Primer Coats: Topsides (2nd) and Deck (1st)

October 18, 2015

It was to be another full day on Alva Anne, but with excellent sailing weather now showing up in Florida, I am super motivated to get her in the water.  My near term goal is to get the primer coats on in order to then turn my attention to the brightwork dry fit installations which will, in turn, allow me to apply varnish coats to the brightwork while I am applying the topcoat paint.  So with sufficient motivation, I began sanding the deck areas.  I approached the Sea Sprite as a bit of an over-achiever - I spent countless hours hand sanding every nook and cranny on the deck and cockpit of that boat, and I had the skin of an alligator upon completion of that sanding work.  For the Dory, "good enough" was what I am going for.  So with that in mind, I used the Porter Cable 8335 for the larger fields, and then came in with the hand work around the tight spots.  In those tight spots, I made sure to remove all loose and flaking paint, but primarily made sure that the old (well-adhered) paints roughed up sufficient enough to take new primer.

I began at the bow and worked towards the stern.  The boundary between the non-skid and finish paint lines took a bit of time, and thankfully there is a limited amount of that.  The aft portion of the sidedecks, cockpit seats, and poop deck went fairly quick as you might imagine.  I skipped the cockpit floor during this session as I was in a race against time (setting sun).

I used 80-grit PSA pads on the right-angle sander and 150-grit sheets for hand work.  I thought, at one point, about breaking out the finish sander, but knew the 8335 would allow for the fastest removal of the old paint.  Upon wrapping up the sanding work I vacuumed most of the sanding dust from the surfaces and then thoroughly wiped the boat down with solvent to remove an residual dust.

In a prior session on the boat, I had over drilled the fastener holes for the deck cleat.  Needing to have this filled so that I could continue on with the priming, I went ahead and mixed some epoxy and thickened it to fill these over-drilled holes.  I will come back later and fair the deck and then drill pilot holes for the eventual drilling and tapping necessary to accommodate the new machine screws for the deck cleat.  The foredeck core is in good shape - no leaks - and I want to keep it that way, so in order to prevent future, accidental water intrusion, I over-drilled the holes and filled with epoxy in order to isolate the fastener holes from the deck core.  This is a time consuming process but an easy one in order to ensure that the boat's coring is protected.

Because I had some of the thickened epoxy leftover from the foredeck cleat holes, I applied the balance on a few areas across Alva Anne's bottom that required a bit more fairing filler.

I also mixed a batch of epoxy thickened with West System's MicroLight fairing filler and applied it with a squeegee across a patched hole on the poop deck.

Finally, I hit a small area on the transom that held a navigation light.  After the first two coats of primer I noticed a few pinholes showing through, so I took a moment to pass the squeegee across this area.  After the fill work was done I tapped off the non-skid lines as well as the deadlight frames and the running lights on the cabin sides.

Next, I mixed up another batch of the PrimeKote two-part epoxy primer.  Having a couple coats on the topsides under my belt and the experience of mixing the primer I had a good feel for how many total ounces (Part A, Part B, and thinner) I would require for a pass on the deck and a pass on the topsides.

The painting work, especially primer, goes fairly quickly.  I use foam rollers that can stand up to the harshness of solvent-based paints, and the small diameter of these rollers allow me to get into tight spots with good results.  Again, I worked from the bow to the stern prior to transitioning to the topsides.

I left the faired area on the poop deck free of the primer for obvious reasons.

I also purposely left this area on the transom unpainted.  I feel good with the number of coats of primer on the topsides, and will shoot for at least one more coat for the deck.

Total Time: 8 Hrs.