I've been through a lot of different waxes and treatments for boats that always seem to take forever to apply, or have some catch. I recently had my boat out of the water, and the cockpit and rest of the deck really needed some help after having been exposed to the elements for a year without much other than the usual wash down.
Enter Collinite – I saw this stuff at Fisheries Supply and read a bunch about it online. I started with Fiberglass Boat Cleaner No. 920 and then applied Paste Fleetwax No. 885.
The Boat Cleaner is designed to strip away any discoloration and restore the gelcoat – it was nearly instantaneous, and very easy to do. I started by using a paper towel to apply it, and then a clean one to wipe it off, which brought with it a lot of dirt and cleared out the "pores" of the fiberglass. I ended up using a stiff brush as the project progressed, and paper towels to clean it up once the brush loosened up things.
It took a fraction of the time for this part than any of the other systems I've used, and the fiberglass looked amazing, even at this stage.
The Paste Fleetwax is really thick stuff, and is really easy to apply as well. Wipe on, let it dry a bit, and then buff it to a shine. It really seems to work well with the Fiberglass Boat Cleaner to form a very tough shell.
All in all, it still took a good solid day to do all of the top of the boat, but I spent a long, long time in the cockpit doing every last inch of it – even in the corners and such, which I didn't do with previous solutions.
The only issue was that for the first day or so, any surface that had been waxed was AMAZINGLY slippery – very dangerous – far more slippery than anything I had ever seen. Since I waxed all of the non-slip tread as well, it made for a very difficult time moving around the boat.
Since the treatment, things have continued to look really good. I am waiting to see how it looks over the summer and with use. Definitely would recommend their products for ease of use and initial quality.
Collinite – magic stuff for boats
Yearly haul out
This last week I finished off a bunch of work on the sailboat and it was re-floated after the bottom was painted (them), topsides were waxed (me), and hull was waxed (them). There was a bunch of work on thru-hulls to make sure they were safe – we found one that was not even clamped on the far end!
The big job was removing the shaft and propeller and replacing the PSS shaft seal that had been there since who-knows-when. As far as we could tell, the old one was so old it was made of some sort of rubber and didn't have much spring left in it, which is important in it's operation. The most annoying thing was at low idle, when a loud banging noise was produced.
I originally wrote about this back in 2008 right after my new engine was put in. The noise never got any better than that visit, and it was still really loud and annoying. My bigger worry was what it was doing to the shaft, shaft log, and anything else.
The good news is that it appears to have been the PSS – replacing it with a modern one has resulted in virtually no noise at idle. And, the guy who did the repair talked with Coastal Marine Engine, the place I had the new motor put in from, and they think adjusting the idle might help get rid of it completely.
Sadly, while I was in the boat yard, the folks who did the waxing found a lot of problems with my paint job on the hull. The red stripes above and below the blue color are coming off rapidly, and look poorly painted. The blue center section has a lot of patch jobs where the previous owner tried to match colors of paint, and failed miserably. You can see it quite obviously in some of my close up pictures which I will post in a few days.
So, I'm faced with repainting things completely, which is pretty expensive, and requires removing the mast and all standing rigging so they can wheel the boat in and out of their paint sheds. Seaview West, where I go, uses Alexseal paint which seems to have a good following – it's claim is that it is much easier to repair than Awlgrip and it's similar types, but still looks close to those types of paints.
I'm going to do a bit of research, as I don't plan on having her painted until November of this year, and hopefully I'll find exactly what I want, color, type, etc. I also have engaged a friend in helping with the logo as that will have to be redone.
The good news is that the bottom looks in really good shape, and is ready for another couple of seasons in the water. I intend on taking advantage of that this year!
Rule iL500 Portable Pump
I'm always looking for a good pump, since the nature of having a boat is having to stave off water being in the boat at some point. I have a couple of manual bilge pumps, and of course a couple of powered ones permanently installed in the right places. But you can always use something more portable.
While doing some random searches, I stumbled across a great idea from the folks at Rule – the iL500 Portable Pump. It's a portable pump that is submersible, can be used in-line, has battery clamps for quick use, comes with hose and a nozzle for spraydowns, and can be used for both water and diesel.
I think it's a great pump to have around when you happen to be away from the dock and need to get water out of somewhere hard to reach, or if you want to use the included nozzle to spray down an area – my boat's not big enough to rank a dedicated spraydown system.
They also built it so you could use it in-line – connect a section of hose before the pump, and down inside, say, a tank or hard to reach area, and then the other side of the pump would be plumbed into wherever you wanted to transfer the liquid.
The included roll-flat hose, and convenient spray nozzle that clamps down on the flat hose are a nice convenience, as is the strainer for the non-in-line configuration. It would be nice if they had a kit or option to replace the battery terminal clamps with a standard 12VDC cigarette adapter for safer connections, and without having to find your battery terminals. You could always chop the cable and do that yourself I suppose.
I found it online at West Marine, but it's only sold in the "kit" version which includes all of the extras above. You can find it elsewhere as well, but I order so much from them it was more convenient to get it in the weekly shipment 
I'll let you know how it works in a few days…
BioSok
My previous engine had a meltdown before I had it removed, and that included dumping a huge quantity of watery oil into my bilge. Ever since then, oil makes it's reappearance almost weekly within the bilge. I suppose I will never get rid of it completely…
I've tried all sorts of things, from absorbent pads, to simply sucking it out with a high volume pump, and disposing of it appropriately. Nothing seems to work that well, at least not until I found BioSok.
It's some sort of powdery looking chemical that reacts to oil and fuel, and pulls it into it, then uses some microbes to eat off the oil. I ended up buying two of the cloth socks, and one small bin of powder. I used the powder directly throughout the bilge on the surface to get the oil that had been in there for a while since the repower. I have the socks standing by to be used once the initial cleaning is done.
So far, the powder has been in the bilge about a month, and it has turned a nasty dark brown color. I don't see any oil in the water, or on any other surfaces of the bilge, which is good. I guess that means it's doing it's thing. At this point, I think I leave it for a while so the microbes can eat, or I could dispose of it appropriately somewhere. The stuff is the consistency of chocolate fudge – I'm sure it doesn't taste as good though.
I'm hoping in a few weeks things will dissipate more, and if not, I'll clean it all out. At that point, I'll drop one of those socks into the bilge in case there's any other problems during the season.
So far, these things look pretty convenient, and environmentally friendly.
Island Girl Products
About a month and a half ago, I bought a kit from Island Girl Products after having read some reviews online, as well as conversed with the owner via email. Their products are advertised in some of the sailing magazines I read, and seem to be well thought out from a chemistry perspective.
Unfortunately, due to the U.S. Mail, I didn't get the first shipment. After a few delays (both on U.S. Mail's side and Island Girl) I got my kit.
A few days ago I dissected it. The only bad part about their products is that there are so many of them! The kit I bought has at least 12 different unique products that can/should/may be combined to do something to some part of your boat. Included with all of these products are some nice microfiber cloths, scrapers, and such. AND, 5 CDROMs.
Since their products can be combined in so many ways, depending on how bad/good your gelcoat or other surfaces are, the CDROMS seem necessary. Diagrams and "flow charts" can be found on some of them, while others are plain old DVDs with interestingly produced movies showing how to use the products. I like the beach music used throughout!
So far I have not figured out exactly which products I need, and when. I hope to be able to do that over the weekend so I can use some next week. My topsides are pretty weathered, and I would like to restore them as much as possible.
More later!
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