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Old 04-24-2012, 05:17 PM   #9
NoBozo
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Quote:
Originally Posted by dippasan View Post
I have a boat in a slip in Salem Mass in the ocean as well as Winni. My ocean boat has bottom paint and is a necessity in the ocean. It's my understanding that bottom paint doesn't actually stop or prevent growth. It is actually sacrificial meaning stuff grows on it like barnacles etc. but the paint comes off easily (power washing etc) thus taking the barnacles with it. I don't put any bottom paint on my fresh water boats. It looks terrible, is very expensive and it can be difficult to cover the entire bottom. As others said I simply have it acid washed at the end of the season for $125 and it looks like new.

Good luck.
There are two types of anti fouling bottom paint for boats in salt water. Hard paint and Soft paint. Both paints KILL/Repel undesirable grouth and are equally effective. The soft paint sloughs away over the season and the paint layer gets thinner. Soft paint is less desirable for "Planing" power boats because the paint is more spongy and can slow the boat down.

I had soft paint on my sailboat for 25 years and I liked it because it went away during the season...leaving less paint for me to sand off the next spring. I always sanded the paint down to Gel Coat every spring prior to adding ONE coat of new paint. One coat was ONE Quart of copper paint for a 32 foot C&C fin keel sailboat.

Hard paints last longer (better for planing power boats because they don't "Wash" off as fast) ...but are much tougher to remove later..because they are Hard.

My experience has been..MOST...almost ALL.. people are LAZY..and just add another coat of paint every year. This results in multi layers (Hard or Soft) that become a Massive Sponge to slow the boat down. That's just my experience...NB

Last edited by NoBozo; 04-24-2012 at 06:39 PM.
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