Rain on fresh paint

[aitchw]

I hate this weather. I finally managed to get the topcoat, Brightside, onto my boat this teatime and damn me if it doesn't rain half an hour later. Anyone any idea what the likely effect will be? As I say the last paint applied would have been on about 30mins the earliest about an hour. I won't get to see until late tomorrow.

Howard

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[Mirelle]

Just two possibilities:

First, the bad news; if the paint was still soft and tacky, your boat will now have the measles, and all you can do is let it dry hard, sand it all off with fine wet and dry used wet, and try again. I've seen a professional yacht painter do the same boat three times, because of this.

Next, the good news, if the paint had "kicked" as the Americans say and had formed a hard-ish skin which the rain did not disturb, you will get an exceptionally bright finish. I remember as a boy that some yards - Tucker Browns come to mind - used to deliberately throw buckets of cold water over varnished topsides to get a more brilliant finish

<hr width=100% size=1>Que scais-je?

 

[aitchw]

Re: Just two possibilities:

Thanks, Mirelle, but being it my boat it's bound to be the first of them.

The practice of deliberately wetting a not yet mature finish is interesting. I wonder what the chemistry around that one is.

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[Colin_S]

Doesn't answer your question but I once passed a house that had been painted (emulsion) shortly before the heavens opened. Most of the paint was running down the street. Ooooooooops!

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[Gordonmc]

Sounds daft, but a lot will depend on the "type" of rain as well as whether the paint has started to skin.
A soft, mist-like rain will probably not do too much harm, apart from carrying muck off the deck, but a wind driven rain will cause cratering.
Fingers crossed and you have my sympathy. I had to wet 'n dry my topsides three times two winters ago for exactly this reason. The worst damage was caused by dust being washed out of the scuppers and sticking to the tacky paint.


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[aitchw]

I fear I'm going to be stuck with whatever the result for the next few weeks as we go away this weekend with the boat. She is an old and sadly neglected little weekender, recently acquired, and this was the first cosmetic step to start her rehabilitation. Topsides need sorting and I was going to do bits on that, weather permitting, whilst away. For that brief half hour before the rain she was quite transformed. Ah, well.

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[snowleopard]

once i had dew form on freshly applied 2-pack paint. all was well to start with but a few months later it went chalky and my nice red boat went streaky pink!

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[aitchw]

Ouch! I guess I should be grateful for small mercies. That must have been a lousy situation to rectify.

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[aitchw]

Well, I appear to have got away with it. Wish I hadn't inspected it quite so closely though, spotted all the thin bits.

Thanks for the input everyone.

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[DogStar]

I can actually help with this one! I had exactly this problem last weekend, after giving my foredeck a new coat of white, an icy shower hit the marina. Bugger! This after having spent the morning rubbing down to get rid of the measles finish already described by Mirelle. I started thinking, though. What is it that causes the problem? I know that paint will go off under a thin layer of water, but the difference in gloss (brighter finish) where the water has collected is the thing. So I thought: just get rid of the surface tension, and the result won't be droplets, but an overall filmy layer over all the fresh paint. Reasoning that warm water would evaporate quicker, I put some ecover washing up liquid in a bucket of bath temperature water and, as soon as the rain stopped, sloshed it over the new paint. As soon as the sun came out the film began to dry. The finish afterwards was spot on. No trace of the measles at all.

I hope this helps.

<hr width=100% size=1>I'd rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy!

 

[aitchw]

I'm impressed and will keep that one in mind!

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[richardandtracy]

That's clever.

Regards

Richard.


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[DogStar]

Cheers! I just need to find an easy way to remove flying ants now! Aaargh!

<hr width=100% size=1>I'd rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy!