I know it's been a while since I posted a followup on this
boat but it's been the "Boat from Hell". The first round of
paint hit the
boat and didn't flow at all. I laid a second, wetter coat on it and it still stayed there with monster orange peel, dull as hell. We spent the next two days
sanding it down smooth for a second round. This time I had a #2 Zahn cup to measure viscosity. I usually spray at 15-17 seconds on the cup.
So, we get more
paint and I reduce the paint about 15% and check it. One full minute on the cup? Ok, reduce it somemore, down to 35 seconds now. A bit more..., down to 23 seconds. Hell, that enough cause this is starting to make me nervous. We fire up the pot and I go at it again. Looking pretty good, with the exception of all of these solvent pinholes..., for about 15 minutes. Then it just falls off the boat in curtains. The next day, all of the gloss is gone.
Ok, I saved some paint for touchup so let's deal with the curtains and color sand the rest with 800 and 1200. I get the runs out, most of them because the paint still isn't quite cured after two days and th runs
lift to the primer, sweet. After color
sanding, the boys buff some out. Jesus that's glossy, looks like plastic, until ya look straight into it, then it looks cloudy. Damn, time for round three. We color sand the whole boat with 1200 (wet) and wipe her down.
With a gravity feed gun, I mix the paint and reduce it a maximum of 20% and start shooting. wow, this stuff is flowing well but why am I only getting a 4" wide spray pattern? POS gun.... So I finish the entire boat with this POS narrow shooting gun. Halfway through, it starts spitting paint on ocassion. Nothing I can do but make a wet pass over the spit to flow it and hope it stays. It did, except a couple of places. Now I'm at the place I should've been two weeks ago with a decent paint job and normal touchup to do.
So today I had the Grandsons at the shop to learn how to
varnish. Izzy is actually quite good, better than most adults, Alex needs more practice... Tomorrow is touchup and more
varnish. The Valiant launched Wednesday afternoon.
Here are some pics of her in non-touched up or cleaned up state, right after the masking came off.
My reflection in sucky light, yes, that's the
rubrail.
Some side shots
The bow looking out the door.
Can ya read this?
Stripe detail (yet to be detailed)
There she be and she'll look much better when we're done.