I spent a lot of time deciding which bottom paint to go with. We had Micron CSC put on in Fort Lauderdale a year ago and it had given up about four or five months ago. Our boat was actually a smorgasbord of Interlux products. The factory put on two coats of gel shield, one coat of Trilux and two coats of VC Off shore. These are hard paints. The Micron CSC was ablative and I can only assume applied after a light sanding. Depending on which Interlux literature you refer to this might all be well and good but the general consensus seems to be that you are best off to have a barrier coat and a single kind of bottom paint. In the tropics, best if that bottom paint is ablative as well.

Practical Sailor had just come out with their annual bottom paint update and Micron 66 came in with top honors in the two year paint category. It was also a pick in the one year group. Seeing as how we are headed for the South Pacific and may be in the water for a while I wanted to go with the best stuff I could come by. Many local folks recommended Islands 44, which is illegal in the US. I really do think that we all need to pitch in to reduce human impact on the environment, and although no bottom paint could be said to be green, I decided that I should probably avoid things outlawed in the homeland. Jay was very happy with his Micron 66 and that pretty much sealed the deal for me.

Over the past couple of days one of the guys from the yard and I had done quite a bit sanding on the bottom. It was down to the gel shield here and there but that was just the best we could do with out a crew. So when Jay, Fred and Cindy showed up we started with Islands 1277 barrier coat to seal the hull and provide a good base for the Micron 66. We finished right as it started raining. The barrier coat dried quickly though and the rain didn't seem to do any damage to the coat. Next we put on a coat of Micron 66. Nasty stuff that. At least you don't have to worry about mosquitoes (or anything else without a respirator) when you're applying it. Then it rained again. Well, I guess any bottom coat that can't take a little water is not worth having. The first coat of antifouling seemed to do just fine except for a couple little spots where the boat draining caused a little running in the very wet paint. After cleaning the first coat up we took a break and then finished the job with coat three. Then it began to rain again.

When the rain stopped the boat still looked great. We had just the right number of people and just the right amount of time to get the work done. As you can see from the photo you have to be careful about inhaling too much bottom paint.