how to paint a boat while it's on the trailer

[austin]

I"m looking to paint my Oday 222 while it's on the trailer, and I don't know what steps to take or what paint to look for. I'm looking to paint the entire boat, as well as below the water line. Thanks..

 

[Paul (Affinity C320)]

Paint on trailer

Austin,When I had my 22 O'Day, I used a car jack to jack up the front, painted and then put it down on plastic wrap and then painted the back.I seem to recall I had to put a 2X6 or something on the trailer frame.Now, if you are going to just trailer, I think you can forget about it. You can get advice on paint from any store that sells paint for boats or check out the Interlux site on the WEB. Interlux will help you out on all kinds of paint.Paul

 

[robert taylor]

two ways i know

i pulled next to a tree and ran a line around the tree and back to a winch. i cranked it tight to support the boat. i then unbolted the hardware on the opposite side and sanded and painted the boat. i repeated the process for the other side. another time, when i wanted to remove all gelcoat and redo the bottom with epoxy, i found four trees that were just right. i jacked the trailor up about four feet off the ground (one 4 x 4 at a time). i then attached come-alongs to the front bow eye and the two chain plates from the slpit backstay and cranked it up tight. i lowered the trailor and drove it out. it looked really strange to have a sailboat hung up in pine trees, but it stayed all winter while i did the work. reversed the process in spring and launched. the boat was an o'day 23

 

[oday 20 carver]

Boat stands

I found the link below a couple years back when needing to paint the bottom of my O'day 20. I didn't copy it word for word, but managed my own system. The boat came with 4 boat stands so I was able to jack up the back end of the boat with 2 of them. For the front, I made a box beam with (2) 2x4 x 12' and (2) 2x6 x 12' boards screwed together. I rested the box beam on top of the other 2 boat stands and hoisted the boat. The front stands need to be outside the width of the trailer. I was able to roll the trailer out from under the boat and block up the keel. I was even able to get the centerboard out enough to get about 90% of it painted.Now to figure out how I'm going to be able to get at the keel of my 25....Greg

 

[John Dawson]

The Mac procedure

A technique discussed way back was to jack up the boat and trailer together, block up the boat and then lower the trailer. This was developed for removing the trailer, but works great for just lifting the boat off the trailer enough to work on.