Antifoul echo sounder transducer

[Daydream believer]

The Airmar transducer on my Raymarine echo sounder has a sticker advising me that I should only coat with a water based anti-fouling paint. A trip to the chandler proved negative & cadging round the marina for a brush-full (I have copper coat) was not much better, as no one has heard of water based antifoul paint
What do most of you paint your transducers with? Come to that, what about the log?
Should I just give it a coat of magnolia emulsion & some antifoul over that?
Any suggestions please!!!

 

[AllanG]

Personally, I never antifouled my transducer, and never had fouling problems on it.

 

[Blue Sunray]

I used this - more expensive than printer ink I reckon! If it's necessary or not I am really not certain but I'm sure a truckload of opinions will arrive shortly.

https://www.force4.co.uk/force-4-ec...MdW1gbsVgA_JR6Wkcnpy_H6NaFyacGBMaAkVkEALw_wcB

 

[prv]

I have a bottle of the transducer antifoul (not the same as what Elecglitch linked to, but presumably similar) for the log. Normal paint is too thick and gunges it up, leaving it unpainted rapidly results in it jamming with fouling. I don't use it on the sounder, but presumably it would be suitable.

Pete

 

[johnalison]

I've been using water-based Optima for many years anyway, but I've never thought much about it re the transducer. I imagine that a solvent would soften or damage the plastic or seal. I can't imagine that any harm would result if you coated it first with Primocon, though that is solvent based itself.

 

[pvb]

I've always antifouled the depth transducer, with ordinary antifoul, with no adverse effects.

I also antifoul the log transducer, also with ordinary antifoul, again with no adverse effects, and with the big benefit that it keeps working for months at a time.

 

[Tranona]

Trilux spray same as on the saildrive housing on both the transducer/log impeller and the plastic housing

 

[macd]

The Airmar transducer on my Raymarine echo sounder has a sticker advising me that I should only coat with a water based anti-fouling paint.

Do you suppose the glue on the sticker is water-based?

If I remember correctly the full advice is (or was) not so use "ketone-based" antifoul. Trouble is, even looking at product data sheets often isn't helpful unless you're a chemist. Here's one of our in-house chemists in 2010: "Not so sure that you would call it [Hempel Mille Dynamic] "ketone based" but it does contain a small % of 4-methylpentan-2-one, aka hexone, isobutylmethyl ketone, 2-methyl-4-pentanone, MIBK, and MIK."

There, that's cleared that up.

Layman's conclusion: Airmar are not being at all helpful, just covering their butts.

There many past threads on the subject, some containing references to specific antifouls which are OK. Maybe.

 

[FulmarJeddo]

I read the same warning when I fitted a new Airmar log transducer. I found that my local chandler had the Eco antifoul. It seemed expensive for such a small pot. However, my log now works all season without the need to pull it out and clean it. In fact I took the log out today while I antifouled the hull and it was spotlessly clean. Assuming it hasn't dried out this will be the 4th year of using the same pot, so the £15 I paid for it seems quite reasonable. I did have to thin it with a drop of water last year.