Tales of Tails & Travels

Paint me like one of your French girls

Published by

Toni Skinner

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A yellow labrador sleeps on a blanket in a boat yard, behind in a large 40ft yacht with a blue keel and below waterline and white hull with thick blue stripe in a cradle.
Our first day at the yacht.

The SunFizz 40 is a french sailboat designed by Philippe Briand and built by Jeanneau in the early 1980s. Ours was built in 1981 and initially owned by a Glaswegian investment banker, then a racing club in the Isle of Wight and lastly bought by the owner before us in 1995. We could tell that she had been well looked after, but was due a little bit of TLC before we could get her back in the water. If you want to check out the specs there is a link here.

Once we arrived at the yacht we did a little once over and made a list of tasks to be done. Tasks were split into: splash down critical; mission critical and would like to get done. The mission: get the yacht sailing and ideally back down south closer to us in Kent before the end of the sailing season. 1st on the list was to clean down the hull and start painting.

The weather this June in Scotland was surprisingly hot, so the fact I chucked more water over myself than the yacht wasn’t too bad.
A man sits at the front of a yacht with a locker open.
Jake cleaning out the anchor locker. *

After the clean up, then sanding we started painting. The main issue we had was that the paint was drying too fast as we had an incredibly hot June in Scotland. We used Hempel Primer Undercoat for the hull and with 2 coats it gave good coverage.

A man stands on a step ladder and is painting a boat. There is grey primer paint covering part of the hull.
First coat of primer.
A man stands of a step ladder painting the hull of a boat on the upper portion.
More painting. *
The hull is grey but there are patches of the white colour that can be seen through the grey paint.
One and a half coats of primer. *
A view of the whole boat from the side in its cradle shows the hull painted grey with primer.
Prime coat finished. *

Trust me I did do some painting too. I took the bottom half with a step whilst Jake followed around doing the top with the step ladder.

Onto the hull paint- Epifanes Poly-urethane. Now I’d like to say I chose this colour because I love this deep blue- but I didn’t. The paint choices were all Jake. The hull paint came in 2 cans that had to be mixed and applied immediately, it is like an epoxy cross paint. Which means sticky after application, you’re not re rolling the same spot, has set temperature it likes to be applied and if you get it on you you’re not getting it off. Thankfully due to the longer days in June in Scotland we were able to get the paint on, dry and 2nd coats in the same day. We would get in around 7-8 am take the boys for a walk, do a coat of paint then rest in the middle of the day whilst the paint dried and it was hot, cracking on with 1-2 more coats done in the afternoon, often not leaving until 9 pm.

An image of a paint can can be seen. The paint can has 'epifanes poly-urethane 2-component yacht coating' written on it.
Hull paint- in donkerblauw
First coat – We had bought 2 lots of hull paint, this was after the first. We opted to not start the second one so we could easily see what had been done and what not.

As we were waiting for the rest of the hull paint to arrive we started painting the antifoul primer, Hempel Underwater Primer. The plan was to touch up the little bits where the masking tape was later on.

A full view of the side of a yacht in a cradle can be seen. The upper hull is a deep blue and has a shine. the lower part of the hull is a grey/ silver colour painted primer. There is a yellow line of masking tape splitting the two colours.
Hull painted and antifoul primer on.
The front of the boat is imaged in it's cradle, the deep blue upper hull is split from the primed underside in grey with a yellow line of masking tape.
*
A man stands in front of a boat looking up at it with his hands on his hips,, His clothes are covered in paint.
Jake admiring his handiwork.
My pride in a straight line.

After the primer we did our antifoul- Hempel Classic in black, to give that goth vibe. We had discussed and looked into copper coat, but decided that would be an investment for the future maybe. There are really positive reports on its use and there was another boat that had just had theirs done sitting on the hard next to us. For us right now though, spending the same on the anti fouling as the boat cost just wasn’t something we were wanting to do.

A woman stands in front of a painted boat looking down with her hands out palms up. She is smiling. Her clothes and skin are covered in paint.
Anti-foul applied onto boat and me. *
A view from the front of the boat in the boat yard in its cradle shows a shiny dark blue hull and black antifoul
Hull painted
A side view of a dark blue boat with black antifoul in its cradle.

As well as the hull we had the deck and helm to paint. Which was made more interesting (difficult) by the fact we were right next to and under some trees. So we would paint, the wind would blow, leaves, debris and sap would land on the boat. It made such a massive difference though and really brightened up the boat making her look fresher. We used deck paint in semi-gloss white, 2-3 coats were needed on the main deck, the helm will need a lot more.

A man is sitting in the helm of a boat painting.
Painting the helm.
Narrated video showing the deck paint.
A view from the helm looking forward over the deck shows masked hardware and a small roller tray with roller, paint brush and paint in. The deck appears bright white.
Painting the deck.
A bright white helm is imaged.
Another fresh coat on the helm.

* Pictures taken with Olympus Trip35 on an out of date Kodak Gold 35mm film. Developed & Scanned by Take It Easy Lab.

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