How flexible is floor paint?

Question

Hi All,

I have a small Zodiac inflatable dinghy (C260 'Roller') and there are a couple of bits I need to do on it.

1) The centre thwart (ply of some sort) could do with a re-paint. It's not bad but just showing some wear on the corners and a bit of water damage (lines in the paint matching the plys) in a couple of places. It's been rubbed down with some fine wet&dry (wet) and is currently drying in the sun.

2) The separate battens that form the 'bottom boards' are made of a

10mm thick phenolic resin faced ply of some sort and one has a split across the back skin, possibly where it has taken a point load (outboard fin or knee etc).

Getting hold of any of that sort of ply is likely to be expensive, especially as I only need a bit about 900 x 100mm (unless I can get hold of an offcut from a trailer manufacturer or some such) but I was thinking that a straight piece of 12mm marine ply, used with the grain (making it the stiffest) and then well painted with something like grey polyurethane floor paint would suffice. It wouldn't be left submerged for any time and dried well between uses.

So, even though much of this floor paint says it's good for stone, concrete and *wood* floors (so should be pretty hard wearing), I'm not sure a wooden floor would generally flex as much as these thin floor battens or thwart might in ordinary use?

FWIW, the varnish that is recommended for my Seahopper (plywood) folding boats is also used on seaplanes, specifically because they also flex quite a bit in use (hence the question) but I'm not sure it would be as good against petrol as the floor paint is (outboard fuel).

So, anyone happen to have used the single part floor paint on some wood that was flexed a bit and how well did it cope please?

Cheers, T i m

tabbypurr · Accepted Answer

Not me, but I have used PU in damp situations, it turned to gloop after a month. It may be proof against the occasional short wetting as long as it dries out totally afterwards, but not more. NT

T i m · Answer

So do you mean this floor paint in general as they use PU Varnish on boats quite a lot? Ok. Cheers, T i m

Brian Gaff · Answer

Sounds like a question for the sheds newsgroup. there are some canal boat  types over there who are always painting their bottoms.  Of the boats that is!  Brian

tabbypurr · Answer

PU glue. It claimed to be waterproof. Might have been gorilla brand. NT

T i m · Answer

Thanks Brian. Downloading the message headers now.

Hehe.

The only thing is ... canal boats are typically made of steel (especially the hull) and I'm not sure that flexes that much in everyday use?

I mention that because we are recommended not to use PU varnish or paint on our Seahopper Folding boats because PU is too hard and would crack because the hull woodwork has to bend quite a bit by design.

The thwart on this inflatable doesn't bend as much as that hull, but the bottom-board slats might.

I have since thought of getting some 5mm marine ply (I may already have some), laminating it into 10mm thick slats and then laying up some carbon fibre 'bandage' on the faces to make them a bit stronger / stiffer. If the whole lot is coated in resin it should be pretty strong and waterproof. ;-)

Cheers, T i m

How flexible is floor paint?

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