Do yourself a favor and hire someoneelse to do the blasting! Trust me on this. THe savings isn't worth it.

Also, I wouldn't use Primercon over the wash primer--and I don't care what Interlux says. The well-proven method is to go right to barrier coat epoxy.

Jeff

Check out my recent post in this section of the forum on taking the bottom down to bare metal before barrier/bottom coating it. It's based on a conversation with Interlux. Time between steps is quite important.

(Joe: where does the chlorine you noted come from)

BTW: I was down at the marina yesterday (Sunday) to wash and wax the hull. Instead, would up taping water line because yard mechanic came in on his day off to pull my boat into position. At close of business Friday, the soda blaster called to tell the marina his people would start my job first thing Monday morning. Of course, my boat was behind others. Five boats had to be unblocked, shifted, reblocked before the mechanic could jockey mine into the clear.
The mechanic (actually, the guy who will do the painting) had me lay down the regular 3M blue waterline tape. Over it, he gave me some 4" wide shrink wrap tape to go over the other, less aggressive stuff. That way, the shrink wrap tape which sticks almost like glue, will be easier to remove.
I also put aluminum from pie plates over the Capac, depth sounder and speed paddle.
I will be on hand Monday to watch the process. Should be quite interesting.
PS: yard neighbor pointed out to me that a pair of robins had built a nest on one of the flukes of my anchor that hangs right under the bow pulpit. Yep, there were three newly hatched babies in it and the parents were trying to come by to feed them while the boat was being moved. I hope they came back after we left this evening. Tomorrow, with the soda blasting, I don't think those unfortunate chicks will get fed. What a shame. And if I launch in about 10 days as expected, they will be over water with little chance of survival. Life sometimes is unfair!

Removes the soluble salts that attach to the metal. It's used by a lot of metal painting companies.

See my other post on bottom painting. Blaster used recycled glass after all, not soda. You can see the tiny, shiny bits of glass embedded in the hull. texture looks just right to me -- not too smooth.

Company says it uses about 100 lbs of the glass per hour and they blasted about 6 hrs. Please recycle your bottles so we boaters can enjoy the byproduct.

When I tested my project 32' on land an old nest with four dead chicks blew right out of the exhaust tube. Another reason for exhaust flappers. At my house a Dove built a nest about eye level in a tree. I saw her sitting in it when I walked to and from my car. One day she was gone, replaced by a big black snake with bird sized a lump in it. Some local kids started to go after the snake so I grabbed it. Too low on the neck. It bit me as I was putting it in a box. I took it way out in the woods and released it. Nature is all about birth and death. We help when we can.

sorry to hear about the birds.....usually once moved or disturbed by humans, the nest is abandoned immediatly with or without living young

If your plan is to sandblast to bare metal and then paint the whole boat by yourself I would get another plan. You are going to blow out all that soft Marinette filler. Why not power sand the topsides? How bad is the paint on your boat? How about starting just with the bottom like a lot of the members of this forum have done? Then work your way down the decks a step at a time.

I have two Marinettes needing paint. One has the original badly weathered factory paint. It does not need a bottom job. The other has got 3 or 4 coats of old finish and needs the bottom blasted to bare metal. I'm going to sand and use one part paint with an etching primer on the topsides. That's all I can handle. I will use the interlux system only for the one bottom job.

Dennis,
I will have to check out the Dual etch.

Yooper,

The paint is bad; I think it is mostly original. I will assure you I do not like to paint. The bottom has bare metal. The topsides are sun-checked and dull. See pictures...

I have a couple body shop people lined up to spray the topsides though.

I hope there is not too much filler on the topsides. I am not going to replace any of the filler on the gunwales. The weld area do not look bad to me.

Where are you in Aurora, My M is at lighthouse point

Fastjeff told me about the dualetch. Good stuff.
I wonder how Norm missed the BL truck in the backgound of your picture?