Question: You call painting an aluminum hull a mug’s game yet you painted your hull?
Answer: The problem is that Morgan’s Cloud was built before computerized plate cutting and bending and like all boats of the time has a lot of fairing compound on her to cover small dips and hollows induced in the plate fitting process. To have her unpainted we would have to blast all the fairing compound off. There would be no structural problem in doing this; it’s just that the combination of Jim McCurdy’s lines and her builders’ execution are so aesthetically pleasing that we can’t bring ourselves to take this drastic step.
I don’t know if this is the right place to post this question, but can anyone advise me on the issues/pitfalls of having an entirely unpainted aluminum hull. i.e. No bottom paint at all. The boat that I am imagining is a 40ft bilge keeler which would dry out at mid tide and thus spend much of it’s time completely out of the water. I envisage giving ithe hull a wipe down with a rough cloth every few weeks to remove “fuzz”, and possibly applying polish periodically?
Any opinions would be much apreciated.
Thanks,
Eric Thesen