Painting Propellors

[Toerag]

OK, so I eventually had to get my ally duoprops repainted after 3 years use a couple of years ago. I wirebrushed them back to bare metal, etch-primed them and used Trilux as per international paint's instructions - which didn't work very well at all, lasted only a season. I then had a run in with an uncharted rock off Alderney necessitating a repair to the ends of the blades, and the prop repair man reckoned you had to acid-dip them and epoxy prime them straight away or the ally oxidises before you have a chance to paint them - which I believe is true, so I got him to do that and triluxed them myself - result - even worse than the time before! It seems that trilux is rubbish at multiple coats as each successive coat dissolves the one below preventing a decent build up of thickness, and consequently the edges of the blades get chipped and start to corrode, with the corrosion lifting the paint easily.

So this time I'm going for the 'acid-dip and epoxy prime' route again, but am thinking of putting a couple of coats of 'normal' epoxy paint over the top before antifouling to give a tough thickness to resist chipping and the cavitation corrosion I get.

Does anybody have any experience or recommendations? I have a spare set of props, so I can pretty much paint a set at my leisure, but I don't really want to have to go through the process every year! I can soon see me getting stainless ones if that's the case.

[Stoaty]

Try painting your alloy props with Owatrol Oil then when dry paint with trilux or antifoul with 20% owatrol oil mixed in. Many people don't bother painting alloy props. They just treat them to a few coats on lanolin to keep them free of barnacles.