Tuesday, October 11, 2011

Post 6 - Removing Non-Skid

The Paint is coming off nicely.  The carbide scraper works well on the hull and the Porter Cable Random Orbit Sander works wonders on the topside paint.

My next battle: removal of the non-skid.

Overall, the non-skid was still attached extremely well, but it had come loose or cracked in a few places.  Most of the non-skid had been painted over twice, but wherever it was exposed, it had turned a yellowish color. It had to go.  To remove it, I went with a suggestion from a friend on the Plastic Classics Forum; I bought a 4 1/2" grinder and used 40 grit flap-disks to grind the bulk of the non-skid material off. On the picture above, you can see how far I went with the grinder on the left side, and then you can see the finished result on the right side after I had sanded it off fairly smooth.

Unlike the Porter Cable Sander, my Milwaukee Grinder has no dust collection system.  The grinder paired with the flap-disks throws an amazing amount of material into the air.  My garage is covered with light-blue dust.  Still, progress is progress...

After getting the bulk of the Non-skid off with the grinder, I switched to the Random Orbital Sander in order to smooth the very uneven surface left from the grinding.  The non-skid clogs-up the sandpaper much quicker than the paint does.