Applying a name to an inflatable and outboard.

[Boracay]

We have a very common looking grey hypalon inflatable with a very common 5hp outboard.

I worry that if I leave it for some time (more than an hour or so) I'll look up and see it zooming off into the distance. It's not that hard to cut through a chain or cable.

I can then imagine the look on my friendly constables face as I tell him my inflatable and outboard with no identifying marks has been "borrowed".

So I would like to apply some sort of distinctive name to the side of the inflatable and possibly to the outboard as well. If done neatly and in the right scale it shouldn't look too bad.

I'll probably give the Admiral free reign to come up with the name, but I wonder :-
1) Should I use some sort of "inflatable paint" or would those stick on vinyl letters work. Is there a generic paint (e.g. polyurethane) that can be sprayed onto hypalon, is there a primer, should the hypalon be cleaned or roughed up first?
2) Does anyone have any ideas about painting an ID on the outboard?

The idea is to make it so distinctive that anyone thinking of borrowing it would have serious second thoughts. The Police might look for an inflatable with dayglow letting but would not worry about a grey one with a black outboard.

[Microship]

I used these guys a few years ago for a nameplate on my Delphin inflatable, and was very pleased. I've since sold that dink (and its Corsair 36 mothership) but during the year or so that I had it the name stayed very firmly attached.

Cheers,
Steve

[MarkJ]

Originally Posted by Boracay

I'll probably give the Admiral free reign to come up with the name, but I wonder :-
1) Should I use some sort of "inflatable paint"

Hi Chris!

Hope you guys are well

Nickerty was given the Dink Naming & Paintin Project and she found a tiny little can of the Airfix paint that was in the bottom of my toolbox from when I was a kid making model areoplanes. Its never peeled!

Lil' Dink is now original and not the sort of thing someone wants to steal! Not for the dink and sure not for the 3.3hp on the back!

Do NOT name your dink: Tender to Sea Life etc... cos if you do the burglars see it at the dinghy dock and know which boat is vacant!!!!!!

Someone who boaught a new 15hp outboard (these 15hps are stolen faster than they can go!) wrote to Mercury and got the Decals for a 6 HP! And then scuffed the whole OB and put them on . Its never been stolen

So in short: Make you dink look like crap!!!!!!!!!!!!


Mark

[bstreep]

Vinyl stick on letters won't work. You can buy a lettering kit from WM or Defender. They are for registration numbers, but the can of paint works VERY well.

[Sterling]

you're going about this the wrong way. just paint the whole thing pink and no one will steal it. problem solved!

[Jim Cate]

We got a small stencil cut by a place that did crating for shipping, but you can make your own. Then used a vinyl-based spraycan paint and painted names/rego numbers on a series of dinks, oars, life jackets, MOB bouys, etc. The painted numbers/names lasted years on the Hypalon material, even in the tropics.

Cheers

Jim and Ann s/v Insatiable II

[rtbates]

Originally Posted by Sterling

you're going about this the wrong way. just paint the whole thing pink and no one will steal it. problem solved!

I was thinking large pink dots on both the dink and the motor. Easy to spot, less likely to be stolen AND would be thieves can't link the dink to it's mothership. Having the dink with the mothership's name is an invitation to thieves to know you coming and goings.

[bene505]

Havent' done it, but been thinking along similar lines: Use a BIG (4 foot wide) orange stripe diagonally down the whole center of the dinghy, tubes, floor, inside, outside and everything. Then you can browse google earth the see if you can find it on some not-to-distant shore or behind a sailing vessel. Or more realistically, you could rent a plane and fly around looking for it.

Or get some patches and start patching it up. Or buy a used one.

[MarkJ]

Originally Posted by bene505

Or more realistically, you could rent a plane and fly around looking for it.

.

Thats funny!