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One nasty job that has to be done on a boat outside of toilet work or dealing with toxic forgotten bait
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is going to be power washing growth from off the bottom of the boat
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But that is just one of the realities that you have to deal with when you leave your boat in the water all you round
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Today I have to do a couple of things that regularly have to get done on a boat
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which is going to be more on the darker or sadder side of owning a boat
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But it gives us the option to show some of these downsides with you
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Now for those of you that trailer, use lifts, or live on freshwater lakes where you don't
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have to worry about barnacles growing on the bottom of your boat like this, it's much less
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of a concern for you. But it's a sad experience that many of us have to deal with
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There are a couple of options you can do to avoid having to deal with this growth, like
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clear epoxy, some sonic systems, or simply not letting your boat live in the water
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But the most common method is to use anti-fowling bottom paint on your boat
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We go over the process of painting the bottom of this boat here in another video
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So today, one of the topics I want to cover is doing a recote of the bottom paint
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But also, some of you might be thinking, what happens if you want to remove the bottom paint from the boat
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Which is a pretty common question, and unfortunately, if the anti-fowling paint was put on correctly the first time
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the answer isn't going to be what you wanted. here. The very first coat of bottom paint is the most important one. The key to doing it correctly
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is a simple step but a crucial one and that is to sand the entire bottom of the boat before applying the paint And as long as the boat gets prepped right by getting sanded then the paint is going to stick properly
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Even if you are using a blade of paint that wears off, if you want to get some longevity out of it
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you've got to sand the bottom. Then when it comes to getting it off
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you've really only got two options. Sometimes you can get lucky and find some alternative solutions
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to removing the paint by using something like this aircraft paint remover stuff here
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But that's not always the case. You can also find that you can get quite a bit of it off with a pressure washer
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But again, that's not going to get it all the way off and leave you with a nice-looking
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gel-coat finish. You can tell when the haul was not prepped properly because the paint will usually come off
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pretty easy with, say, a pressure washer. And you'll notice that under the paint, you'll find a waxy, smooth, nice-looking, shiny
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hall. But no, pretty much your only two options for removing bottom paint are going to be either
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sanding it off or by having it sandblasted off, which is going to be the quicker way of removing
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it, but either way, whether you go with the sanding or the blasting, you are going to need to have
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the bottom refinished once the paint is off the boat. The sandblasting is going to leave you
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with a much rougher bottom, though, compared to the control that you can have with the actual sanding
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But again, the hole will need to be repaired once the paint is off the boat
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Either way, you choose to get the anti-fowling paint off of your boat. Now, when we go back to talking about the recote, this is actually a super simple job
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Once you get all that growth off the bottom. On a side note about the growth, though, if you are on a freshwater lake
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you really only have to worry about some algae and some minor growth compared to the warmer salt water where you are going to be dealing with actual barnacles That has to be pressure washed or scraped off the boat and if they are left in for too long it can be damaging to the bottom
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of the hull, especially if you don't have bottom paint on the boat. They will eat their way
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into the gel coat of the boat and leave permanent damage to the boat if you let it go for too long
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Depending on where you are, we'll also determine how long it will take to grow on the bottom of the
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boat. In a warmer, saltier climate, you can see growth start within a week and can even begin
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to stain the haul, but it really takes a couple of weeks for actual barnacles to start developing
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and build on the boat. And a month can be devastating when it comes to the amount of barnacles
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that you can find on your boat, especially if it doesn't have bottom paint. But bottom paint
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loses its effectiveness over time, and using this as an example, this is about three to four
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weeks of growth here in the bottom of the boat with a bottom paint job that is about a year and a half
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old, which means that it's time for a recote. But recotes are super simple. We just have to put the
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tape on the boat, and when it's a recode, you just follow the paint line that is already on the
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boat. Then once it's taped off, we can stick the boat somewhere that allows us to get under it
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and simply lay on the paint. Now over time, the paint is going to wear off and get spotty
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in some spots. So after so many reccoats, the paint isn't going to
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to look smooth and fresh like it once did. But bottom paint isn't supposed to look like a freshly finished gel coat, it's supposed
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to keep growth from going on the bottom of your boat, which will slow you down and if left
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for too long we even keep your boat from getting on plane altogether That why the paint will start to look spotty after so many rec coats though It just what it looks like especially on older boats like this where we have about 30 years of bottom paint jobs on the bottom of the boat
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Now something else that probably isn't going to be a shocker to many of you but has to get
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done on the boat is going to be the servicing of the engine, and a service can mean different
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things to different people. We have another video that tells you all about services, what's involved, and what needs
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to get done on a service. service, as well as how to save some money, but you can check that out here
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Now for right now, though, we're just going to be doing the vitals today, meaning that I'm
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just changing the oil, the gear lub, and the fuel and oil filters
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There is a lot of stuff that you can put off, but changing the oil and the filters isn't
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really one of them, especially when it comes to the gearloob. Getting to see the gearloob is the only sign you will get of a potential problem with your
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expensive lower unit. Seeing the color of the lube lets you know if you've got a water leak
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Some metal shavings or anything else that could be going on with the lower. Like here
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we've got a little bit of water coming out with our lube, which is this greener colored line
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that's in the gear loop. This isn't an excessive amount of water though, but it is a sign that I
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need to pull the lower unit off pretty soon and do a pressure check and change out some seals
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as well as the engine oil. You can see how dirty the oil is coming out compared to the fresh oil we're putting into the engine
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The dirty oil is what you expect to see on high-hour engines like this one though
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And we run a fuel cleaner as well, and this is just showing that the cleaner is doing its job
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So after changing the gear loob, the engine oil, and the fuel filters, we're good to go and our boat can go back in the water
