Barnacles

[Tony]

I have just taken my H240 out of the (salt) water for the first time in 4 months. The bottom had quite a few barnacles. I guess I need to re-paint the bottom. I scraped them off with a paint scraper, but it was difficult to remove them entirely. How do you get off the pieces of barnacle that stick to the boat? Is there a product out there for this purpose, or is it just elbow grease? Tony H240

 

[Bill]

That tough, huh?

I've never had that much trouble! I use a brush or if needed a plastic scraper to remove growth before it turns to barnacles, i.e., every 3-4 weeks thru the summer. The marina people here who put the paint job on the bottom told me when they did it that metal takes the paint off. I find barnacles occasionally, but they pop off pretty easily. Hard to imagine that the barnacles in FL are that much tougher than those in SC. Is it the paint? I wonder.

 

[Sean Coerse]

Pests

I also keep my boat in salt water (Chesapeake Bay). It is bottom painted with Micron CSC every other year. During the summer a couple times a month I use a green scrub pad on the bottom. I do this because I race on Wednesday nights. Occasionaly I will come across a soft barnacle, but the pad takes them off without a problem. I imagine that if they are allowed to harden on the boat after it is taken out of the water that they would be more difficult to deal with. The place I get them the most is at the leading edge of the centerboard.

 

[Janet Ory]

Keep them off!!

I have had a couple of sailboats that have been kept in saltwater all the time and have found that if you put cayenne pepper in the paint, the barnecales will stay off it. They don't like the taste. Of course, eventually the pepper loses its umph, but our sailboat has been in the saltwater for over 4 years and when pulled out last month, she doesn't even need any work, just maybe a very light paint job.