Wilbur Hubbard wrote:
wrote in message
...

The next major project was to clean off the bottom of the boat so we could
do a new bottom coat.

Between the blister repairs we did in our original,
We'll also be doing a new barrier coat - special paint which will keep
water
away from the fiberglass, which can aborb moisture, leading to blisters,
later. We've taken most if not all of the barrier coat which was applied
over a "peel job" (removing all the original gel coat, the factory means
of
applying a barrier to the fiberglass during manufacture) at a very long
time
ago in a prior owner's history, during our blister repairs in our initial
refit

Dear skip
please describe your bottom history.
im very interested in you "peel job" and "barrier coat" and blister
job... and how your bottom looks now?


You should be able to imagine the hapless "Flying Pig's" condition yourself
if you've spent time in various boatyards.

"Flying Pig's" bottom, after having been stripped (peeled) of paint as
Skippy indicated he was doing, would look like a patchwork of
roundish-outlined epoxy blister repairs with some new smaller blisters
rearing their ugly heads in between. Also readily visible are the largish
repairs using polyester resin and matt where he's run aground several times.
Most notable would be on the port side rounding of the bilge where the "Pig"
lie on her side pounding on a rocky shelf in the Florida Keys that he would
never have grounded on if he were paying attention to navigation. Also in
evidence would be way too many tired through hulls (probably about 12-18 all
told) for various unnecessary systems which through hulls probably ALL need
replacing at this stage due to electrolysis, oxidation and galvanic action.
Some of them are probably little more than soft lumps of patina at this
stage.

For a blistering boat bottom, a barrier coat is but a band aid that doesn't
usually work so well as moisture already in the layup will remain there
under the barrier coat where it will still fester and pop up new blisters.
The only effective way to get rid of the moisture in the layup is to store
the boat on the hard in Canada where humidity is low and winters are
brutally cold. About two years of dry storage using heat lamps in the
summertime will dry out the soggy lay-up sufficiently so then and only then
is an epoxy barrier coat of greater worth than dubious.

I hope this helps.

Wilbur Hubbard
Master of "Cut the Mustard" (no blisters-ever!)



So, if we stored you in Canada for a couple of years, all those
festering pustules on your body would go away and Jessica would visit?

:)