Tony. Whatever you want to use will be OK. Paint, specialist sealer. Eze-cote, Zpoxy, resin. Take your pick.

Obviously something used with glass cloth will strengthen the hull if you are likely to be ramming U-Boats, best not to use ordinary fibreglass resin as it takes a while to go off and is difficult to sand.

Everybody has their favourite. There is no right or wrong here. Generally I now use eze-cote as an initial water-proofer and then ordinary household undercoat and whatever on top…Humbrol/ polyurethane paint/red oxide below the waterline. BUT there again virtually all previous builds used nothing more than paint.

Ashley​

Tony, because you're using balsa/obeche, I would use an epoxy. Probably find that a 1 litre pack of WEST or SP will be cheaper than specialised modelling resins. Get them from ebay sellers or your local boat chandlery. Always mix till your arm drops off before applying and try to use in a warmed up room, 12 degrees or warmer, without too high a humidity. Painted inside generously with poundshop chinese bristle brushes, you should have no problems internally.

Externally, be generous without leaving runs. Rub down when hard and then use sanding sealer (cellulose) for the general finish as a primer and sealer for the lengths of ply on the hull, roof and cabin. It'll need at least 4 coats, depending on the surface quality of the ply. But cellulose sanding sealer can be recoated within half an hour and then sands beautifully. I'd do this smelly job outside though! After that, just use your favourite paints. I recommend you use enamel paints as water based never seem to work very well, often reacting even with themselves. That never happens with enamels. Remember that the hull of a narrow boat is always blacked with tar which is glossy for all of a week! So do the hull parts in a satin black, the upperworks in gloss.

Good luck,

Cheers,

Martin

Well, if you don't mind using more epoxy (it ain't cheap!), then do all of the hull. I would use an old credit card to apply it to the flatter sections. This helps it soak in better and uses far less epoxy. 2 coats like that will give you a good skin.

My wife and I restored the historic wooden working boat Heather Bell a few years ago and I used the above method for epoxying the brand new back and fore cabins I made for the boat. A good rub down and priming with red oxide and two coats of high build super alkyd resin enamel paint and it looked like steel! I got my paints from Tra-Mar Coatings, but I don't know if they're still going. Mark made our paints specially for us using more pigment than the standard paint. And he never charged us a penny! Last year I used some of the tin he marked "Heather Bell Burgundy" to restore my 56 year old Aerokits Sea Urchin back to its original condition and it went on beautifully.

But I digress…if you want to save on epoxy, just concentrate on the bow, then sanding seal the rest, but please pay the bit extra for cellulose sanding sealer. It really is worth it. Water based paints on wood is just daft<G>

Cheers,

Martin

Well, all seems to have turned out well! Glad you got there in the end.

Cheers,

Martin