The mast is painted!!

[guidera48]

Finally a nice day without scorching heat or buckets of rain. Goodby Irene. After moving the paint day several times, the forecast was for a clear Sunday in the aftermath of Hurican Irene. By Friday it was clear it was not going to land in S.C. so we made plans for Sunday morning. Busy, busy day. First a good scuff all over, then aluminum primer, then filler touch ups, a wipe and a blow, then primer tinted white, then lunch. A good wet sand with 400, a wipe and a blow. Then 2 coats of white Dupont 2 K Urethane, wet on wet. Finished about 4, just in time to let it dry before the night dew gets on it. Looks great. Now it is time to get it all back together. If I could only remember where I stored all the parts!
I love it when a plan comes together.

Jose

 

[rardiH36]

Jose:

Beautiful! Better than new!

If I might ask, what brand/type of aluminum primer did you use? Also did the mast have any pitting/corrosion spots (such as around stainless steel fittings) that you couldn't sand/grind back to fresh Al metal? If so, how did you treat these areas?

Thanks,
Rardi

 

[Ed Schenck]

That's just not fair! Suspended at work height from a fork lift so you didn't have to turn it? With good spray equipment? And I'm on my knees trying to get the bottom side with a 2" paint brush. I'll not be posting any pictures of mine after seeing those. What a nice outcome.

 

[rhythmsurfer]

Looks great Jose. Glad the storm didn't give yall too much trouble.

 

[guidera48]

Hi Rardi. As you can see on the first picture, the mast needed to be painted. However, the only areas I found realy pited where under the halyard exit boxes and under the spreader brackets. It was obvious before I even started taking it apart that these areas needed to be cleaned. I guess 30 years of disimilar metals takes it's toll. The paint was flaking off and aluminum corosion was present. I had 90 screw holes welded shut ( I removed 15 steps @ 6 screws per step) I cleaned all the welds and the pitted areas with a 180 flapper wheel on a hand grinder. Later on, I used a sandblaster (with very fine silica) to get inside the pits only were needed. (under spreader bracket and halyard exits) Used a D.A. sander with 80 and 120 to go over the whole thing. Used very little filler just to smoth out the deeper pits only where needed. The aluminum primer was a PPG product and had a very light, translucent green color. I ordered all the suplies from the local automotive paint suplier.
Sorry ED. Wish you were closer. Would love to help. A good foam 4" hot dog roller with interlux paint does great on a mast also. I am sure that it will look like a million box when you are thru. Just take your time and sand between coats.

 

[Ed Schenck]

Now I am excited! If I can get the mast to look like the spreaders I just this hour painted, then wow! Not a single brush stroke nor run. Pictures can't do it justice due to size of the pic and the poor light. You'll have to take my word for it.

If I could thin the Perfection enough could I get it not to run but still have time to keep the wet edge? This has to be done about a foot at a time for the whole circumference of the mast. If so then I could run to the winches to turn the mast side to side. I could get much better coverage than crawling under it.

 

[MLampner]

Jose congratulations it is a thing of beauty. Ed seems like you are off to a good start.

 

[Ed Schenck]

Jose, what about the sail track? I assume you have it off of the mast and are painting it separately. Will it go back in the slot?

Since I am brushing I am hoping one coat of Perfection is enough. Nothing shows through on those spreaders. Today I will paint the small boom. What do you think, any advantage to a second coat?

 

[rardiH36]

Ed:

Eve though your mast is looking good with one coat, I would do two. Reason isn't the first thing to come to mind, but it has happened to me. Granted for my Perfection cabin top job, I mixed Interlux's "flattening agent" into the Perfection to give me a semi-gloss outcome which I preferred. Flattening agent is clear and is needed up to 50/50 for max gloss reduction. This reduces the opacity of the Perfection itself. All was fine until about 1.5 years later when yellow splotches began to show up in my originally Mediterrenean White finish. What was happening is that UV penetrates through the Perfection onto the underlying epoxy primecoat. The epoxy primer yellows in the sun. Conversations with Interlux tech department confirmed that this could happen. I put on three coats of the Perfection + Flattening Agent which would give the protection of about 1.5 coats of unflattened Perfection. I am thinking that without two coat on your mast, you might not have enough opacity to prevent the same yellowing Primecoat as I had from eventually showing through.

Just a thought.

 

[rardiH36]

Hello Jose:

Thanks for taking the time to describe your process and to post the pictures.

I had asked, because I wasn't totally successful a couple of years ago painting Perfection on my boom. I did this with the boom still on the boat (but with all fittings removed except for the gooseneck and at the boom end). Eventually I will need to do again because any area that was pitted has bubble up again from underneath. I was hoping that you found a primer that would pacify the hard to reach oxidation without the need to get right down to fresh metal.

Guess there is no short-cut.

regards,
Rardi

 

[Ed Schenck]

That's some good info Rardi. I just now did the staysail boom. On that much area the thin spots are more obvious. And I have trouble mixing a small enough amount of paint. I mixed about 1/3 of a cup. There was too much left over so I put a second coat on those spreaders. And still had to throw some away. I thought maybe their recommendation for two coats was just to sell more $50. quarts of paint.