenacious in its adhesion to the epoxy coating so I mixed up a batch, loaded up my paint pot and started shooting paint... back to the pinholes.

If you look close you can see them. Click to enlarge.

They were tiny, literally the size of a hole left by a pin prick. I wasn't interested in going the epoxy route at this stage. Way too hard to sand for the size of this type of blemish.  I felt that these were largely due to the microballon filler being a little too dry.  Waterproofing wasn't a concern given the amount of epoxy saturation and filling with the Xynole fabric application.  This was purely cosmetic which in its own way is just as important.

The hardener was blue.  You can see the ghost blue blush across the
side of the pilot house.

After a lot of research and a lucky encounter with a former paint guy in Savannah who worked on boat  restorations we settled on a high quality 2K pourable putty under the Smart Brand label from the Finishmasters chain of body shop supply houses.  It was thin, easy to use, could swipe it on thin and sand off in 20 minutes. Grab a cheap set of metal body filler spreaders from Harbor Freight and use a piece of cutting board for the mixing board.  Work fast, you have about 3 to 5 minutes. Pour a 2" bob on the board and squeeze a line across the blob.  Take a stick and mix like crazy till the color is consistent.   I went over the entire pilot house and cabin. I kept finding little blemishes that just doesn't show up until the first coat.   Lots of blocking out by hand and we were finally ready to shoot the primer.

Primed portion of the well and deck.

I decided to prime after all.  The topcoat was rated over bare epoxy but no mention of filler, regardless of how small the fill.  The primer also serves as a filler of sorts.  this I didn't realize and could have cut down on some of the pinhole problem.  Oh well, not the first time I ventured out with an idea that turned out to reinforce the old tried and true methods.  In this case, prime before paint.
In the meantime I scorched my 1 year old Husky 30 gallon oiless compressor.  It wasn't up to the task and would run continuously after about 2 minutes of spraying.  I was using a conversion LVLP gun or an Asturo HVLP pressure pot setup.  Neither are big air consumers.  Still, the Husky tripped a breaker and gave up the ghost.  In its place sits a IR 2 stage 80 gallon with a dedicated #8 to the breaker.  It allows me to spray for about 5 minutes, comes on for about a minute and off again for 5, amazing.

Now it's time to paint...

The process was straight forward and followed our plans We did make a last minute adjustment at the end which was to paint the sheerstrake and rub rail to match the hull color. The first photo shows the painter's film covering the hull.  No pinholes this time.  One good quality about the Smart product was that it could be used between topcoat layers if one or two popped back up.
The rest of the photos that follow are the results of the finish.  On the whole, the System 3 WR-LPU is a little finicky to use but the benefits outweigh the aggravation.  I tend to shoot pretty heavy and sags and runs are easier with this product than solvent based 2K paint.  If I had a decent supplied air respirator system, I would have gone solvent, probably Awlgrip.  I will leave it alone for now and let it cure.  Maybe down the road I'll wet sand a few trouble spots and buff.  Overall, it definately changes the look of the boat and gives a sense of her shape.  Mahogany handrails, cleats, bow rail and trim are up next.  We're giving the paint a few days to harden up so it doesn't get bruised.
After those items are in, we turn a huge corner.  We move to the inside and all the creature comforts that sit in boxes ready to be installed.

Next... On to the trim and something special with the outboard!