to paint or wax topside...when is it "OK" to start thinking paint

[Herschel]

Dimitri asked:

This seems like a nice old thread to 'bump'.. @Hershel, did you ever paint your boat?

No, but this fall is "fish or cut bait" time for me on this issue. Beginning to wrap my head around it and set aside time in the fall for same. I have often thought I would use the forward hatch as my test piece. When I get it right and feel like the process is working, I'll try the main hatch, trying to learn as I go. I hope I can do a "rub rail to rub rail" job without doing the sides, and it will still look good/right/match.

[Herschel]

OK, I am six months away from painting my topside, which I define as a "gunwale to gunwale" job including hatches, cockpit and stern. I am collecting info and tips. I ran across this on an boats.com website:
"With on deck-painting projects the most important step will be to carefully tape off hardware, handrails, hatches, etc. It would be ideal to remove these things before painting, but in many cases it’s impossible or impractical. For crazing and gouges, the same processes of sanding, filling, and fairing apply as they do in topsides projects. As for non-skid surfaces that were molded at the factory, there’s no way to bring them back; the only solution is either to stick on an entirely new surface like Treadmaster, or paint the areas using the same type of boat paint discussed in the section above on topsides, but laced with a nonskid compound that will dry in place with the paint. You can get boat paint with nonskid material already mixed in, like Interlux InterDeck or Pettit EZDecks, or you can buy your paint and nonskid compound separately and mix them yourself according to how aggressive you want your surfaces to be. Done correctly, a paint job with nonskid compound will provide better footing than the original molded nonskid and will look neat and uniform to boot." Comments from actual Mac painters would be appreciated as the months slide by.

[Dimitri-2000X-Tampa]

I'll be rooting for you and following closely particularly in terms of how much work it ends up being and how it looks when you are done! I'm a bit mortified of doing a crappy job, a lot easier to paint a bedroom well...lol I know when I painted my 17, at least half the work was in the prep if not more, so much taping, that part took forever. I think it ended up taking me about 3 weekends to do the whole job, iirc. That's probably a relatively slow pace compared to any real boat painters.

[OverEasy]

Hi Herschel!

We’re ‘in the same boat’ as it were with top deck painting. For us it’s gonna have to be next year’s project.
New Ablative Bottom paint this year…

We’re currently in SC and have this horrible yellow pine pollen season during the spring in our new season boat prep time.
This lasts until about mid April..sometimes longer 🫣
Before painting I’m gonna have to rig up some kind of covered area with sides to have a weather & pollen resistant work area along side the garage…nothing too permanent or anything to worry the local busybodies… just a 90 day wonder…or a shade gazebo that I can unfurl a tarpaulin over the top & sides.

Pretty much decided upon the Alexseal product approach top deck for both the white & black raccoon stripe.
Will be replacing the windows too as the existing ones are crazing after 23 years and the sealant also has seen better days.

Keep us posted on your efforts!
We can all benefit from our collective experiences!

Best Regards,
Over Easy

[Herschel]

I have a huge tarp that I bought a while back originally to cover my travel trailer, but it is too cumbersome to be wrangling a huge 32x16 ft tarp on the top of my travel trailer at my age. So, I hope to detach mast, of course, build a braced X frame at each end of boat in which the mast will be placed as the peak beam, and the tarp, stretched over and anchored in the ground (or around a tree) at a suitable angle leaving me a temporary "shed" for painting. Very open to ideas about brand of primer/paint. My biggest boat painting job was a ten-ft O'day Sprite I did several years ago. It turned out well, I think.

[Herschel]

Stopped by West Marine today. One quart of topside Petit paint is $59.95. Primer same price. My O'Day Sprite needs some touch up, so I will use it as my practice boat. Then move on to the forward hatch of the Mac. May use the month of May for the practice run but will probably put off the whole Mac topside until Jan/Feb 2025 when I can trailer it home and put together a temporary cover and the working temperature will be comfortable for the most part. Plus, the autumn is a good sailing season as Florida temperature is more comfortable.

[1st Sail]

Following is an old YT post from Boatworks Today. Scrolling thru more recent posts it appears there are some follow up posts. Here is the original from three years ago. The surface finish is amazing for a roll on nontipped finish. Had I not found and had excellent results with Glidecoat I would have made the jump.

[Gotro]

I to am about to paint both the topside and below the rub rail . Basically the whole boat . I don’t like the raccoon strip and have already primed that area . I want to use Alex seal paint . And there’s away to redo the non skid area that’s a trick I learned from my surfboard / sailboard making days. Basically you can use gel coat or color resin over the non skid areas. How you apply it is done with fiberglass cloth wetted out to just fill the cloth with resin when the resin kicks off and starts to gel you peel off the cloth and it leaves the cloth impression which give a great looking and very effective non skid surface . I will practice this and show the effect . Here shortly

[NiceAft]

Post a photo when complete. It’s been awhile since I’ve seen a photo of a de-striped Mac.

[pitchpolehobie]

Very interested in this as I have a 2002 and may be in the same "boat" soon. As far as I can tell the Macs age super well. I think due to many soft curves of the 26x it will take and allow paint to adhere well since there arent many sharp points.

You really dont like the racoon stripe? I love that it makes all the "real" sailors squirm so much

[Ixneigh]

Re: nonskid. The Durabak product Erik ok and is effective. The black holds up very well. It covers the factory no skid fairly well too. Make sure you get the “outside” version.

[Herschel]

Re: nonskid. The Durabak product Erik ok and is effective. The black holds up very well. It covers the factory no skid fairly well too. Make sure you get the “outside” version.

OK, here is my dumb question. What happens if you just clean the nonskid areas really well and then paint over them with topside primer/paint? Won't the pattern still be there just with a little more paint in the low areas? Also, I've been watching some YouTubers spreading on a putty like stuff (Kiwi Grip) from a can with a plastic spreader and then roll it out, and it has a nice non-skid surface. What about that option?

[OverEasy]

Hi Herschel!

I’m pretty sure that there won’t be much texture after one tries to paint over it as “gravity always wins” and the paint will flow into the grooves pretty much filling them….the result is gonna come out pretty smooth or slick without much grip.

Kiwi grip is nice but pricey and some have found it can be a dirt collector (depending on one’s technique) and does have some wear issues over time. There is also a bit of a paint color matching challenge.

Another option is to paint the surface then sprinkle with these rubber (?) texture crumbles on to the wet paint.
Allow the paint to set then apply next layer of paint to seal in the crumbles…if too much “rough” feeling apply another coat of paint to “tame” it down some.


There is a couple other suppliers available from various sources.

If you look up “Boat Works Today” he has a couple segments on applying this type of nonskid.

It’s probably what we’ll be going with when we get around to painting our top deck.

Best Regards
Over Easy

PS: An age old technique has also been to sprinkle rounded washed (fresh water) sifted beach sand