New bottom paint study

skennelly

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/nova-scotia/dartmouth-startup-special-hull-paint-study-1.6199466

YYZRC

I don’t think I could do my hull for under $1000 with regular ablative! Too bad this is years away from being a reality. 

LaRea

I call BS.  Even a perfect, zero-friction bottom paint won't improve fuel consumption by 20%.  Fuel cost comes from wave drag and engine losses.  

And -- reducing underwater noise?  Ferizzle?  Underwater noise comes from the engine and propeller, not the hull.  [EDIT:  After you clean the hull, you don't have to over-drive the engines, so the boat uses less fuel and is quieter.  But you'd get the same result with any type of bottom paint.]

"Measurements were taken when the hulls were fouled with marine growth, after they were cleaned, and finally, after the hulls were sprayed with the dark grey paint."  Well, if you clean a hull that is crusted with an inch of barnacles, obviously it'll be faster and quieter no matter what paint you apply.  

Geez, I'm such a skeptic.  But I don't agree with their conclusions.  

YYZRC

@LaRea - the anti anti fouler. 

Ian

Come on @LaRea, surely this has to be true after getting $2.4M for the study….. And it was done in Canada.

Maybe they got 20% from being encrusted to painted but not clean to painted. But their scale is all wrong, on a ship based on weight and speed you’d not see anything like this.

Waiting for the 2022 study….

LaRea

Baha - you got me. 

The Canadian government is indeed studying underwater noise, but says it's "mainly generated by propeller cavitation and onboard machinery."  The problem is low-frequency noise from ships in the open waters of the North Pacific.  There's no mention of hull friction noise from lobster boats in Nova Scotia.  

https://tc.canada.ca/en/initiatives/oceans-protection-plan/understanding-anthropogenic-underwater-noise

BTW the company presents itself simultaneously as a startup and "a leading Canadian materials engineering firm."  

YYZRC

They have been “leading” for aboot twenty minutes, eh?!