VE Day - and the paint starts to go on.

(first published May 2005)

The preparation of the inside of the hull for painting has been three days (admittedly fairly short days) of temptation and frustration: frustration at not being able to get on faster because of the amount of scraping, sanding and making good to be done; temptation to simply slap some paint on to hide the defective surface and pretend everything was all right. But now, finally, the first coat’s on and, although I didn’t manage to remove all the blemishes with scraper, wet-and-dry paper and filler, it looks more like a boat and less like a camouflaged bath tub now.



The trouble has been that curse of the painter and decorator - poor preparation in the past, paint slapped on over a previous layer of gloss with no sanding. It lasts for a year or two, then starts to flake off the unkeyed surface. But the problem is that it doesn’t flake off uniformly - you end up picking at bits of it with a penknife blade or even fingernails. Then you have to sand the layer underneath, which should have been done last time, to give the new paint something to key to. On Lugg there were three layers of paint like this, all of them flaking. In the words of Terry Pratchett’s Witches - bugrit!

Now that the new paint’s on the inside of the hull I can see the few little places where I didn’t manage to get all the old loose paint off - they really weren’t visible on the tatty, multicoloured surface. Still, it’ll be an easier job to tackle them now, before the second coat of Danboline Bilge Paint goes on tomorrow.



Speaking of which, what a good investment that stuff is. I know of no paint that lasts so well under boaty abuse. When I had Fram I painted the bilges with Danboline and it was the only coating which was still intact 7 years later - despite being half-submerged in bilge water for much of the time. The bloke who bought Fram from me just left it sitting on its mooring for 7 or 8 years and did no maintenance. The varnish and the paint on the topsides and deck were in a sorry state, but the submerged Danboline was still OK. (I’ll have to tell the story of Fram’s new owners some time - it’s a salutary tale.) So use Danboline - accept no substitute. Can I have that sponsorship now please, International Paints?