Acrylic house paint for hull

After much reading I decided to finish my NE Dory hull with white acrylic "latex" house paint . Reasons were reports of excellent durability, water and UV resistance, flexibility and water based cleanup. The manufacturer help line said it would bond well with sanded epoxy.

I might have made a mistake because after one coat it's not sticking at all well, and peels immediately back to bare epoxy in some areas with a light sand (2days after application). Other areas show obvious brush marks that don't sand away. Has anyone got any bright ideas? It occurred to me that we might have sanded the epoxy with too fine a grade of paper (400) before applying the paint. The weather has been cool but not cold (10-15 Celsius).


3 replies:

« Previous Post       List of Posts       Next Post »

RE: Acrylic house paint for hull

One issue may be an amine blush on your epoxy that causes the paint not to stick.  When using non-marine paints for marine applications, one should always be extra careful.  If blush is the culprit, then wiping the hull down prior to scuff coat sanding should help.  Good luck!

RE: Acrylic house paint for hull

I've had some success using white house paint on my oars, spars, seats, interior of hull, rudder, and centerboard. The paint was labeled 100% acrylic, exterior. The surfaces were first painted with epoxy, then sanded, then wiped with damp cloth to get all the sanding dust off. I believe CaptainSkully has a very good point about wiping potential amine blush off. Perhaps the sequence should be wipe down, sand, wipe down again, then paint. The paint has held up except against scuffing such as on the rudder bottom hitting sand or oars knocking around against bulkheads; that sort of wear caused the paint to become black.

RE: Acrylic house paint for hull

Thanks for the input. It was very well cured epoxy and had a good wash with soap and water before painting.However there are now two coats on and it's looking better. Will try one more and see how it goes.   

« Previous Post     List of Posts     Next Post »


Please login or register to post a reply.