Ressurected old bottom paint with liquid methylene chloride and gasoline

Discussion in 'All Things Boats & Boating' started by sdowney717, Oct 21, 2014.

  1. sdowney717
    Joined: Nov 2010
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    sdowney717 Senior Member

    I have an old 5 gallon bucket of bottom paint that had about 2 gallons used up that sat for about 10 years.
    It dried up but not all the way. The top had cracks and you could cut it with a knife, like putty.

    I got some methylene chloride liquid and dissolved it back into suspension and also added E10 gasoline. I blended it with a power mixer and it acts and looks like bottom paint.
    What I was wondering though has the binders been used up in the paint when it almost dried up?

    I was thinking of adding some boiled linseed oil to the mix before using it on the boat. Maybe in a gallon of restored bottom paint, add in a half quart to a quart of linseed oil. I can experiment to see how that works.

    This paint was the hard ablative variety. My dried sample of restored paint dries up but not as hard as I think it might. And it takes a good week to dry hard. It does not wash off in water.

    This was not a cheap paint, it was a good quality expensive bottom paint from that time. It was the good stuff with lots of bio active components, not a wimpy eco type paint.
    I had the metal can so long, it rusted and I had to put the paint into a plastic 5 gallon bucket.
     
  2. sdowney717
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    sdowney717 Senior Member

    https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.846387565376599.1073741851.216763968338965&type=3

    googling linseed oil bottom paint, I came across someone touting using linseed oil as bottom paint with red pepper. I have my doubts.

    Other web sites said linseed oil in bottom paint will slowly ablate off the hull.
    And copper bottom paint has been around at least 100 years. I imagine the copper paints from 1912 magazine Yacht World advertisement used linseed oil as the binder.

    Oil paints uses linseed oil AFAIK. Did and still do.
     
  3. Grey Ghost
    Joined: Aug 2012
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    Grey Ghost Senior Member

    I don't know the answer. I'll be watching for you to post the results of your experiments.

    I hate dealing with bottom paint and don't take any chances and always buy new. As a result, I have lots of old partial cans on the shelf now :(
     
  4. PAR
    Joined: Nov 2003
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    PAR Yacht Designer/Builder

    It all boils down to the resins and vehicle used in the original paint. More importantly how they cure. Most of them are moisture cure (polyurethanes and acrylics) now a days, though a decade old formulation may have been something else. Specifically, what was the paint?
     
  5. keith66
    Joined: Sep 2007
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    keith66 Senior Member

    So the paint now has methylene chloride in it, is that the same stuff they put in paint stripper? I wouldnt want to put that stuff on a grp boat!
     
  6. sdowney717
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    sdowney717 Senior Member

    Its going on my polyurethane coated wood boat, those solvents will flash off very quickly.

    The brand of paint was something beginning with a 'H'?? Some kind of shipyard paint. I no longer have the can as it rusted years ago. I honestly dont remember. It is VERY heavy, likely due to the copper.
     
  7. philSweet
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    philSweet Senior Member

    The chemistry is all dead. It is worthless. It has a shelf life (typically one year) even if it looked perfect when you opened the can. Just add it to your collection of gravity clamps.
     
  8. sdowney717
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    sdowney717 Senior Member

    I will use it and let you know.
    Pretty sure now that Hempel was the brand.
     
  9. sdowney717
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    sdowney717 Senior Member

    Took 1 gallon to coat one side of boat. My plan is 2 coats.
    I used a 3 inch good brush.
    I started with rollers but it ate them, they fell apart both foam and the nap.

    what worked for me was
    fill gallon pail 3/4 full with the restored paint
    put in a cup of boiled linseed oil.
    put in some more gasoline E10 as it still needed thinning.

    It brushed out well with that combination.

    It was rolling out beautifully, until they fell apart.
     
  10. waikikin
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    waikikin Senior Member

    I've used plenty of "past date" paint but only on my own vessels with no issue.

    Although you may well be right about this mix, I was concerned about the methylene chloride part, we used to(35 years ago) use that to strip paint, apparently pretty unhealthy stuff- a co- worker sat on a pail(closed) of it & the fumes that leaked out burnt his behind, the unscrupulous would also wash hands with it for an apparent dose of dermo & get a week off.... a surf every day & it would clear up!!!!
    The solvents might well go ok in it.......? hope we find out.

    Jeff
     
  11. sdowney717
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    sdowney717 Senior Member

    The methylene chloride being such an excellent solvent is what you need to redissolve paint. Use the liquid version, not the paste. It certainly can burn your skin, not acid or base, it is a very potent solvent. I experienced no ill effects and I had splatters get on my hands as I paint on the hull.

    Methylene chloride will evaporate very quickly so it wont stay in the paint and neither will the gasoline. Using both together guarantees the paint will become like paint again. I have used a lot of paint removers, if you dont let the liquid sit on your skin your ok. Someone who would deliberately burn themselves with it sure is not right in the head. If your worried, use gloves.

    I reconstituted this paint back in the summer time maybe 4 months ago. So some of the methylene chloride had evaporated out from the paint. In that large bucket, I used up 3/4 gallon of methylene chloride and a half gallon of gasoline. I started with the methylene chloride and let that work on the paint first, then added gasoline a later. You want it to look like paint again. Both of those solvents will evaporate out quick, so if you put in too much, leave the top off the bucket to thicken the paint. And as your brushing it on the hull, they flash off quick, so even thin paint quickly thickens up, It helps for the paint to be smoothed on, gives even coats thinned like that.

    Dont even bother with any rollers, those solvents will eat them.
     
  12. PAR
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    PAR Yacht Designer/Builder

    The problem with methylene chloride (dichloromethane) is it'll break down many of the compounds in the resin base and it doesn't actually replace the vehicle, so much as just make a slurry of decomposed chemical and organic compounds. These compounds may or may not recombine after the DCM flashes, but this seems unlikely, considering the nature of DCM and what it will do to the base resin molecule.
     
  13. WestVanHan
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    WestVanHan Not a Senior Member

    I'd suggest putting a fan up or working in the wind.
    I helped a friend strip some paint with this,we got higher than a kite.

    Also left the one gallon steel jug (with the handle on top) out in the sun-amazingly it swelled up almost totally round like a soccer ball and yet didn't leak.
     
  14. sdowney717
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    sdowney717 Senior Member

    Well it is drying and sticking to the hull and me too.

    Consider that the active biocide is metal and you know solvents wont do anything to metal. And it does not wash off with water.

    It paints on like all the other bottom paints paint on boats.
    It will take a couple years to prove if it still works as bottom paint.

    I have one coat now on the entire boat. It did not smell too bad. It does smell like bottom paint. Not as strong smelling as Micron Extra, but you can smell the linseed oil. Turned out I needed more binder, so I upped the linseed oil to 2 cups. Looking at the dried surface next day exhibited some crazing, which adding in the second cup that went away.

    I dont notice any methylene chloride type smell in the paint. I think much of that solvent is gone away as it is extremely volatile. The MC dissolved the paint and the gasoline is now the primary solvent.
     

  15. waikikin
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    waikikin Senior Member

    That's some backyard chemistry you're up to.....
    Hoping it works out for you...........
    & stick good but not like glue....
    Would ward off the flu... achhhewwww!!
    Might need some for my boat tooo...

    Don't scoff...
    That's for the toff..
    If it fall off..
    You can depleat..
    & put some more on in a feat

    It's cheap...
    Which you can't beat..
    Be descreet..
    Use it on the fleet...
    Be careful in the heat...

    Man those solvents are strong.......... I'm a whole ocean away........;)
     
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