Bottom Paint Choices - PPG, Interlux, Petit

[sjcdwright]

I have Petit Horizons ablative going on 2 years now in So Fl and no fouling.

I spent January to June in the PR / BVI area and got over one inch of all round growth while parked in a marina for a month! and thereafter had to keep scraping and cleaning weekly in the BVI/USVI area.

Upon return to the bahamas in june and So Fl, all the growth just washed off and has not re-appeared to date . ! It will be 2 years old in Oct 2016.

So it goes to show that where you are / want to go is very important when selecting a paint.

Going back to Caribbean next year so also need a paint suggestion ?

s/v Tuesdays Child

[Seighlor]

My experience with Vivid involved regular (weekly) ocean sailing with my slip being at a marina having what is known as "brackish" water. That is, a mixture of fresh and salt waters. The marina is about ten miles from Ponce de Leon inlet on Florida's east coast and has a tidal influence of one to two feet vs. three to four feet in the immediate area of the inlet.

[stnick]

OF course not ! ask the US navy what it puts on its submarines ! Tin ! Never saw barnacles on a submarine !
You can get tin base bottom paint in the Caribbean and Mexico . What do you think the cruise ships are from other countrys for And cargo ships.
They just dont want the little boat owners to use it !

[fstbttms]

Originally Posted by stnick

OF course not ! ask the US navy what it puts on its submarines ! Tin ! Never saw barnacles on a submarine !
You can get tin base bottom paint in the Caribbean and Mexico . What do you think the cruise ships are from other countrys for And cargo ships.
They just dont want the little boat owners to use it !

You are sadly misinformed, chum.

1.- The U.S. Navy does not use tin-based paints on any vessels and if you took the five seconds necessary to think about it, you'd understand why. There is a world-wide ban on tin based paints in place, and almost all seafaring nations have ratified it. The Navy has business to do in these places but would not be allowed into port if their vessels were painted with an illegal anti fouling coating. While it is true that in the U.S., the Navy is exempt from anti fouling regulations, they have public relations concerns, just like any big business and they are actually on the forefront of developing non-toxic anti fouling solutions.

2.- No cruise ships from any country use tin-based paints, for the very same reasons I just listed above. Why would a cruise ship company paint the hulls of their vessels with a product, the use of which would mean those ships would be forbidden from entering the United States or any other country upholding the tin paint ban? Same goes for cargo ships.

3.- The fact that you can still buy tributyl tin-based anti fouling paints in certain third-world sh*tholes doesn't make using it something that any self-respecting sailor should consider doing.

You clearly haven't given this much thought. You certainly haven't researched your position on this.

[Galues]

We have used ABC for the last 12 years paint every year (mainly for maintance)start to loose a third to half a Knott after 8 months 8kt hull speed,used Jotun prior to that lost speed after 6 months ,we are constantly using our deep sea Commericial fishing vessel ,PPG ABC is known as one of the better anti fouling paints out there.

[BillyBobtx]

The marina here in the Corpus area recommends Pettit Trinidad SR as well as some experienced local contacts. I believe most have their eyes on Carib sailing.

When I told a local worker I was going with the color red he said that is great as red has a higher copper content. I think that may be old thinking as for at least Trinidad- the copper content appears to be the same for all colors (60%ish).

[fstbttms]

Originally Posted by BillyBobtx

The marina here in the Corpus area recommends Pettit Trinidad SR as well as some experienced local contacts. I believe most have their eyes on Carib sailing.

When I told a local worker I was going with the color red he said that is great as red has a higher copper content. I think that may be old thinking as for at least Trinidad- the copper content appears to be the same for all colors (60%ish).

It's not "old thinking," as it is true that (in general), darker colors have a higher copper content than lighter colors. Just how much more is not always easy to tell from paint can labels or even material data sheets. But the difference in copper content between (for instance) red and blue is relatively small and not really enough to provide a noticeable difference in anti fouling performance. IMHO.

[Cavalier]

Originally Posted by BillyBobtx

The marina here in the Corpus area recommends Pettit Trinidad SR as well as some experienced local contacts. I believe most have their eyes on Carib sailing.



When I told a local worker I was going with the color red he said that is great as red has a higher copper content. I think that may be old thinking as for at least Trinidad- the copper content appears to be the same for all colors (60%ish).

We're on year 3 of Trinidad Pro (which also has the slime resistance component of the SR) here in Texas. The bottom was scrubbed last week and there was no growth other than a little slime (ironically) that was simply wiped off.

Sent from mTalk

[fstbttms]

Originally Posted by BillyBobtx

The marina here in the Corpus area recommends Pettit Trinidad SR as well as some experienced local contacts. I believe most have their eyes on Carib sailing.

BTW- you may be aware that the slime retardant (Irgarol) historically used in Trinidad SR is no longer available. Pettit now uses PTFE as their slime resistant ingredient. While PTFE may (or my not) provide the same resistance to slime as Irgarol did (it certainly isn't doing it in the same way, if it does) I think Trinidad was an excellent anti fouling paint before the SR version was available and I see no reason to believe it won't continue to be after the departure of Irgarol. It continues to be one of the two anti fouling paints that I recommend.

[DDabs]

What is the other paint you recommend?

[fstbttms]

Originally Posted by DDabs

What is the other paint you recommend?

Interlux Micron 66

[first wind]

Originally Posted by bluetequila

About copper coat..?

copper is also toxic. that's why it works.

interesting point: you can't smoke out of a copper pipe or drink alcohol out of a copper cup. the chemical reaction is toxic.

although, also interestingly, arthropod blood is copper based (compared to our blood which is iron based). that's why caterpillar blood is green. copper oxide is green like iron oxide is red.

[first wind]

Originally Posted by billgewater

My own observations.
As antifouling success depends on variables such as boat use, salinity, water temperature, turbidity, oxygen and local nutrient levels, then local advice may be best.
The worst failure of antifouling I have personally seen was at Hout Bay in South Africa. It seemed that stuff grew in front of your eyes. Crystal clear cold water! Nothing seemed to work.

i don't doubt it. the cold benguela current is very nutrient rich.

[slowpoker]

Last time bottom was painted, I used Trinidad hard copper epoxy type paint in blue but also added a couple of day's worth of grinding a long piece of soft copper grounding wire into a coarse powder ( like grains of sand ) onto the second coat of paint, mixing it in the paint tray and rolled it on all over, as evenly as I could, then the third coat was without the granules of ground copper to 'glue down' the granules some more.
Got almost 5 years in the warm, barnacle prone waters of Tampa Bay and Gulf of Mexico, with occasional brush cleanings before seeing any barnacles. Just lots of slime and algae growth.
Yes, had to be done at a do it yourself yard and it was difficult to grind the copper wire on a grinding wheel which I had fitted a cowl to catch as much of the flying granules as possible.
It worked well for me, it's just more copper into the paint and lasted quite a bit longer than anything else. Maybe you could buy copper powder somewhere and mix it into the paint as best you can, it gets lumpy in places and have to thin it a little here and there.
Guessing I used 3/4 cups of copper filings per gallon of copper antifouling paint. Will do it again.

[fstbttms]

The copper you ground off of a length of pipe is not the same kind of copper used in anti fouling paint. Further, there is no evidence that simply dumping a random (or any amount) of copper filings into a can of anti fouling paint increases the effectiveness of that paint. If it did, the chandlery shelves would be stocked with expensive bags of copper powder. But they are not.

Same goes for chili pepper. It's a wive's tale.