Antifouling with Hot Chili Powder . . .

[Mike43]

Originally Posted by fstbttms

If adding chili powder was an effective method to improve the efficacy of anti fouling paint, everybody and their brothers (including the paint manufacturers) would be doing it. This idea has been around for decades at least and yet for some reason, has failed to catch on. Hmmm, I wonder why...

Sometimes large companies won't do R&D because cheap readily available products have no profit margin for them no matter how good they are.
Research DMSO to see why Pharmaceutical companies don't market this as a FDA approved drug.

I listen to everybody and then form my own opinion

[swagman]

Originally Posted by Mike43

Sometimes large companies won't do R&D because cheap readily available products have no profit margin for them no matter how good they are.
Research DMSO to see why Pharmaceutical companies don't market this as a FDA approved drug.

I listen to everybody and then form my own opinion

Big companies? How big do you think one has to be to produce / sell paint?
Seriously - do you not wonder why everyone 'hears' of others doing this and no one actually has seen it working? If it worked, I'd start making paint and clean up (a pun). Sadly, it seems it doesn't.
JOHN

[boatman61]

Well I use a white vinegar and bleach mix to clean decks that have been ignored for a long time (just about every boat I've bought).... works a treat.
Some one watching me treat a deck said "Wow... you should market that stuff.."
I got really excited thinking I might finally be on my way to my 1st million.... for about 5 minutes... then I figured it would'nt work.... two simple ingredients...
Why should they buy my product when they can knock up their own more cheaply...
Ahh well....!! Back to the sketch pad......'sigh'

[reiner]

Originally Posted by Jim Cate

Hi Reiner,

Just a cautionary note on interpreting the results of your experiment: because boats left in a fixed marina berth most of the time get different sun exposure on different parts of the bottom, they often will have different degrees of fouling on different areas, even with identical paints. So, while your experiment is interesting, I doubt if it will provide substantive information! But good onya for trying!

And just what sort of chilli did you use? Ground Habenero's from the Yucatan would likely be the best, but are hard to find here in Oz.

Hope that all is going well with the H-28, and that you have gotten in some good sailing as well as bottom painting. We may be through Manly in the next week or so, and if we do stop, we'll look ya up.

Cheers,

Jim and Ann s/v Insatiable II lying Big Woody Island, Great Sandy Straights, Qld, southbound

Hi Jim
Samantha did say exactly that......we might have to turn the boat every few weeks. :-)
The Chilli powder we bought from one of the Islander shops.....I know it is very hot but have no idea where it comes from.
We have plans to do a better experiment painting some bits of wood with different additives and hang them of the pontoon.
But that was after some glasses of "grape juice" .....lets see if that happens.
H28 is great and we done lots of sailing. Not many weekends where spend on land.
It would be good to catch up and please say Hi to Ann.
cheers
Reiner and Sam

[skipmac]

Originally Posted by boatman61

Well I use a white vinegar and bleach mix to clean decks that have been ignored for a long time (just about every boat I've bought).... works a treat.
Some one watching me treat a deck said "Wow... you should market that stuff.."
I got really excited thinking I might finally be on my way to my 1st million.... for about 5 minutes... then I figured it would'nt work.... two simple ingredients...
Why should they buy my product when they can knock up their own more cheaply...
Ahh well....!! Back to the sketch pad......'sigh'

Because people are lazy and easy to fool.

Windex = ammonia + a few drops of surfactant (soap) + blue food coloring.

Make your own for less than half what it costs to buy but very few bother.

So, mix it up, add some blue (or your favorite color) and a fancy label (with a few outrageous claims as to it's efficacy) and voila!

Just remember me when you're rich and famous.

[VirtualVagabond]

Originally Posted by boatman61

Well I use a white vinegar and bleach mix to clean decks that have been ignored for a long time (just about every boat I've bought).... works a treat.
Some one watching me treat a deck said "Wow... you should market that stuff.."
I got really excited thinking I might finally be on my way to my 1st million.... for about 5 minutes... then I figured it would'nt work.... two simple ingredients...
Why should they buy my product when they can knock up their own more cheaply...
Ahh well....!! Back to the sketch pad......'sigh'

Boatman,
Damned if I know, but in 2008 U.S. bottled water sales topped 8.6 Billion gallons! And paying up to $2.00/bottle for what the tap delivers for $0.01...

Imagine sitting in Coca Cola's board room when some idiot comes up with the idea of selling coke with all the ingredients missing, except the water, and selling it for more!

People are idiots.... all you have to do is find a way to make your deck cleaner irresistably 'cool'

[GordMay]

Originally Posted by Mike43

Sometimes large companies won't do R&D because cheap readily available products have no profit margin for them no matter how good they are.
Research DMSO to see why Pharmaceutical companies don't market this as a FDA approved drug.
I listen to everybody and then form my own opinion

No - but bottling companies like Coke & Pepsi, have done an incredible job of developing a market (28 billion bottles each year, according to the Beverage Marketing Corporation) for DMSO.

[Goingbuddha]

One possibility is to use one of a group of chemicals called avermectins. These are antiparasite agents (the most familiar is called, confusingly, ivermectin) that are used against fleas and gut worms. They also, according to Hans Elwing of the University of Gothenburg, in Sweden, prevent barnacle colonies from taking hold by stunting their growth. A barnacle that runs into the chemical finds it cannot bind as strongly to the surface. Only a tiny amount, about one part in a thousand of the paint by weight, is needed, and other marine species are not, as far as can be ascertained, affected.

from: Technology monitor: Reducing the barnacle bill | The Economist

[Neeltje]

That's the problem with you Anglo-Saxons; you don't know the first thing about cooking.

Any self-respecting Frenchman knows full well that chilly peppers just don't go with molluscs.

In this case, what you need are Basque Espelette peppers. Just ground them up and let them macerate in virgin olive oil for a couple of days before applying to the hull, and when you scrape the barnacles off, you can pan fry them and have a tasty treat within minutes.

Works equally well with eels and frogs, but there, I digress.
Jacques

[Neeltje]

PS - As far as "bottled water" is concerned, the spring water from Luchon (my Dad's home town in the French Pyrenees) was so notorious for giving tourists the 3-day runs that even the Larousse Dictionary ended up "having the Luchonaise" as one of several alternative contextual forms of "having diarrhea".

Now, they bottle the stuff and sell it worldwide for it's "cleansing effect".

Jacques

[fisherman.ben]

I tried it on the dingy, totally failed. with in a month I had all kinds of barnacles and mussels and sea weed growing on the bottom. maybe I did it wrong, but by july I had to sand and use real bottom paint on it. (was kinda bummed, hoped I could get away from 100 dollar a gallon bottom paint, but no.)

[captmike2]

I heard Cayenne pepper will deter barnacles so I will try this summer in New England. Thanks folks!

[fstbttms]

Originally Posted by captmike2

I heard Cayenne pepper will deter barnacles so I will try this summer in New England. Thanks folks!

A waste of good Cayenne.

[boatman61]

Originally Posted by captmike2

I heard Cayenne pepper will deter barnacles so I will try this summer in New England. Thanks folks!

You'd do better buying the fresh peppers and pressing them to extract the juices/oils and mix those in your medium..
Or, blend them into a liquid form and add to your paint, allow it marinading time before application.

[redneckrob]

Originally Posted by useDaGreyMatter

No telling. Just a guess but the thought occurs, maybe because it is to easy and cheap and if every one did it they would not need to pay through the nose for anti fouling paint? Not saying I'm right, just saying its a thought.
Seems to be the logic on a lot of things people depend on corporate for but could do cheap and easy them self. That seems to be the pattern I've noticed, 3rd world or poverty stricken cultures find ways to accomplish cheap or even for almost free what we spend large amounts of cash to do. Twenty years ago people said the same thing about straw bale homes, solar electric, etc.

Twenty years ago solar power was over $10/watt. Billions of dollars and an insane amount of effort by a huge number of people has brought it down to less than $1.00/watt. That's not adding chili pepper to your bottom paint. The equivalent would be that sub $1.00/watt solar was available 20 years ago and inexplicably only poor people used it, and that's just now how it happened.