Painting Mast?

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Painting Mast?

Postby Fly4rfun » Tue Mar 30, 2021 6:14 pm

my mast is ugly as sin, all blotchy looks to be original aluminum finish. i would like to get a uniform but eye pleasing finish on it. any recommendations?

1. repaint black or gold color
? suggestions
"Sail Aweigh" 1966 DS1 #2675
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Re: Painting Mast?

Postby GreenLake » Tue Mar 30, 2021 6:43 pm

Neon green for visibility?

Wrap in duct tape - for the aluminum look?

Your chance to construct a mast fairing to reduce windage?

Sorry, today's menu starts with "non-sequitur" and goes downhill from that.
~ green ~ lake ~ ~
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Re: Painting Mast?

Postby Fly4rfun » Wed Mar 31, 2021 12:03 am

I like the Neon green idea, but think i'll go with a barber pole motif with Neon green and hi vis orange , I surely will be seen :roll:
"Sail Aweigh" 1966 DS1 #2675
Fly4rfun
 
Posts: 287
Joined: Tue Oct 13, 2020 5:10 pm
Location: Salem, WV

Re: Painting Mast?

Postby GreenLake » Wed Mar 31, 2021 1:05 pm

In your situation, I would probably pick a silver spray paint; something close to the underlying color, so scratches are least visible and also, contrary to the neon green suggestion, some color that doesn't call attention to itself. I like to use Hammerite because it's a color that isn't plain, but has some "structure". I find that makes it more forgiving when doing touch ups. I would stay away from black, because it heats up in the sun.
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Re: Painting Mast?

Postby tomodda » Thu Apr 01, 2021 12:36 am

Ok, all kidding aside, please don't paint your mast. Painting on aluminum is non-trivial. You're just inviting later headaches, because if the preparation and paint job are not done perfectly, it either peels soon after or worse yet, you get bubbles which eventually trap water up against your mast. Bad news all around. The prep work is basically clean/sand/scrub/clean again till the mast is shiny, then prime it with a self-etching primer, then spray on two coats. But, if you're going to clean it up to the point of being shiny, why bother painting? Just go with your new shiny mast, and cover it with an aluminum clearcoat preservative.

To make a long story short, that was my thought process when I reached the point of total disgust with my own scratched up, blotchy, hadn't been cleaned in 20 years mast:

DirtyMast.jpg
Old Mast
DirtyMast.jpg (242.85 KiB) Viewed 3423 times


Not the best photo to show the oxidation and scars, but best I have. How bad is your mast? Anyway, here's a before/after from when I was working on it:

Contrast.jpg
Before/After
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The before part is above the spreaders (closer to camera) and is already after the initial cleaning, but still you can see the difference. After all done:

After2.jpg
After
After2.jpg (151.74 KiB) Viewed 3423 times


Two years later, mast still looks good. Not quite as shiny, but I can always buff it again. If this works for you, let me know and I'll try and write out some instructions on exactly what I did and what magic glop I put on the mast to preserve. Basically I did some light hand sanding with a fine grit paper on the really bad spots, otherwise it was just a lot of cleaning with one of those two-sided scrub sponges and TSP. Lastly put on the magic glop, let it dry, hand-buffed with a cloth, done. I'll need to dig thru my paint locker to find what I used, but really anything from the auto-store that you'd use to preserve aluminum wheels will do.

For what it's worth, first time I went sailing again with my mast all nice and shiny, I proudly pointed it out to my regular crew. His reaction: "Oh? And the boat sails so much faster now?"
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Re: Painting Mast?

Postby Fly4rfun » Sat Apr 03, 2021 12:56 am

Like they say with Motorcycles, chrome won't get you home! thanks for the input. and it's really not that bad
"Sail Aweigh" 1966 DS1 #2675
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Joined: Tue Oct 13, 2020 5:10 pm
Location: Salem, WV


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