Coppercoat bottom paint

[Capt Phil]

bobconnie... +1! No kidding, Phil

[Ewan Clark]

Hi Fstbttms – sorry for not responding to your earlier question, which having just trawled back through the thread I have now found. It was not a deliberate snub I assure you! You may not be a fan of Coppercoat, but when it comes to the performance of various AF’s in the SF Bay area your experience is indeed valuable.
I would advise you to contact Jim Edwards of Coppercoat USA (based in Florida) for details and examples of Coppercoat-treated boats in the US. He will have details of boats in all sorts of locations and may well be more useful than I can be in this situation. His email is jim@coppercoatusa.com
But I can say that a couple of weeks ago I was chatting to the owner of a Malo 42 in Antigua, and his 8-year old Coppercoat is still performing well and is on a par with the likes of Trinidad and Micron used on neighbouring yachts. He scrubs his boat twice a year to keep it clean, but finds this easier and less expensive than re-painting it each year. However a friend of mine with an Oyster yacht in the same location uses Seahawk with the TBT additive and over the short term this can give even better performance. But of course, for good reason TBT is banned by virtually every responsible authority and, for the sake of the seas, PLEASE don’t use it. (And before you ask, my friend bought this boat with the Seahawk already applied –it’s safe to say he won’t be reapplying it.)
It’s probably fairest to say that over any given 12 month stretch, on some boats and in some locations, Coppercoat will keep a hull cleaner than, say Micron 66. However, on other boats in other locations, the reverse is true. Either way, at the end of that time the Coppercoat treated boat will just need a wash, while the boat treated with Micron will need to be sanded and repainted. And I for one know which job is cheaper, quicker and less work.
The point you make about leach rates is interesting, and in some cases a lower leach rate can indeed mean worse performance. Just not always. What matters is not only the speed and total volume of biocide release, but also the exposure. Coppercoat provides a very copper-rich surface, a surface which marine life finds inhospitable. The amount of copper exposed is high, but the volume that leaches away is comparatively low. The epoxy holds on to the copper, so that the hull stays protected. We have to remember that our job is to anti-foul the bottom of the boat, not the bottom of the sea. (By comparison, a soft eroding anti-foul paint is designed to leach its contents quickly, so that approximately a year after application its biocides have fallen away from the hull and are sitting on the seabed.)
The clever bit with Coppercoat is that the epoxy is, simultaneously, sufficiently “strong” to contain the required mass and density of copper, sufficiently “porous” to allow the cuprous oxide to be produced and sufficiently “weak” at the surface to allow it to leach (and slough) away slowly. If you get this balance wrong, the performance of the coating suffers. The main reason why some other epoxy/copper systems have underperformed is because their resin chemistry was not appropriate. I’d like to think that over the last 20 years we have proven that it is possible (just not easy) to make a high performance anti-foul that lasts a long time and isn’t damaging to the environment.

[fstbttms]

Thanks for the reply Ewan, I appreciate it. I recently cleaned a boat here in the San Francisco Bay that had Coppercoat on the hull that was (despite the owner's insistance that the coating was only a few years old and had been dived relatively recently) so difficult to clean I had to charge him considerably more than I normally would. We don't see many boats with copper-loaded epoxies on their bottoms here, and I suspect the reason is that past examples of this type of coating have performed miserably in California. And honestly, the coating on this boat seemed no different. I find that anti fouling performance varies greatly with location however and I make no claims about how well your product performs elsewhere.

It would be nice to read some local anecdotes about Coppercoat (particularly from hull cleaners who service boats that are using it), or to see some testing results from California, if any exist. Perhaps your U.S. rep could be persuaded to chime in here.

[Ewan Clark]

I know that Jim Edwards has been very busy at the Annapolis Boat Show, hence he's probaly not been on this forum for a while. (You may get a quicker reply from his direct e-mail, but I can't promise!)

Coppercoat gained EPA approval in the USA about 4 years ago, so we are only just getting going over there. But we only applied for (and were granted) State approval in California one year ago, and I'm not fully up to speed with what has been put in place for sales/supplies in your approximate location. Again, Jim would be the man to ask, so I'll see what I can find out. I am not aware of any boats in SF using Coppercoat yet, and I wouldn't be surprised if it turned out that the boat you mention has a different copper/epoxy mix to ours (I known this sounds a little silly, but we have had people come to us at Boat Shows asking about their Coppercoat treatments only to discover that what they have is not our system at all). If you can provide me with the boat and owner details I'll happily look into it (a private message to ewan@coppercoat.com might be best for this).

As a quick aside, there is a boat cleaning company here called Sea-Lift 2 that offer a lift-and-clean service for boats up to about 65ft. They are delighted when a Coppercoat treated boat comes along as they find them quicker and easier to clean - so much so in fact that they are now discussing offering a discount to the owners of such Coppercoat treated boats.

[fstbttms]

Originally Posted by Ewan Clark

As a quick aside, there is a boat cleaning company here called Sea-Lift 2 that offer a lift-and-clean service for boats up to about 65ft. They are delighted when a Coppercoat treated boat comes along as they find them quicker and easier to clean - so much so in fact that they are now discussing offering a discount to the owners of such Coppercoat treated boats.

I have no doubt, as there are plenty of posters on this and other forums that report good results with Coppercoat. But again, what works well in one region may not in another. However I suppose it is possible that the customer was mistaken about his product. I'll see if I can get more info from him.

[skipmac]

Hi Ewan,

Any comments on performance in fresh or brackish water? I have occasionally kept my boat in rivers or estuaries for a couple of months at time and for traditional bottom paints some and some are not rated for fresh water.

[Sam Plan B]

What is the active ingredient in copper bottom paint? Is it actual copper powder or a copper based chemical?

[fstbttms]

Originally Posted by Sam Plan B

What is the active ingredient in copper bottom paint? Is it actual copper powder or a copper based chemical?

Typically cuprous oxide.

"Copper(I) oxide or cuprous oxide is the inorganic compound with the formula Cu2O. It is one of the principal oxides of copper. This red-coloured solid is a component of some antifouling paints. The compound can appear either yellow or red, depending on the size of the particles, but both forms degrade to copper(II) oxides in moist air.[1] Copper(I) oxide is found as the reddish mineralcuprite."

Copper(I) oxide - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[Ewan Clark]

Hi Skipmac - it's perfectly okay to use Coppercoat in fresh water. We don't actually see a big difference in performance when comparing fresh to salt water locations. In fact, the cleanest boats are often those that regularly swap back and forth from salt to fresh water. (I've even met some boaters that say that they move sufficiently regularly to get away with using no anti-foul at all - as whaterever grows on the hull while it is in one location dies and falls off when the boats moves to the other.)

As examples, we have scores of Coppercoat treated boats kept on the canals through France and the lakes of central Europe (Switzerland, northern Italy etc), and here in the UK the governments Environment Agency use it on their river boats. But as with the salt water based craft, an annual clean-off is still the norm in terms of upkeep.

[Blue Crab]

Originally Posted by lateral

Glad you can't & hope you get busted if you do.

I hear you Cap. I just don't have as much faith in the inherent goodness and wisdom of government regulations and administrators as some do.

Plus, take all the people in the US, say 350 million or whatever, add the 47 people in NZ, and you still have the other 6,650,000,000 folks on the planet dredging, dumping, and defiling daily. And using effective bottom paint.

Or put another way, there are ~196 countries on the planet. Deduct the 6 or so that regulate everything possible, and arguably "care" about the planet, one is left with 190 countries doing exactly as they please.

Doesn't make it "right" maybe but it is what it is. You know the story.

[fstbttms]

Originally Posted by Blue Crab

...there are ~196 countries on the planet. Deduct the 6 or so that regulate everything possible, and arguably "care" about the planet, one is left with 190 countries doing exactly as they please.

Yeah, except 57 of 'em have adopted the ban on tributyl tin. But keep telling yourself that it's OK to hate the environment and to do anything you want to it.

[Blue Crab]

Originally Posted by fstbttms

Yeah, except 57 of 'em have adopted the ban on tributyl tin. But keep telling yourself that it's OK to hate the environment and to do anything you want to it.

Well, I am suprised at that #. I guess I'm somewhat doubtful. Are they sincere about the ban or are they essentially signatories in line with our policies to ensure continued foreign aid, defense, access, whatever? Moreover, how do we know whether these 57 know or care about what's going on in the boatyards?

You always seem to have all the answers. If you have answers to those questions, I'd be interested. Otherwise not so much.

[fstbttms]

Originally Posted by Blue Crab

Are we using the the stuff on ships?

No. While the U.S. has not officially ratified the ban, it is abiding by it. And even if it weren't, most of the world does not allow vessels with TbT on their hulls to enter their territorial waters.

Originally Posted by Blue Crab

You start by being a community organizer.

You didn't need to include that little quip for me to know which way the wind blows your flag.

[muskoka]

We've had decent results with Coppercoat here in Hong Kong (sub-tropical). The boat still needs some attention from a diver to periodically remove the slime. There is also an odd propensity for barnacles to gather around through hulls so these are anti fouled with conventional paints.

I Coppercoated my catamaran for two reasons: Firstly, I hope there will be less stuff leaching into the water, and there will certainly be less of a mess getting hosed into the sea after a conventional haul out. Secondly, it's a hard anti foul and adds a little more speed to the boat.

It'll pay for itself over the long run. This autumn will be the one year anniversary of CC and if I'm happy with it I'll also do our motorboat. Will keep you posted!

Cheers

[fstbttms]

Originally Posted by Blue Crab

Why are you wasting your time underwater? With your apparent intellect, and anger er...determination and forcefulness, you could have a career in politics...

It dawns on me that if you earned your living in marinas, in the water, under boats (as I do), perhaps you'd have a better understanding of my "determination and forcefulness" regarding water quality issues. I wonder how you'd react if someone suggested painting the walls of your office with a product that they knew would give off a dangerous toxin? What if it was mentioned that until municipal sewage systems were guaranteed never to have spill events, everybody who was of a mind to should be able come and bust off a yam on the carpet in front of your desk at work?

You (and those who believe as you do) apparently have no problem with contributing to boating pollution. Unfortunately, I have to work in it.