"Short Wave Sportfishing" wrote in message
...
On Fri, 30 Nov 2007 18:53:33 GMT, "Delburt D"
wrote:

Hey guys,

We have a boat with the bottom painted with International Ultra Hard
antifouling paint. It is in rough shape and needs to be removed and
recoated. The International rep says we need to remove it completely.
Has
anyone had any luck with conventional paint strippers. I really do not
want
to sand it all off.

Thanks in advance.

I just had mine done - sandblast. You have to find a guy with the
expertise to remove bottom paint. Mine used a special gun with a
super fine grit (almost like talcum powder but gritter - like a
jewler's rouge) with low pressure. The results were amazing. You
will have to do some sanding after for reapplication, but it won't be
as tough.

http://www.swsports.org/images/Pictures/IMG_0010.JPG

http://www.swsports.org/images/Pictures/IMG_0011.JPG

You might have to find a blaster who uses glass beads - they make a
brittle bead for this purpose.

Soda blasting is another alternative, but it's messy as hell. Water
blasting isn't an option as you have to use too much pressure.

There are solvents out there like EP-Strip http://tinyurl.com/2orn2u.
But that's for normal paint - harder paint, or double/triple paints,
take more. Compared to blasting it's slightly more expensive - say
25%.

Hope that helps.

I am very leery of blasting since we have a wood boat. I have seen what
blasting does to wood if done wrong.
I used to work at the shipyard here in Portland and the local blasters were
right across the road. They ruined a lot of stuff. We also don't really
have that many yards that do the blasting. We have the ability to do the
stripping, I just want to be sure we use the right product.

Thanks for your input.

Tom