Advice for painting a ricon tail lift

[Gibson]

Hi
I have a ricon tail lift that is a bit rusted from the last owner.
It's charcoal and yellow.
I'd like it to be all black. And the rust gone.
I considered hammerite, but would this not work/be long lasting? (I use a powered wheelchair).
I contacted powder coating companies but no one has got back to me. So I'm looking for alternatives.
Thanks so much for any info!

[Burgerman]

First you need rid of any corrosion. That may mean drills with f
wire brushes, grinders, blasting, etc. Then priming. Then any kind of paint pretty much works the same way. Even rattle cans and clear laquer. It all depends how perfect you want it. If it were me I would dissademble the whole thing, blast then powder coat every part. Reassemble with new rod ends, stainless bolts etc all better than new.

[Gibson]

Thanks so much Burgerman. That is incredibly helpful and as always, very much appreciated.
I spoke to someone today that might be able to powdercoat it (just got to check if his oven is big enough).
Bit worried about it being put back together correctly. I'm wondering if I'll need to pay a ricon lift engineer to do it? (I'm clueless).
I'm going to leave the sides mounted in the van in place to make it more straight forward (they are grey - so would be ok with black I think. It's the platform lift itself which isn't looking the best).
Thanks for this forum. It's brilliant!

[Burgerman]

You cant powdercoat something thats fitted into a van.
You can paint or spray with paint or epoxy paint.

Powder coating is or can be very good and look as good as a proper paint shop did it. Or it can be very dull, and not very professional. And industrial. Take a look at his work.

[biscuit]

I lived on a boat with a steel hull. We cured the rust with a marine solution called Ospho, which was phosphoric acid. Phosphoric acid reacts with the rust, converting iron oxide (rust) into iron phosphate. The excess iron oxide has to be removed first. The result was a rust-proof undercoat. Maybe Hammerite contains phosphoric acid, idk. Don't bother using coca cola, even though that contains phosphoric acid. Water (particularly seawater) is most unhelpful in this process.

[Burgerman]

They should make boats from stainless. You could then never worry about rust or painting at all. Stainless costs more. But not that much more. The difference in outlay would be covered by the lack of any need to paint or maintain and no rust later on.

But they dont. Same applies to many things. Nothing is built to last and while stainless was super hard to get and really expensive many years ago, thats not true today. But they still use steel. Because thats how they always did it...

[biscuit]

Ships have pretty thick hulls, I can't see shipbuilders finding stainless steel good economics.

[biscuit]

We didn't own that boat nearly long enough to make stainless steel a good investment for us either.

[Burgerman]

Well...
Since stainless is never going to corrode, and weight for weight is around double the price of steel. The on the face of it it is expensive. Except that when building a boat the reason the steel is thick is partly to allow for corrosion. So it could probably use a thinner steel plate. And that means easier and faster to construct. And labour is much more of the cost of construction of a hull than the raw materials. And the hull is in any case not the biggest cost. The stuff it contains, engines, sub structures, fittings, prop shafts, etc and the top half and living parts make up more of this cost. Then not adding the cost of anti corrosion measures, special coatings and paint etc with ongoing maintainance means that its probably not going to add a lot to the total production costs, with higher potential (never rusts or needs retreating/painting) resale value.

So I wouldnt be so sure.

There was a guy in the marina near me who was building a large concrete boat. Reinforced with lots of chopped stranded fiberglass strands in the concrete mix. I never saw it float. But he assured me that it would. And that like stainless should never need retreating. Just barnacle removal. A concrete boat. Sea going, sailing boat. I kid you not!

[biscuit]

I still don't buy it. Whoever commissions the building of the ship will likely get rid of it before rust becomes a problem. All the fittings above the waterline are what is prone to rust and they would need painting frequently whatever they're made of. Below the waterline never rusts. Rust threatens above and around the waterline where the paint gets nicked and then the air gets in.

Concrete hulls are bizarre but I think they are cheap to build. I didn't know glass reinforced concrete was a thing, I always thought that the reinforcement was steel. Live & learn! GRP is the usual material for yachts, but it isn't the perfect material either. Our neighbours in Seville lived aboard a concrete boat, we had steel, all the others in the marina were GRP.

[Burgerman]

All the fittings above the waterline are what is prone to rust and they would need painting frequently whatever they're made of. Below the waterline never rusts. Rust threatens above and around the waterline where the paint gets nicked and then the air gets in.

If they are made of stainless, you can leave them anywhere, above below, on a beach, you can scrape, or grind them, and zero corrosion at all. Including fittings. All of the thing, can be cleaned with a powertol and a fire wheel and in fact polished like chrome if you want as good as brand new 50 years on. A 100 year old boat could look the same as a brand new one. Without any previous maintainance. And thats why its value would exceed any steel boat when sold on after a yer, or a decade, or a century.

Another thing.
Barnacles... They cause corrosion, and they take £££work to remove. They add 15% approx to your fuel bill through added drag.
But the whole of the hull can be mirror polished if its stainless. The barnacles cant attack. Same with rudder, prop, etc. And so no periodic barnacle cleaning. And the polished hull will also mean less fuel/drag too.

All this is almost definitely true. But it will cost more initially. But ends in a superior product. And higher resale value.

[biscuit]

Many no's! No to grinding your carpets and walls of your house or your below deck ship fittings. No to shiny surfaces on water. No to initial buyers investing in eternal materials that the final buyer will probably have to scuttle themselves when the ship gets too tatty and outdated to sell on. No to building the ship with two different alloys. No to anything at all causing rust under water in less than 1000 years. Yes to needing an anti foul coating (and dried up barnacles are basically permanent). You could be correct about whether barnacles can colonize stainless.

[Burgerman]

You dont like my stainless boat idea then?

What different metals?
Electrically (and so corrosion wise) steel and stainless are almost identical. And I would make everything from it anyway!

Why no to shiny hull under water? Blind the fish? Nothing for a barnacle to attach to. No need to coat the hull with anything. Bit like an unpainted tesla cybertruck. No need of paint or anything else

You could go back to your 316 stainless scuttled boat in a couple of centuries, refit it internally, and good as new! If made from cheaper 304 stainless it may have signs of corrosion by then. But not much.

Regarding corrosion, all that can ever happen to stainless is a mild light brown discolouration. Which can be wiped off with a type of stainless cleaner acid. There are already stainless parts like railings etc used on boats as they stay shiny pretty much indefinitely in spite of sea water. Usually these are 304 tube, not even fully corrosion proof grades. Even so they clean up very easy.

[biscuit]

how did you guess?

Of course shiny things are lovely, I totally get that. But not for walking on, or for denting as cargoes do, or for keeping polished.

[Burgerman]

But the whole point is hat you dont need to polish it, or "keep it polished" as it stays that way indefinitely. It may get dirty. But so does steel. Which is harder to clean as you also get corrosion. Dents? Yes all steel dents if you hit it with something. But stainless is harder to dent or damage. The SS cybertruck is bulletproof, and people kick them and hit them with hammers to try and dent them. And cant. Carpets wear out regardless and need to be replaced.

[biscuit]

This all starts to sound like an erection debate, all mile high point scoring and no actual foothold.

I don't think life would be happy as crew or visitor on a stainless steel ship or a stainless steel yacht.

[Burgerman]

Really? Why?

You just treat it exactly the same as any steel hull. The only difference, no corrosion... And no maintainance.

Question. Would you swap a stainless steel kitchen sink at home, for a steel one that you needed to paint and look after and maintain to stop it corroding?

Waiting for an ineresting answer! Because its exactly the same thing.

What about the stainless steel drum in your washing machine. You would prefer it made of steel that rusts like crazy?

Tell me, what exactly is the difference?

How about all the knives, forks, spoons? You would prefer rusty ones?

I used stainless tube to mount my solar panels in the garden. About 12 years ago. Still no rust, looks exactly the same today as when I did it. No paint and no corrosion at all.