Varnish Challenges on Elysium

Experience is the best Teacher

As discussed in the blog...one cruising friend threatened bodily harm if i didn't listen to what he suggested for the exterior woodwork. So I listened. And for years we were quite happy with it. Signature Finishes. We would get 12 to 18 months before needing to recoat. Any new wood we could cover and apply the product wet on wet. Eliminating the multi day delay, coat, sand, repeat.

For 15 years we were satisfied. The only issue we had was shipping internationally. We did end up working that hiccup out. What got us, the owner of the company passed on. His wife tried to keep it going but she choose retirement instead. What to do?

At an epoxy manufacture in Brisbane we discovered an epoxy coating. The company owner-chemist- said the surfboard industy had found this product and the example in the shop looked really good. The final straw was that the coating would last 5 years. Remember, if it sounds too good to be true it probably is. We were in a quandry. We could not get any more Signature product and if this only lasted half as long that will be fine.

We stripped all the old off tapped up and applied the epoxy coating. It looked good. Not as good as the shop example but good. We were happy until.... Austraila has these events called Rain Bombs. We had a few days of heavy constant rain. When it dried up and we looked at the epoxy coating. The coating had all turned white! OMG as well as a few other choice words.

We contacted the company and complained. We did recieve a reply but I was still PO'ed. They said, Oh that is just a blush, simply recoat it with more epoxy. Not good. Not what we wanted to hear. We left it alone and Elysium looked like she had just been dusted with snow.

We needed to leave Australia. Visa and boat import time was up. Six months later were in the Spice Islands in Indonesia. We had enough of the Signature Finish for one coat around the boat. So...we tried to overcoat the epoxy with it. Bingo. At a minimum it looked good again. No snow. That coating with the epoxy undercoating gained us another year.

Now in Malaysia it was looking shop worn. Time to address the issue again. Brad, whom we had met in NZ and visited again in Australia had some good looking varnished teak. He said it was Awlwood. A power boat came into Rebak Island Marina with some good looking varnished teak. We picked their brain and found they too had used Awlwood. Theirs had been on about a year. Ah ha! Two cruisers had good looking teak, a varnish coating that lasted, time to switch. We found the product at a local chandlery..

We've began working our way through removing the old coating and applying the Alwood. Twelve coats to finish. Wet on wet. It takes 4 good days to make 12 coats. After which we expect to recoat again...once every 12 to 18 months.