SOF: white polyurethane coating

Submitted bytraveler onSat, 03/27/2021 - 19:47
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Kayak Building

Just finished skinning my SOF kayak with 9 ounce nylon. Have Cory’s Goop polyurethane to apply and want to keep the skin white (on my last one I used rare earth powder pigments and it came out fine, but I do like the look of white better). Have been advised that tinting the goop with titanium dioxide powder will work. Does anyone have any experience with this or other ways to get a decent white tint for two part polyurethane? Am I asking for trouble with a white SOF in terms of longer-term discolouration? Thanks for any thoughts/advice/tips on this.

Tony

Thomas Duncan

Mon, 03/29/2021 - 19:33

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The goop will yellow, and keep yellowing, over time, and not that much time. It's a good coating, but difficult to apply well. It needs to be mixed exactly and stirred well. You can probably add powdered pigment, but I would avoid it. If you use it, keep it well suspended during application. If you want a really white boat to stay white, you might think of using something else. Spar varnish, if you can find the real oil based stuff, you can mix it with white artist oil paint and get a nice opaque white that will stay white. Much easier to apply well, and faster drying, maybe not as durable tho, but easier to touch up or re-coat. 

 

 

Thanks Thomas. I have used Goop for a past kayak and agree it can be a bit fussy to apply, but not really any worse than epoxy on a cedar strip. Any yellowing that has occurred is not really noticeable so far, but then again it hasn’t been that long and it was tinted sort of light brown with a powder pigment so less likely to show anyway. I am kind of committed to the goop for this kayak as well - it gives a really strong and durable coating that I like, but agree the yellowing issue might be a bigger deal with white pigment over time.