Visit our Popular Forums

phorvati · 01-05-2013, 06:20

So I am about to put the third and hopefully final coat of flag blue intelux on my hull above the waterline. I just thought I'd share some experiences/thoughts as it might save someone precious time and labor.
So far, here is what i did.
removed old awlgrip over the winter, it was cracking and faded, and falling off in few places.
Faired/sanded to 120Grit with porter cable 6" random orbit sander. Porter-Cable 97466 6-Inch Random Orbit Sander with Dust Collection - Amazon.com

Put 3 coats of primer(white).
Sanded with 220 after the last coat of primer. It took all day to remove primer orange peel.
First coat of interlux was applied a bit too generously. I rolled with these. http://www.jamestowndistributors.com...ut&part=116687
I tipped with a 3" ox-hair purdy brush(very soft brush). First horizontally, then vertically down. Coverage was excellent, but on few spots I had white streaks as i pressed too hard with the brush. Also some runs and sagging. Any place where a bit of a breeze picked up, paint cured faster then normal and leveling was not as good. Any place where I tipped too far back into the panted area, it caused it to not level very well.

So i had to sand it before next coat. I tried 220 power sanding, but it was clogging. What worked is taking out runs and sags with 320 by hand, then 400 with larger home-made Styrofoam sanding pad(about 7" by 15"). By the time I evened out the brush grooves there were large streaks of white primer showing through in some areas. At least i got it down to where you could no longer feel orange peel or brush streaks when feeling it by hand.
So that was a major undertaking, almost 12 hours of sanding to get it back to level by feel, and I ended up with some major white spots.

Learning from that mistake, I applied the next coat with a bit more reducer then 10%, putting a very thin coat, this stuff levels very well. I also had a helper rolling. I made sure only 1 vertical 9" section was rolled before tipping, and i tipped lightly maintaining a wet edge. I started at 11am in the shady side of the boat. That side looks amazing, there are areas where it looks like it was sprayed. The only problem was again one spot with runs, one place I noticed a brush hair was stuck but it was too late to do anything about it, and few places where white primer was still showing. Not too bad for a second coat, still need one more coat.
The bummer was that I had to wait till about 2PM for the other side to be in the shade. By then seabreeze picked up. Not to strong, just the usual breeze. And having wind made paint cure faster so this side ended up with evident orange peel, and some brush strokes. The good part is that I applied very thin coat, and it was very easy to wet sand with 400 grit to remove orange peel and brush strokes. About 2 hours of wet sanding for that side. I still have to wet sand the first side.

So for the (hopefully) last coat, I am tempted to reduce the paint 15-20% instead of 10%, hoping to get a better leveling effect. Prior to rolling, I'd like to first touch up the evident white areas that might show through the last coat. This way i ensure coverage. But I have to make sure I feather out those strokes otherwise they will show through the final coat.

Anyway, any thoughts would be appreciated.

Tim R. · 01-05-2013, 06:36

Use a vertical pain of glass to test your thinning. It should level nicely with no runs. The glass can be wiped and used to test multiple times.

See my website in my sig. I repainted the spars on my Ericson 35 with Perfection a few years ago.

**minaret** · 01-05-2013, 06:57

Definitely more reducer. If you still have primer showing you may not get coverage on this coat either. Just be glad you're doing blue and not a warm color.

bstreep · 03-05-2013, 09:41

We've found using more reducer with Perfection does result in a better finish. We also found that on large sections, we just rolled, without tipping. Here's our project, with photos.

http://www.cruisersforum.com/forums/...ion-96573.html

phorvati · 03-05-2013, 17:51

Nice photos bstreep. Yea, reducing helps a lot.
The problem with vertical pain of glass to test is that the sag was not immediate, it could be 10 minutes and later that you start seeing the sag. In my experience, you have to develop a feel for the amount of paint that will sag and the amount that is ok. Couple to that humidity, amount of reducer added to the paint, wind, sun and temperature, and you see why its a job best left to the pros.
Anyway, i'm done. This paint is not for everyone, there is big learning curve in using it, it levels very well, and runs like nothing I've used before. Its affected by the elements like nothing else i've seen, and learning as you go can turn into disaster. I was fortunate to not have hairs, bugs and dust land into it on this last coat, and i am very pleased how shiny and level the surface came out.
I ended up reducing it 20%. That helped the leveling even more. Light spots got covered pretty good. This time unlike the previous two, I only brushed one way, horizontal into the painted edge. I felt that if i was brushing two ways, I am impeding the paint's time-window it has to level. So I used a roller to make sure there is an even coat of paint, no missed spots, and no roller marks. Basically, my brush was used only to take out bubbles and what would become an orange peel. The weight of the brush itself is almost too much pressure and would leave grooves, so the feathering has to be so light, that brush barely touches the surface. Its an art. Any time I found myself using the brush to spread the paint or cover areas that had no paint, I got into trouble and ended up with brushmarks afterwords. Here are ew before and after photos, stern does not have the last coat yet.