Painting Hypalon

[hellosailor]

Ann-
A half dozen sailors, a couple of jugs of cheap rum, haven't you ever played "Pin the tail on the RIB" ??

Hoo Ray! And up she rises!

This could replace Beer Pong as competitive sport, you know.(G)

[jcapo]

Originally Posted by Hudson Force

I have Liquid Rubber, Tuff-Coat and Flexithane left for me to choose from. I'll be reseaching these a little more before making a choice. Sometime in the future I'll post some before and after photos. I just hope the "after" photo is a success story!

What product did you wind up using and how is it holding up? I can't find a follow-up to this thread.

I have a 20 year old Avon RIB that holds air just fine but the fabric area on top of the tubes is showing its age. I would like to use this Urethane Coating that the river raft folks really like but 4 day the cure time out of the sun is a problem. All work on my dinghy has to be done on the foredeck.

I'm leaning towards using the Tuff Coat product probably with wear patches on the tube seating areas too.

[Hudson Force]

I used the Hengs rubberized roofing paint and I'm very pleased with the result.





I used a light buffing with a fine sandpaper for preparation.

[ErikFinn]

Originally Posted by Hudson Force

I used the Hengs rubberized roofing paint and I'm very pleased with the result.

I used a light buffing with a fine sandpaper for preparation.

How did you end up with that product choice please? I don't think that was any of your previous options earlier in the thread? Did you read some appraising review or had a recommendation or you had nothing to lose and wanted to expirement? Not trying to be funny, just very interested. Some of the Tuff gallon kits were crazy price, something like 600 bucks..

[roverhi]

Seem to remember someone thinned 5200 and painted the boat with that. Know 5200 sticks real well to hypalon as I have glued a patch on with it. Biggest obstacle is you are limited to white, black, and mahogany. No designer color in your future.

Originally Posted by hellosailor

I can think of a couple of problems. Hypalon is after all a "plastic" material and paint solvents can remove plasticizers causing rubber, plastics, etc. to crack and age prematurely, so you would want to make sure that any paint you use is compatible with hypalon.

Then there's whether it will bond to the hypalon. There are special adhesives (IIRC Bostich makes one, a urethane base with a special primer) for hypalon, and rubbers in general will stick, so you could buy a bottle of the special glue and a sheet of rubber (from McMaster, etc. if not locally) in a variety of colors (red, white, black) and glue something on. Paint can be removed or painted over--but gluing on something large...well, they won't be able to get that off, either.

[Hudson Force]

Originally Posted by ErikFinn

How did you end up with that product choice please? I don't think that was any of your previous options earlier in the thread? Did you read some appraising review or had a recommendation or you had nothing to lose and wanted to expirement? Not trying to be funny, just very interested. Some of the Tuff gallon kits were crazy price, something like 600 bucks..

Having kept inflatable dinghys for many years over the decades that we have been cruising, I am aware that they often begin to diffuse air with age without obvious leaks at seams or tears in the cloth. I've seen this happen after about ten years of exposure in Florida and the Bahamas.

I do not favor the use of covers or "chaps" because I don't want to deal with the dirt, mold, spider nests under the covers or the extra cleaning.

I selected the Hengs paint because I saw the outcome with it's use on other dinghys. because the application was quick & simple and because the price was low. I used this paint as a preventative measure on my dinghy that was old, but still sound and not leaking. This was in no way an experiment performed with "nothing to lose".

After about a year with the Hengs rubberized paint coating I have seen a number of small "crazing" cracks in the paint. I expect that there will be times when I will want to refresh the surface with an added thinned coat. The Hengs paint is easily thinned with water before application. I do not yet have any observations of the long term endurance of this coating.

I read back through this thread an noticed the three year lapse before the renewal of the discussion. My 8 year old dinghy was just over 10 years old when I made the final decision to use the Hengs paint. 'not a quick choice without much thought.

[atlroofman]

I have been a commercial roofing contractor for 30 yrs dealing with epdm, tpo, and pvc membranes. They do have a hypalon paint for rubber membranes. the biggest problem comes when people do not clean throughly and do not prime before coating. preperation is everything.

[anacapaisland42]

I'm using white rubberised roofing paint, goes on easy,lasts, is flexible, does show the dirt but I just repaint it, really cheap, (Home Depot/Lowes 5 gallon pails about $80 White Knight), when applied any leaks (inflated soft) show up as bubbles

Bill


PS That is on our POS Zepplin hard bottom Ribby, our 40 year old Achilles soft bottom inflatable used with 6 kids sailing in both salt and fresh water still doesn't need it and still no leaks....but it's too big for 2 of us





Has anyone had any experience painting a dink used in salt water?[/QUOTE]

[LifePart2]

Anyone got a follow up review of how their dinghy repaint has held up over the years?

[Pura Vida]

FWIW, mine lasted a few years until the dingy went into the dumpster. Not pretty but functional. I also painted a Giant Loop cantle bag for my off road riding. Again, not pretty but the paint has not come off despite the bag being constantly folded, unfolded and crashed on a handful of times. The West Marine part number, if it is still available, is 7775349.

[tomvandyke]

Here in Philippines I've had great results using an "elastomeric" paint brand called Primero. We used it on an old Avon RIB mainly for UV protection. Prepped surface really well by scrubbing with cleanser powder and wiped it down with acetone before painting. It's a water based paint of course so we thinned it out maybe 30% and applied two thin coats. Re-coated after a year just to make it look nice again but have had no problems with peeling or cracking. A friend recommended this and we're sold on it. We have a new 3.4m Orca CSM (hypalon) cloth RIB (similar to Highfield Ultra Light) which I'm likely going to paint with the same as it'll keep the weight down as opposed to using chaps. I do think an advantage to chaps is abrasion protection so thinking hard about that.