softscrub-gctid384403

[Guest]

Has any one ever used softscrub on a hull on a old badly oxidize boat before? Any goods or bads? Thanks, mike.

[Guest]

Mclark wrote:
Has any one ever used softscrub on a hull on a old badly oxidize boat before? Any goods or bads? Thanks, mike.

It will scratch, and not take the oxidation out. You need to either use a rotary buffer or wet sand it.

[Guest]

Soft Scrub is a mild abrasive. Good at removing dirt from non-skid. Oxidation is not surface deposits like dirt, it is a 'pitting' or breakdown in the surface of your gelcoat.

Soft Scrub will destroy the shine on good gelcoat, I know this from personal experience :-(

Don't use Soft Scrub on oxidation, you will make things worse.

[Garchar]

I use 3M wax with heavy oxidation built in and it is the best I've found for Oxidation removal. I then put on two good coats of regular 3M marine wax. Does anyone know a better one? If so let him know. Gary

[Guest]

3m hd compound + buffer or wetsand then 3m hd compound + buffer. Theres no way around it, Ghetto tricks simple do not work.

You must also follow up this process with a finer cut buffing compound, a polish, then a wax to do it properly and protect the hull from further damage.

[RinnyBeth]

Mclark wrote:
Has any one ever used softscrub on a hull on a old badly oxidize boat before? Any goods or bads? Thanks, mike.

an old salt here in our harbor told us he uses this stuff called :worth ON/OFF.. its in the marine cleaning supplies and its AWESOME.. our boat the P.O neglected it and it was badly oxidized.. its pretty harsh stuff, we used a mop with a sponge end.. and our boat was perfect.. made it easier to buff and wax and shine when dry docked..

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51DH-yUZH0L._SL500_AA300_.jpg

[Guest]

Softscrub is meant for cleaning, not for oxidation removal. There are much better products for oxidation removal (I prefer 3M products for that). I do, however, use Soft Scrub (with bleach) to clean off the textured deck surfaces. It works fantastic for that. It also removes wax, so it's not something I'd use wash the whole boat off with. The "grit" in soft scrub is calcium carbonate, which is pretty soft (a 3 on the Moh's scale of hardness). The softscrub website also has a "surfaces" guide in which you pick from various surfaces to see if they can be cleaned with soft scrub products. According to the website, all the softscrub products are approved for cleaning fiberglass (after all, that's what tubs/showers are often made of). If you pick plastics/acrylics as the surface, it says to use caution and test a small area.

Soda blasting, which uses material (sodium bicarbonate) with a similar hardness to calcium carbonate, is known for it's "smooth" blasting results as opposed to sand (obviously much more abrasive than soda).

I would agree that calcium carbonate would dull an otherwise glossy/shiny surface, but I don't believe it's abrasive enough to start wearing holes into gel coat--or actually be abrasive enough to be good for removing oxidation. And if you did dull an otherwise glossy surface, you would just need to re-buff or use a swirl remover.

For anyone who's ever "color sanded" a paint job (such as a newly painted car), sand paper and buffing compounds/swirl removers are the very thing used to flatten the orange peel and other defects in new paint in order to make that flawless "show car" winning paint job (it sure as heck doesn't come out of the paint gun like that!). Super fine sand paper like 2000+ grit, used for this color sanding would take FOREVER to sand through gel coat. If you otherwise didn't know about color sanding, it would seem down right WRONG to sand a brand new paint job, but that's exactly what will happen. And yes, sanding dulls/scratches the surface immediately, but the point is to sand down the defects in series of steps with finer and finer grit (making the sanding scratches finer and finer too), until you can just switch over to swirl remover etc.... for the final step (before wax etc...). P.S. color sanding can be used on many surfaces such as faded headlight lenses, fiberglass gel coat, etc... Heck, I even color sanded the plastic screen on my scuba diving gauge/computer and made it look like new again.

Soft scrub is MUCH gentler than sand paper, but again, I would only use it for cleaning dirty surfaces because that's what it's for. Just my .02

[Guest]

Try the Shurhold products. They work really well with minimum effort. www.shurhold.com/marine

[Guest]

Degrees of oxidation are in the eye of the beholder. I started with 600 w/d and lots of water then moved to 800/900 and lots of water. Test an area, you might find you can go with just the finer grade or not. I did my 2850 hull 3 times in one session (4 days) starting with 600 and went all the way up to 1200 which turned out to be a waste of time. After the 800 it was easier and more effective to use 3M Imperial and a variable speed buffer. Then wax, what wax is another whole thread and there are plenty of opinions.

Harbor Freight buffers are fine if you ditch the pads that come with them and get the good Velcro type made for Makita or other brands. I like the ones that have true variable speed vs. 1-2-3. The other thing is to make sure you use the right composition pads for compounding vs. buffing. I was surprised at the difference when I used the wrong one. Beer is more important than you might think during the process.

[Guest]

I use Softscrub on the white fiberglass inside the cockpit. It really removes almost any stain. As stated, don't use it on glossy surfaces or any waxed area. Once done scrubbing, rinse well with water or you will have that white powdery stuff when dry.