DaySailer.org Forum

Yesterday I made the 6 hour trip to Augusta and picked up our new for us daysailer. She's an 85 Spindrift and, as you can see, she needs some work. This is my first boat and there will be lots to learn but I'm excited about the journey!

She seems to have everything there for my wife, small daughter and me to get out sailing this spring. And I was really pleased this morning that a few sprays of greased lightning should be enough to get off most of the stains. I know that will especially make my wife happy!

I think the first thing I'll do over the winter, after a general cleaning, is to remove the woodwork and work on painting the cockpit and inside cabin. Any suggestions?


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First, congratulations - you bought a grand boat and there are lots of folks here to help. I bought my DS1 a few years ago and it was in much worse shape. It was a great joy for me to restore Truelove to her former glory.

THere is a lot of info on restoring the footboards and the coamings. Strip, sand, varnish. Take the footboards completely apart and mark the pieces!

As for the raw fiberglass surfaces, I used a latex. I called West Marine tech support and they recommended their boat interior latex. The MSDS sheet said it was basically a good quality exterior latex. Instead of paying West $30/qt I went to the local harware and bought Kilz primer and then a wquart of exterior latex. I sponged on a contrast color.
The latex has held up well.

You could also use an epoxy or even gel coat

As for the stains on the bottom, start with one of the nasty boat cleaners with oxalic acid. Use rubber gloves. After that go at with with polishing compound and a power buffer.

As for the sails, look up www.sailcare.com

See if the fabric is still strong. If it is punky, replace them. If not, sailcare can clean, restich and re-resin the sails at about $1/ft2

I don't know about the Spindrift boats, but most of the Daysailers need to have the foam flotation replaced. They used blocks of styrofoam which get waterlogged with age. I pulled a couple hundred pounds of sodden foam out of my boat.

Piparoo wrote:I think the first thing I'll do over the winter, after a general cleaning, is to remove the woodwork and work on painting the cockpit and inside cabin. Any suggestions?

Welcome to the Forum!

If cleaning and other restauration work leave you time, spend some of it by systematically reading older posts on this forum. Primarily the DS1 section, but also the repair oriented topics. You'll learn a lot.

For the wood you have a variety of choices, from oil, oil or water based varnishes or polyurethanes to epoxy sealing the wood and then varnishing. Practical Sailor had a recent review of various treatments. As their tests were done in Florida, they might be closely applicable to you.

The main difference among the types of treatment is the time expected before touch-ups or maintenance coats (and the ease or difficulty of doing that maintenance).

Oil needs to be refreshed every few months, but takes little prep to do it. Oil based varnishes last a bit longer but are similar in maintenance. Water based polyurethanes can be tricky to reapply (need sanding for the new coat to grip as there's no chemical bonding). PU is otherwise pretty durable, but will crack on impact. Epoxy durably protects against moisture, but needs a clear coat that protects it against UV.

After various problems with PU, I've switched to Epoxy sealing (because moisture is the biggest issue for me) with PU topcoat. It's important to not seal in too much moisture.

The coating seems more durable physically than PU alone, but I have no long-term experience with how it weathers yet. Oil is not a bad choice, if you are the kind of person who stands ready with can and brush to give it the frequent light coats. Because it does not form a film, it's more forgiving on impact the way I see it.

Good luck!

Welcome to the site and congrats on the beginning of your “Navy” fleet. Like potato chips, its hard to eat just one.

Your boat looks to be in generally good shape. Once you have the surfaces cleaned up you should consider a good buffing and wax job. Your hull may take some time as the waterline stain looks pretty bad. I have used C.L.R. on waterline stains with great results. After the cleanup, woodwork, and gear restoration, I would take an afternoon and go over the trailer for typical things like the wiring harness and greasing the ball coupler. I would definitely pull the wheels and hubs and repack the wheel bearings. Like GreenLake mentions reviewing the posts on this site will provide invaluable help. There is a great “search” feature provided. Brad

Consider using a pressure washer on the waterline stains, any mold, and the loose paint in the cockpit.

I did on my DS1 and had great results.

Thanks for all the great advice. I've spent the past few days reading the forums and cleaning the boat up as much as possible. Bar Keepers Friend and elbow grease have been pretty good at cleaning up the topside and cockpit area. The underside of the cabin and the centerboard trunk will need to be completely scraped and painted. After doing some reading, I'm thinking of picking up some oil-based paint at the hardware store for those areas.

Also giving serious thought to painting the hull. The gel coat looks to be in decent shape but both my wife and I would love to see it painted red. I'm planning on careening the boat in our front yard, per the instructions found on this site. Then cleaning the hull with MEK, lightly sanding the gel coat for adhesion, and then rolling on primer and rustoleum enamel. Does that sound crazy? I have a palm sander that I was hoping to use prior to priming, small & square. Do you think that'll work or do i need an orbital sander?

Before you commit to painting the hull, try to restore the orginal finish. I was amazed after cleaning and polishing

Good point Kokko. The crazy thing is, I think the gel coat would clean up nicely. It's not all that bad. On the other hand, I know my wife will enjoy the boat a whole lot more if the hull is red. I think I would too.

I totally get what you are saying about wanting the boat in a different color. On mine, the decks were some light turquois in color, and a previous owner had painted them a nice dark red. I think it might have even been several owners back.

The same person painted the inside of the hull (I know, because they handed down receipts). If the boat had been the original color, I would probably not have looked at it - I couldn't picture myself in what must have looked like the inside of a pool.

The paint was a reputable marine brand. (I'm not giving a name, because I know that the particular type paint is no longer for sale). The looks are still pleasing even though after over a decade since appliation, the paint has faded were it was uncovered for several seasons and any and all scratches look bright blue-green - exposing a gel coat in good shape where the paint has rubbed off.

I'm still likely to repaint, when it comes to that.

Inside of the hull was painted with the same brand, light gray. Has held up, except below the floorboards (standing water at times and rubbing of the boards' feet on the paint). I protected the laminate with a touchup of clear gelcoat repair paste. (Don't really care about the looks under the floors one way or another, as long as there's no exposed laminate )

The paint on the outside of the hull is a different story. It's the same shade as the gelcoat, and looks like it's been applied in order to hide extensive gelcoat cracking. I don't know what kind of paint it is, but it's held on tenaciously, also for nearly a decade (if not longer). It's survived rounds of pressure washing by eager teenage helpers, and is damaged only where I've beached the boat or banged it into the trailer on retrieval.

My conclusion is that I would definitely go for high-grade marine paint, if and when I get around to repainting the bottom.
(My DS is sailed dry, that helps a lot with the durability of the paint, and the sun exposure is moderate)

I took a look at your profile pictures GreenLake, she's a good looking boat!

I've decided to focus my efforts on the interior underside of the cabin and the centerboard trunk. I'm new to fiberglass and it looks like there's been some repair work done on the trunk. There is, what looks like very solid tape all the way around where the trunk connects to the hull and again on the port side of the trunk. Can I sand and repaint these repairs or do they look substandard to you?

Also, would it just be awful to use spray can paint on the interior underside of the cabin? It seems like that area never gets any sun, or traffic and little water on it. I'm hoping to scrape away most of that old paint. After scraping, would a solvent be the next step to remove anything remaining or would palm sanding be a better choice?

I'm a real novice so I appreciate all of the great feedback!

The glass work on the cb locker could use some work. It may just be cosmetic, but consider going over it again with another layer of glass and then fairing it out again. For the later you could use marine bondo.

Pay particular attention to where the cb locker meets the hull. The seam should be solid. it looks like someone caulked it.

As for painting the cuddy, spray paintwould be more trouble than it is worth. It is an ennclosed space and the paint will get everywhere. It would be simpler to sand, prime and repaint with a foam roller.

The CB to hull joint can use being strengthened anyway. If you are adding a layer of glass (tape, I'd assume) then you can, and should, sand the existing stuff down to bare glass. You want to read West Marine's little handbook on fiberglass repair with epoxy first. Then you need to make sure that the glass comes to lie in a reasonably smooth curve, and some fairing material is useful. However, you probably don't want the only contact of the new glass to the hull go through a layer of Bondo, whether Marine quality or not.

The epoxy needs to be measured precisely and mixed well (and not too much). It needs to really wet the tape. You need to squeeze out the excess so the glass rests close to the seam and isn't separated by a layer of un-reinforced resin. Those are the biggies to watch out for.

By all means, try it out on something else first, to get the feel for how the material handles. Nail some pieces of wood together in 90 degree angle and try to tape the "seam".

To do your undersides, rest the boat upside down. Rolling paint should then be easy.

On the fiberglass repair manual I think that GreenLake meant to refer you to the West System repair manual. There is a PDF version of it online here http://www.westsystem.com/ss/assets/How ... enance.pdf . There is a lot of good information there.

KC