bottom paint or not

jollyrodgers

Rinker dealer told us "absolutely not" to bottom paint New 276cc. As owners of a 260ec we were shocked. Do any of you 276 owners bottom paint?

pepmyster

My first boat with bottom paint and we love it!

Cableguy Greg

I was always told, runabouts no bottom paint. Cruisers, yes to bottom paint. If I was going to bottom paint a runabout, I would use white paint. Just my 2 cents worth...

Black_Diamond

If it sits in a slip you need to bottom paint. Gelcoat is not waterproof and will blister. 

LaRea

Size makes no difference.  A more appropriate saying is "trailered or lift-kept boats, no bottom paint -- slipped boats, always bottom paint."  

There are many 40-foot cruisers that run without bottom paint because they are kept in a lift, out of the water, and don't have a problem with bottom fouling.

jollyrodgers

Thank you. The "largest Rinker dealer in the world" told us the 276 loses value as soon as it's bottom painted. He said the velocity no longer blisters.

jollyrodgers

sorry...should be gelcoat no longer blisters.

JC290

I don't think that dealer knows what he is talking about. 

mattie

No bottom paint on ours. I've seen some nice white coatings that finish up well - been tempted.

Aside: three things that make the 276 a great boat - windlass, sport arch & big block power.

My 2 cents....

raybo3

IMO how could you not bottom paint if your in a slip. For the 1 or 2 MPH you lose with paint is better than not getting on plane or the speed you lose with growth on your boat. Also the blister problem. It really is a no brainier. You really need to paint if you are staying in a slip. 

jollyrodgers

Mattie, debating about putting in fridge and therefore shore power. What do you think?

Stodge

Bottom paint is a one way street.  And I have to agree, if you're in a well you'll want bottom paint.  Seems that one of the biggest advantages of rack storage is not needing bottom paint.

The factory fridge in our 280 was DC powered only.  Shore power was a must to keep the house batteries charged.

TikiHut2

If I read that OP correctly it sounds like the dealer is referring to a perception by sales people and noob buyers that a boat without bottom paint is somehow more desirable. They might be great sales people but....... they're selling. Promises of untested or fanciful and somehow exclusive new and improved materials are something you might take with a grain of salt.

In reality if it sets in a slip for more than a few days in fresh/salt water without an effective anti-fouling paint specifically designed for the glop/growth in your area it'll start to get growth that'll quickly handicap performance.  Eventually it'll just become a reef.....with blisters.

The other piece of the bottom paint scenario that wasn't mentioned above is the need for 3-4 layers of properly applied barrier coating BEFORE the bottom paint goes on. This is NOT a step to be skipped. Like BD said, gelcoat truly won't hold back water from eventually getting into the hull. 

Good luck in your decision. Mike

frenchship

Gelcoat by itself is not water proof , neither is anti-fouling paint . The only way is a epoxy barrier coat after a good sanding and 3coats.

jollyrodgers

Hoping to hear from some 276 owners. The dealer on Lake St Clare said he had one 276 he couldn't sell bc of bottom paint. He said the rest of the owners he knew of did not bottom paint.

JC290

Betting they are rack and launch people or trailering. The only ones not painted by me are rack customers. Paint it if your leaving it in 

TikiHut2

+1 for RYs statement.....and everyone else.

Mine has a bare bottom only because we trailer it, and before that it was always stored on-shore in a rack. Sorta rare for a 270 that is 10 y/o. If I do a week in the water I always have annoying growth that starts to cling to the hull/OD. Docking longer is not an option for me.

Other fresh water lake dwellers might give you some feedback but bottom paint is an expensive option/upgrade that is desirable if done properly and if you EVER intend to keep your pride and joy at a dock for more than a few days.

Local mindset against such an upgrade would be very localized, ill-informed and simply narrow minded. imho

Mike

TikiHut2

It varies by region which is why you talk to the locals about what works best in a specific area. Lets call my area an "active growth zone" for barnacles and incrustations. Not quite as much for slime.

With no bottom paint I'll have what looks/feels like a sparse sandy grit on my hull after only 6days in the water (maybe a dozen grains per sq ft). It falls off after being on-shore for a few days. If it's in the water for 3weeks+ I'd have to scrape it off and there'd be 3x as much. They're in the reef makin' business. Not weekend fun.

I haven't had a boat that I've left in the water for long, aside from my sailboats which never came ashore and require a different(from power boats) type low speed ablative type paint with a biocide to repel barnacles and kill/impede the algae. Interlux shark white ablative w biocide was the cocktail of choice on sailboats and it'd last 2 full seasons between re-paint.

Apparently the salesmen from the original post have boats in a lake with NO living organisms. Sounds like bliss......or a pitch to sell rack space. From the recent news in another spot, like Toledo I'm guessing they're having a little algae problem in that area.....YIKES. I'd call that hyper-aggressive growth. Bottom paint won't fix that.

Mike

TikiHut2

Again....depends. I've seen boats hauled after 2-3 seasons that have bottom paint without a proper barrier coat but also have tiny blisters here and there. Once it begins it expands and will ruin a hull/boat if not hauled and opened to dry out for months. The only way to fix it is to strip the hull bare and apply a proper barrier coat after the fact = $$$$$$.

Others might last years and years with little damage. The nautical moral to bottom prep is that gelcoat, although tough, is not a barrier coat and osmosis will occur on boats left in the water continuously unless the hull is properly sealed. Growth prevention is the secondary protection provided by bottom paint.

.....all that coming from a guy who tired of doing both and trailers now.

Mike

JoeStang

276 owner here, and my salesman was John (from Hideaway, largest Rinker dealer). He told me the same thing, but I wasnt 100% sold either.

So I called Randy Rinker. Verbatim his words were "we use vinylester resin, so a barrier coat is NOT needed. Blisters will NOT be a problem. You'll have algae growth and could lose a little speed, but it will not hurt the bottom. A powerwash plus some chemicals in the fall and it'll be white as new".

Now, I boat in fresh water so barnacles are not a concern. We get algae and zebra mussels on a boat sitting a lot. I wet-slipped all last year and so far this season with no blister issues.

Does the bottom get green and fuzzy? Sure. So about once a month I'll throw on a snorkel mask and scrub the bottom with a brush on a pole and it gets 90% of it off. There's still a yellow stain, but no growth. At the end of the season I'll powerwash and have to scrub it again with some bottom cleaning chemical, and it'll look like new. Every so often I'll get a couple mussels in the trim tabs pocket, and I'll have to knock them free. I dont think bottom paint would prevent them, though.

I will say that the more you use the boat the cleaner the bottom will stay, even without paint. Last year I put on 50 hours and went out during the week quite often. This year I've only put on 25 hours so far and no weekdays, so the sitting for a week or two without moving definitely promotes faster growth.

If I never planned on getting a trailer or lift, then yes I would barrier coat and bottom paint. I am hoping to buy some waterfront property in the next couple years so that will allow me to keep the boat high & dry all the time.

Rack storage is an option, but I really like the convenience of a private marina. We can come & go as we please and can hang out on the boat without leaving the slip if we shoose.

I have not noticed any speed change even with a fully fuzzy bottom. I'm not setting any speed records though with 6500lbs and a 350 Mag, so it cruises 25-30mph regardless of load or bottom condition.

frenchship

In the 1980 to late1990 the type of gelcoat used by the manufacture was  unsaturated polyester resin not as good as what is used today for manufacture who used epoxies resin. Most thickness of gelcoat is about .5mm to .8mm. Thicker than this will cause some spider web in stress area.But most manufacture do not mention the type used or thickness.

MarkB

He bottom coat will keep the bottom clean. You can easily lose 5 mph and fuel economy with bottom growth, even in fresh water. I think a good bottom coat adds to the value of the boat, in my opinion. 

Michael T

Vinylester resin even with tridirectional fab mat that is vacuum bagged and heat cured (which Rinker does not do) will not stop water penetration into gel coat. Water penetration into gel coat will start the minute your hull is placed into the water. Gel coat is NOT a water barrier. Waxing the hull with a high quality hand applied and hand buffed wax will slow water poenetration. The quick wipe on/off products are almost useless.  Any slaesman with an IQ higher than a barnacle knows that bottom coat applied to a new boat is a tremendous selling feature (The old wives' tales about bottom coating were that they were applied over older hulls that had a problem - not an issue in your case). I advise you to have the bottom of your hull - cleaned to remove mold wax, 3 coats of high-quality epoxy barrier coat flash applied and a final epoxy bottom coat (the black that you see) applied. Your hull will last forever, attract less growth and any growth that it attracts will be much easier to remove. BTW using spray washers with acid is IMO  terribly hard and harsh on gelcoat. If you plan to keep the boat for up to 5 years and want the best re-sale price, bottom coat is the way to go. A local expert can recommend the best final coating. MT

TikiHut2

MT has posted insight on this topic that's absolutely 100% right on target. Marketing hype otherwise, is simply hype. Go bare and rack/lift store it or go all the way, there's really no shortcut if the boat's in for more than a few weeks. 

I especially liked the "IQ of a barnacle" part. .

Subtle but direct.....lol

jollyrodgers

Why would a reputable dealer push " no bottom paint bc it makes resale difficult "?

JC290

jollyrodgers said:

Why would a reputable dealer push " no bottom paint bc it makes resale difficult "?

What dealer are you working with? 

JoeStang

So what motive does Rinker have? There are LOTS of boats up here in the Great Lakes that are wet-slipped and dont have bottom paint. I dont see tons of used boats for sale with blisters all the time. Most of the few I've seen with blisters are from the 80's & early 90's.

Now thats not to say you could leave a brand new boat in the water for 6 months every year, for 20 years, and never get any water intrusion. But lets not go overboard and say that blisters happen after a few weeks in the water. My boat is proof of that.

JoeStang

To me its kind of like washing & waxing your car. Is it better to have some protection, of course. But I know lots of people up here in the salt belt that never wash or wax their car and 10 years later its just fine. Yeah it needs a buffer to get it looking nice, but its not rusting away like a car from the 80's would have.

I could probably find DOZENS of 28'+ cruisers and runabouts that were wet-slipped for the past 10 years up here and the gel coat is just as blister free as when they were new.

TikiHut2

Fair enough JS. "A few weeks" was probably too extreme even for the worst mfg. and your car analogy is right on.  

I admit that I recently learned that blisters aren't ALWAYS the only indicator for water intrusion/osmosis. A compromised hull is really only known with a meter in the hands of a competent surveyor. I even questioned my well seasoned surveyor a few years ago on why we'd bother meter testing on a hull that had obviously/supposedly spent its life in dry storage and looked perfect to the scrutiny of my salty eye. I was schooled that even the best visual inspection is no true indicator of a hull that's compromised with water intrusion. 

Speaking for myself, I suppose I'll ALWAYS have a moisture test with a survey at the purchase no matter how good a hull looks and if I intend to leave it at a dock for a season or more it'll have a barrier coat and bottom paint on it if only for the peace of mind..... I guess I'm just an old school boat guy that figures if the hull is compromised then we can stop there because everything else attached to it is irrelevant. If it doesn't have a barrier coat then the marketing hype from the new-and-improved gelcoat guys better be absolutely 100% guaranteed.......which it may be?

I hate doing bottom paint because I've spent so much time scraping/grinding/stripping/applying/breathing that mandatory and wretchedly caustic stuff. I'm done thinking about it too. Mike

JoeStang

RinkerYan said:

Send me a picture of one

http://detroit.craigslist.org/okl/boa/4600045488.html

That took 30 seconds on craigslist. That boat is too big to trailer and was likely kept in the water all season. There are LOTS of boats up here in St Clair that sit in the water for the 6 month season and dont have paint.

I'll take some VERY VERY detailed pics end of this season. If I have a bottom covered with blisters I'll eat my words (and Rinker will be getting a letter). I am confident that wont happen though.

Now guys, please dont misunderstand. I am NOT saying bottom paint/barrier coat isnt a good idea, especially for larger boats (30'+) that are not easy to trailer or put on a lift/rack storage.

I'm just saying that its not like blisters appear after a season in the water if the gel coat is done right at the factory.

There are people like me (and the OP) that have a boat that is right on the edge of not really being trailerable. However, it is reasonable to expect that the next owner would love to trailer his 276, and the bottom being painted could be a negative. Did the original owner paint the bottom to hide damage, blisters or other? What if he has a home on the lake and wants to put it on a lift? Now he either has to look at ugly bottom paint or pay to have the bottom gel coated. You dont think that would affect the selling price?

I'd wager that water getting into the hull in such a volume to register on a meter is MUCH more likely due to leaky thru-hulls, un-covered cockpits, and constantly wet bilges. Do a quick google search on blisters due to sitting in the water for a season without paint, and then search for rotten transom, or soft cockpit flooring, or water intrusion on the cabin deck. Tell me which one has much more results and is still an actively occurring problem.....

On a side note. My next boat will NOT have bottom paint, unless its is easily proven that it was done professionally and recently. A lot of guys just slap on paint without the proper prep and then they have patches flaking off mid season. After 3 or 4 coats now they have an ugly buildup of failing paint and probably promoted blisters due to sanding the OEM gel coat. I'd rather see the bottom for myself to make sure it is defect free and pay a pro that will do the job right.

JoeStang

Its a big price to pay for a 5 month season! I'd much rather be forced to paint it and have year-round use of the water.

But in all reality its still definitely better to barrier coat & paint if its going to spend its life in the water all season. I was just saying its not a (blister) death sentence for a newer boat to spend some time in the water.