Sawford's Zip Build

[vupilot]

The extra work now should pay off later. Keep up the work while it is still somewhat comfortable in the shop. I got both my car in the garage this weekend too, thanks to a buddy who goes to FL all winter, freeing up his garage space here.

[sawford11]

Finished sanding...1000, 1500, 2000 and then buffing, and finally polishing. The finish is just "ok." The finish is smooth, but not glossy enough for my liking. It doesn't look as good as cured epoxy, or any of the types of finishes I've used when making furniture. That being said, it did leave a very hard surface. I'm considering (and only considering) scuffing again, and hitting it with another coat, to see if I can get it to shine. The floor boards, which were only foam brushed, are very glossy, though if you catch it in the right light, you can see small streaks from the brush. So if I apply one more coat on the deck, I think I can get it very glossy, but there might be a trade off with small brush marks. Maybe I'll try one small area, taped off, and compare the results....decisions, decisions...

[Bill CNC]

She looks BEAUTIFUL

A nice satin finish can be a benefit, The glare off a glossy deck can be more than you bargained for.

[Roberta]

It does look really nice. WR-LPU is very hard to get a glossy finish on a larger boat. Humidity has to be very high and you need to maintain a wet edge all the way through each coat. Any overworking becomes a sanding nightmare. It seemed that when I needed to wet sand and buff, I could never get back the gloss. I'm not sure if I wasn't buffing long enough, or what. I had the best results on very fine grained wood like the Okoume Joubert plywood. Philippine mahogany and Meranti plywood were very hard to get a good finish on because the grain was hard to fill in. On my Zip redo I used filler stain and three coats of Pettit 2018 sealer on the Philippine deck and African sides. That was sanded with a long board by hand and scuffed by hand with scotch brite. I now have two coats of Epifanes down and it looks better than the old finish ever did. I still have a lot of sanding and 14 more coats of Epifanes left to do. As you know, those really mirror like finishes take a lot of work.

If you want to re-coat, scuff sand with 320 grit and roll the WR-LPU on in very thin coats. You can do 4-5 coats in one day, if needed. Tipping WR-LPU never worked for me. I had to roll it on thin and trust it would level out and shed bubbles on it's own. If the humidity was above 50% I had no problems. Low humidity and overworking WR-LPU will just lead to another coat being sanded.

When I did the Super Spartan, the bottom (which was Okoume) leveled out very nicely using the epoxy and the WR-LPU and I got a very nice gloss, way better than the Zip turned out and only needed to sand the epoxy once before the WR-LPU was applied. Never had to sand or buff the bottom coats of WR-LPU. But when I did the deck, which is Meranti, I had issues with the grain not filling in using either the epoxy or the WR-LPU. I put about 8 coats of epoxy on the deck, sanding about every second coat before I got most of the graininess out. Then I put about 6 coats of WR-LPU down. I never could get it to look as good as the bottom.

So the moral of my story is the finish results with WR-LPU is based on the type of wood you are coating, the prep done to fill the grain on the wood, the conditions you are coating in (humidity and temperature), maintaining a wet edge, and not being tempted to overwork the product. I hope I am not preaching, as I am not intending to, but I just wanted to re-convey my experience using WR-LPU and where I was successful using it. I will say that WR-LPU will give you a good gloss if all the variables line up and it is one TOUGH finish that will hold up very well. The bottom of my Zip, to the boot stripe, is still coated with WR-LPU and I do not have any intentions of redoing that for a long time. A lot of people thought I was nuts redoing my Zip. But I had issues with wood filler in the staple holes remaining light while the wood turned dark, creating a freckled look all over my sides. I needed to get back to bare wood so I could stain the filler along with the wood to even out the colors. The some of the products I wanted to use would not have been compatible with the WR-LPU, so I went with the Epifanes. It is a very nice product, but now I have to deal with lengthy wait times between coats, more sanding, many more coats (16 in all plus sealer), solvents for cleanup, and a horrendous smell. I hope it all is worth it in the end. We'll see!!

Sorry for high-jacking your thread.

Roberta

[vupilot]

The satin look you have, while perhaps not your goal, looks very, very good. If its going to be as durable as Roberta says it will than I would leave it for a couple seasons. Perhaps there is a higher gloss product that is compatible with the WR-LPU that you could apply a few coats of over what you already have? Whatever you do I think is going to be a tradeoff. To get the gloss you may have to live with a surface that is not as smooth and dust free as you may have now with the wetsanding and buffing you have nicely done. Besides, when youre behind the wheel, throttle in hand, on a sunny day with your family it doesnt even matter if its glossy or has a blemish or not, you really do tend to forget about all those little things when the boat is out of the garage and being enjoyed.

-Chris

[cusoak]

Hi Jeff here
I am jumping in here on the tail end of this post.
Read Reberta's post regarding WR-LPU.
Could you tell my what sort of a coating that is and why you used it.
I am also building a zip.

[Roberta]

The System Three WR-LPU is a water reduced cross linked polyurethane paint and clear coat. The nice parts of using it is no smell, environmentally and human safe, water thinned, water cleanup, several coats can be applied in one day, and provides a very durable finish. Downsides are it is tricky to use due to ambient weather conditions like temperature and humidity can greatly affect it. Thinning too much and applying it too heavy will cause it to run and curtain like crazy. Over working and not maintaining a wet edge will create a graininess and leave brush and roller marks that will have to be sanded out and re-coated. Re-coating must occur within 24 hrs or it will need to be scuff sanded. Sanding for re-coating should not be done until the product is sufficiently cured to withstand sanding (I'd wait a week). Wet-sanding and buffing should not be done until the product is fully cured (at least two weeks).

I had a long learning curve before I was successful in using this product. I had hoped I was able to convey my trials and tribulations and help anyone wanting to use this product. Like all sophisticated painting systems, it has it good points, trade-offs, and pitfalls.

Roberta

[Andy Garrett]

By all means, get it the way YOU want it, but I actually really dig the way it looks now. It's got a 'warm' feel to it--much like some high end furniture I've seen.

Looks awesome!

[sawford11]

1 month since last post. Where has the time gone??? I've moved past the clear coat and onto things that I am actually good at. Cleaned up the electrical, mechanical and fired the motor up for the first time. I never did this before, but here is my first ever youtube post....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z5lAb-l3 ... e=youtu.be

It is a very boaring video, but I was pretty happy when the motor fired up. At about 1 minute, I moved around the boat to show a better view of what it actually looks like. The video was from about 3 weeks ago and we had some unseasonably nice weather.

I haven't worked on the boat too much. I did just install the chrome bumper this evening. Oh yah, before I installed the motor, I also made a chrome motor plate to place between the transom and outboard. I also made some transom bands that are ready to be installed.

Below are some relatively lousy phtos from my phone camera. Merry Christmas!

[Roberta]

Look's really nice!!!

Roberta

[vupilot]

I really like your boat. Its coming out excellent. The finish looks shiny in the video and pictures now did you do something more to it?

The motor really sounds and looks good. You will be ready come spring and I am sure you cant wait for the nice weather to return.

[steveh41]

Your finish looks pretty darn good from here!

Appreciate your pics & Roberta's great comments on applying & finishing out the WR-LPU products.

Regards,

Steve

[billy c]

Hi Jeff here
I am jumping in here on the tail end of this post.
Read Reberta's post regarding WR-LPU.
Could you tell my what sort of a coating that is and why you used it.
I am also building a zip.

here is some good reading from those of us who have used this
search.php?st=0&sk=t&sd=d&sr=posts&keyw ... u&start=30

[travis24]

Great Job !!

Travis

[sawford11]

Thanks folks. Not much time lately...just tinkering here and there. I did start the cutwater and tacked it together. I still need to run a weld along the length and polish later.....