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1) Marine Paint. Do I have to mix Marine Paint with Mineral Spirits? I live in Vancouver so I prefer Marine Top Side Paint. "Exit" has a separate website detailing the technique. On his website it implies that mixing MS with Brightside is the prescribed method. However on this thread ... many have used Brightside without mixing MS. I intend to mix Brightside with 20% MS ... any thoughts?






Think of the mineral spirit or the 'brushing liquid from Interlux' as a useful tool. Thinning either type of paint basically does two things :

a ) it buys you time. It takes the paint longer to cure or form a skin. So that allows you additional time to work the paint, get the bubbles out, and still leave enough time for the paint to self level out before the top surface of the paint begins to cure. This is probably more essential when you are first developing your rolling technique and working out the kinks on how to apply it just right.

b ) The thinner primarily allows the paint the opportunity to lay on a thinner coat during each coat stage. If the paint is laid on too thick you will get the outer skin of paint drying and trapping 'still moist' paint between the lower surface being painted and the hardening outer skin of the paint. In such a scenario, where softer paint is trapped below a curing outer skin - and you add another coat... it will cause wrinkling ( elephant skin ) on the paint. By laying on a very thinned layer of paint, it has the best opportunity for the entire layer to fully harden and cure before the next coat of paint is added.

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2) Home Depot sells a CIL Marine paint. It is about the same price as Tremclad for a gallon. Can I use the CIL Marine paint? It looks to be very similar to Brightside except at 1/4 of the price. Here's what CIL's website saids about this product:

CIL Professional Marine Enamel
Is a top quality oil based high gloss enamel designed for use on metal and wood. Marine quality, the high gloss finish is perfect for use where maximum durability and protection from the elements is required. Available in a wide range of popular ready mixed colours, or it can be tinted to thousands of CIL colours. Meets CGSB specification #1GP59.





Originally, I chose the Brightside after searching and heavily researching what the boaters were using on their boats. After all, they have been rolling paint on their boats for 10 times longer then any of our car body painters. The overall majority opinion that I picked up was that MOST of the boaters went with Brightside. In some cases it was the ease of application that had sold them, in other cases it was the durability factor. But feelings were quite mixed on most other marine polyurathanes. In the case of the CIL paint... well... it was just not even making it on the radar... no one had much to say about it... nada... So it all boiled down to going with the most popular paint in use by the boaters. Since CIL is not on the radar with a large percentage of the boaters, I would suggest you follow their lead and stay away from it as well. I am not saying it is not up to par... and in fact it may be a marvelous paint - but if the boat painters themselves are all giving glowing praise about Brightside and not talking about CIL, then I would suggest to you that we can infer that the product has not made much of an impact on the boater crowd.


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3) Metallic Paint. I know it is not advised. But has anyone tried using the Tremclad Aluminum and then a Clear Coat, then wetsand? I know it was talked about way back in the original tread ... but has anyone tried it? I think I'm going to try this method on the test panel as well. Any suggestions?





Just don't bother. It's a no go. At some point you will need to do 'some' sanding, whether wetsanding or dry sanding of the aluminum paint. At that point it will go gray. Aluminum paint does not like being worked....

And it almost seems like the components of the aluminum paint are slighly different compared to their flat / gloss brothers.

To date we have not had any vehicles or even tool boxes that have successfully had the roll on technique applied.

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4) Tremclad Clear Coat. Did anyone try this? Does it work? If using clear coat, will it reduce the amount of sanding? Will the procedure need to be changed with use of Clear Coat? Coat, Wetsand, Coat, Wetsand, Coat ... then Clear Coat? Do I have to Wetsand before the Clear Coat? My test panel is getting big ... but it looks like I'll be trying this too.





Charger apparently got his hands on some of the Tremclad clear coat... but I don't recall if he ever applied it to any of his projects up to this point. Charger can step in and clarify what ever happened with the clearcoat Tremclad.

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5) Spray. I've read in recent posts that some have had success using a cheap Black & Decker Sprayer. Sounds like a great idea ... especially if I'm going to use clear coat. Any suggestions? I currently don't have a sprayer, but have been wanting to buy a air compressor for a long time. If I get a air compressor ... I'll pick up a spray nozzle as well. Any suggestion on what I should look for in a air compressor and a nozzle? I think I'll need to get 2 test panels.





There have been some really excellent spray jobs done using the Tremclad and the Brightside. The one thing to keep in mind is that it is a messy affair with overspray going all over. That was one of the reasons why the 'roll on' method gained favor.. in that it is relatively mess free... compared to a spray job for example.

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