Black spots all over boat in marina; do I have any recourse? How to clean?

[Leighpilot]

Sell the boat. It’s the best option you have. If you want someone else to pay you every time something goes wrong, sailing isn’t for you. There are three options in life when stuff goes wrong. It’s your fault , it’s someone else’s fault , it’s no ones fault. And in this case it’s not the marinas fault. Yet here you are trying to get the marina to pay for your bad luck. Sailing isn’t for you.

[Al.]

Looks like soot and or unburnt fuel to me.
We have had a similar thing happen twice in 10 years in differenr marinas.
First time we believe it came from a nearby trawler which had a refrigeration auxiliary engine running through the night.
The engine was sick and every time it loaded up belshed out a plume of smoke.
The night was still and a foggy morning compounded the issue.
Second time was similar conditions.
After periods of idling unburnt fuel can build upl in the exhaust system. Next big rev and out it comes. Heavy air will bring it down.
Your case may be different of course.

Not recomending this as its a personal decision, but we washed the boat twice using ordinary kitchen detergent and a broom with limited sucess. Then washed again with gumption disolved in a bucket of water and again a nylon broom.
Followed by a really good polish. We were not happy either but in our case a few other boats were affected too.
Compensation? We just had to suck it up as it is hard to definitavly prove. Cheers.

[weavis]

Originally Posted by Pete7

Also does a good job on the purple bird poo we have problems with at this time of year when they eat blackberries.

Pete

Purple bird poo? Oy!

Made me laugh.. Never seen that one but Im sure its a pain to clean up...

[weavis]

At this point the most important step is to clean the vessel. Do it soon so the gel coat remains intact.

[Holeinwater]

Originally Posted by Cool Hand Luke

I just stopped by the boat and there are hundreds and thousands of little black spots all over my boat (See Photos).

I pay a lot of money to the marina for the slip and something like this is unacceptable. It was literally clean and without those spots 3 days ago. What the hell could have happened?

Do I have any recourse with the marina? What should I tell them? I'm about to pay them a very large (over $5,000 USD) invoice for them and I'd love to be able to tell them to discount the invoice so that I could hire professional cleaning or for them to throw in the cleaning in the invoice amount.

See photos. Any help/recommendations will be greatly appreciated since I just spent this past weekend cleaning up the entire vessel.

Why don't you ask the Marina what the hell happened??
One time I went down to my Boat and it had what looked to me like Soot from a fire-- Sure enough I found out that a Business nearby had a fire overnight.. They sent a crew down to the Marina and they cleaned every Boat!!

[Tetepare]

Really? Not marinas fault but want to squeeze them anyway? Call Dr. Phil.

[Nani Kai]

Originally Posted by Woodland Hills

How on earth do you expect the marina management to be pollution cops for the entire neighborhood? Were they granted some sort of enforcement powers by the municipal authorities to be the local EPA? In what universe would you expect this to happen?
BTW, if you expect preferential treatment by a boatyard for spending a measly $20k, you are in for a rude awakening.....

What ever happened to customer service and courtesy? How much trouble would it be for the marina owner to check around a little? Maybe this has happened before and he has a pretty good idea where it came from. If it's a one off occurrence wouldn't he want to know why in the interest of his customers? At the very least he could express empathy for the boat owner and offer advice for the clean up. If he was a customer of mine and had just dropped $20k at my place I'd throw in some cleaning chemicals and a deck brush along with the advice.

[seatotaler]

Is your marina near an airport? My marina is only about a 10 minute drive away from an International airport and the aviation fuel deposits fall from the sky constantly. The only way to combat it is to wash the hull constantly. If I let it go 3 to 4 weeks which can happen during the wet and chilly winter months here on the pacific northwest then the only way to get it off is to kneel down and scrub. I haven't come across one product that works better than the other but I found liquid VIM to work pretty good. My boat has that chalky patina. Due to my busy life I just haven't found the time to get a good wax finish on it but I suspect that if the boat is well waxed the deposits would come off easier. The entire deck has to be scrubbed with a hard bristle small scrub brush. One square foot at a time. Often the size of the deposits are the size of a dime. But usually just millions of black dots. If I can stick to a routine of washing the deck at least once a week I don't notice it as much.

[Montanan]

[NormanMartin]

Some waxes react to pollutants and cause the black spots. I clean with Prism Polish and overcoat with Mirage. Works like a champ.

I have no financial interest in the product or its promotion. just a satisfied user.

[Montanan]

Be sure to listen and whistle to the proper nautical music when swabbing the decks to remove those hundreds or thousands of tiny black spots.

Then hoist a ration of rum, after the job is done.

Here is to the joys of owning a sailboat!



Link below to the .mp3 file for playing the music:

https://www.colonialdance.com.au/cms...-the-Decks.mp3





This song was played on the British ships that were taking convicts to Australia. Everyone was encouraged to be on deck to get air, sunshine and to dance.

[Dooglas]

Originally Posted by seatotaler

My boat has that chalky patina. Due to my busy life I just haven't found the time to get a good wax finish on it but I suspect that if the boat is well waxed the deposits would come off easier. The entire deck has to be scrubbed with a hard bristle small scrub brush. One square foot at a time. Often the size of the deposits are the size of a dime. But usually just millions of black dots. If I can stick to a routine of washing the deck at least once a week I don't notice it as much.

Ah, you have time to scrub the decks of your boat with a bristle brush, on your hands and knees, one square foot at a time, every week; and you don't have time to buff and wax it? Hmmmm.

[Montanan]

After you get the boat cleaned, a preventive measure would be to keep your boat protectively covered, just like it is customary to cover your white sails.

Clean white snow makes for a bright white appearance and works well for keeping the bug poop, soot, oil, mold, overspray, dust, etc. off the deck. The deeper the better. My boat which is placed on the hard for the coming cool season [nine months, the year being June, July, August and Winter] should have its winter cover installed within a month or so. I like to think of it being like a solid water rinse, one that you need to utilize a shovel with instead of a mop or bristle broom.

As to the black dots specifically on the aft portion of your boat, well they call that a poop deck for a reason. Okay, if you prefer French, the words for the stern, la poupe from the Latin, puppis [which is so not to be confused with the English words for, the poop & piss, which if I recall is the name of a pub].

[Montanan]

Okay, so I spotted this reply note on a posting from December 2013 regarding how to remove and prevent dark mold spots on the deck of a boat.

"You know what they say, you can take the boat out of the mould, but you can't take the mould out of the boat."

FYI: Mould being British English, a.k.a. EnglishEnglish or Proper English; mold being Yank speak.

[Sailorbob8599]

Originally Posted by Michael-Perkins

If you are near an airport it is mostly jet fuel they dump before landind.Could not open your pic so just guessing.

WOW! does this really happen? I was unaware that planes dump fuel prior to landing. Is this a common practice, or does it only occur if they are experiencing some kind of emergency?
What other reasons would cause a pilot to dump fuel, If not an emergency, & WHY would they dump expensive fuel & what are the rules as to WHERE they can dump fuel? Can anyone explain this?