Smooth Sailing™ Factory-Direct Antifouling Boat Bottom Paints

$44.98 per quart. Get a free calculation of your boat surface area and costs or call 612-226-5200 NOW  to discuss your needs with our experts.

For a drag coefficient smoother than ice, teflon boat Bottoms can’t be beat.

Protect your precious boat bottom. Once fouling has established a hold on a boat hull, it can rapidly spread or "colonize" the surface. Prevention is a must, and will pay dividends with increased boat speed, lower maintenance costs, fuel consumption, and improved exhilaration.

Smooth Sailing sells environmentally friendly, low drag Teflon, boat bottom coatings. No biocides leach out of your bottom paint because we use the "non-stick" technology of Teflon and the time tested magic of copper to keep growths away. So you can take advantage of the very hard wear-resistant qualities of a Teflon
and urethane bottom to keep growths away. This Teflon urethane has been tested by the US Navy and been shown to last up to a decade. It is available in white, charcoal gray, yellow, or navy blue.

Cleaning your bottom by keelhauling used to be the only way to reduce drag on water bound vessels. Drag drains power, which means that more energy is needed to compensate. Sleek hydrodynamic hull designs are of little value if your hull surface is creating water turbulence. Whether you are hydroplaning, trying to reach hull speed, or targeting your best fuel economy settings, drag is your enemy.

A low drag coefficient means:

• Less drag and a faster boat
• Less damage to the bottom from growths, reducing maintenance
• Less wear for better resale value
• Less work to remove organisms from the bottom because they can slide off
• Less wipe and brush to remove slim build up
• Less fuel consumption

Our ships were moving like tortoises while the British fleet was bounding about like stags.
--Comments of a French admiral after the British fleet clad its war ship bottoms in copper.

Power versus Drag
Power and drag are the two elements at play to determine boat speed on the water. If you have unlimited power then drag is not such a problem. The amount of drag your hulls are producing will dramatically affect how fast you slow down and long it takes to accelerate back up to speed. If you are racing a sailboat, your power is limited to the lift that the combination of wind and sail shape can provide. In addition during starts, rounding marks, tacking and jibbing increases drag and taxes power. This is why in the 1700’s the British Navy retrofitted all of its war ships with copper sheathing. The copper reduced buildup of
growths on ship hulls, decreasing drag and making a life and death difference.

The old problems are also the current ones. Stuff grows in water. And much of that stuff is looking for a home that will provide renewable food sources. Lots of living things like to cling onto your boat bottom. And most of them by design are not great for your hydrodynamics. These organisms want to filter out nutrients from the flowing water your motion creates. And we all know that filters create drag as water passes through them, over them, and around them.

You can get prevent fouling on boat bottoms by providing a boat hull surface that is inhospitable to growth. Aquatic organisms require adhesion and nutrients to survive on your boat bottom. To resist adhesion, Smooth Sailing Boat Bottom Paint uses Teflon which has one of the largest molecules known and a drag coefficient more slippery than ice. Because adhesion to Teflon is so difficult, it is considered a "non-stick" surface. As a result, the faster water flows over your hull surface the less likely that any organism will be able to hold onto that bottom.

Our bottom paints do not become soft with oxidation, nor do they leach away biocides when stored out of the water. As a result you are never required to re-coat after dry storage. Many other boat bottom paints can become soft and chalky, and require re-coats after winter storage because their biocides leach out of the film over the winter. For this reason, boats must be sanded and re-coated with fresh antifouling before re-launching.

Smooth Sailing coatings use PTFE, the same chemical used in Teflon®. Most people associate Teflon® with nonstick household products or with the space program, but the properties that make it perfect for those applications also make it an ideal ingredient in antifouling coatings. PTFE creates the lowest coefficient of drag in any coating available. The lower the friction, the less energy is required to move the boat through the water. For powerboats, this means, increased speed and lower fuel costs. For sailboats, a smooth hull will provide greater acceleration. In addition, your top hull speeds can be maintained through tacks and jibes.
You will achieve top performance with less wind. PTFE melts at 400 degrees and can be sanded easily allowing new coats to be applied at any time. In addition, these coatings dry quickly so that spots from cradles and straps can be touched in just before launching if need be.

Would you like to know how much bottom paint your boat will need?
A free cost analysis outlining a kit of materials tailored to your boat bottom project is available along with a 24/7 help line.

Our free no obligation cost analysis will give you the answers. By requesting a free analysis we can help you to determine what the right amount of paint is for your project, as well as to know exactly what tools you will need.

After submitting this simple, semi-anonymous form we will send you the following information:

• A complete list of materials and tools needed for your project
• Exact price for the boat bottom paint and each item needed
• Detailed, step-by-step instructions covering every aspect of coating your boat, including preparing the surface, applying the coating(s), and keeping it smooth and clean
• Answers to your questions.

Here are some instructions and photos showing the process of applying our urethane teflon antifouling paint to a canoe. The same process applies to boats of all kinds. And you may be interested in these tips for painting your boat bottom. You may also enjoy our video series detailing the steps involved in preparing a boat bottom and applying paint to it.

Reasons to keep your bottom free from fouling
Safety
Heavy fouling growth reduces responsiveness of the craft. The added weight of the fouling can make the boat sit lower in the water than intended. This can have obvious implications in heavy weather conditions.

Protection
Prolonged growth of certain types of fouling can damage the substrate of the hull. For example, the natural glues which organisms use to attach to the hull can damage wood and fiberglass. Fouling can also clog water intakes and cause damage to the engines.

Speed and Efficiency
Fouling causes drag. As drag is increased, fuel consumption increases and speed is reduced even to the point where a planing hull may not be able to get on plane. For racing boats, this can be the difference between winning and losing a race.

Smooth Sailing Antifouling coating is not meant to be a cosmetic or decorative coating. Smooth Sailing coatings rely first on the large polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) molecule which produces a drag coefficient smoother than ice. Smooth Sailing Antifouling also uses copper. Copper has been protecting boat bottoms from growth since the 1700s when Britain's Fast Ships like the Cutty Sark raced from the orient to England with cargoes of fresh Tea. All antifouling paints change when they are immersed. The true color will establish itself after the boat has been launched. Along the waterline you will often note that the antifouling coating looks dirty or faded and can often turn color from copper to a dark gray and ultimately to a green tone. This is due to the reaction of the paint with oxygen forming green copper oxide. Because color change will occur over time, you should try to keep the Smooth Sailing Antifouling coating as close to the true waterline as possible.

How often should a boat bottom be coated?
Smooth Sailing coatings will retain their antifouling properties as long as the coating is on the hull. Sanding between coats will add to the longevity of the bottom jobs. By sanding the bottom in the spring you will get more coats to adhere and forestall the day when too many coats means that you must remove all the antifouling coatings from the surface and start over. Smooth Sailing coatings must always be sanded even if they have just been power washed.

Because Smooth Sailing Standard and Smooth Sailing Antifouling bottom coatings wear away with use, there is no buildup of coatings that will eventually have to be removed from the surface. The minimal buildup reduces the maintenance and preparation needed when it is time to apply more antifouling. In contrast, Smooth Sailing Urethane lasts up to 12 years and is so hard that it does not wear away. Because of its long expected life, coating buildup is usually not an issue since five or six coatings can be applied before any thickness build up is a concern.

A disadvantage to hard antifouling paint is that frequent applications result in the buildup of residual paint film that occurs when the surface is not properly sanded prior to application of new coats of antifouling paint. When hard paints are hauled and stored for the winter season, the paint film, as well as the biocide, oxidize, making it more difficult to release biocide out of the film. For this reason, they must be sanded and re-coated with fresh antifouling before re-launching.

Smooth Sailing coatings use PTFE, the same chemical used in Teflon®. Most people associate Teflon® with nonstick household products or with the space program, but the properties that make it perfect for those applications also make it an ideal ingredient in antifouling coatings. PTFE creates the lowest coefficient of drag in any coating available. The lower the friction, the less energy is required to move the boat through the water. For powerboats this means greater RPM's, increased speed, and fuel savings. For sailboats, greater speeds are achieved with less wind. Because PTFE melts at 400 degrees or more it will not flow into gel coat pores when wet sanded, so new coats can be applied at any time.

Antifouling performance factors
The level of copper is not the only determining factor of how well an antifouling paint will perform. The resin-binder system, the material that holds the paint together, has its own antifouling agents and is equally important. The amount of copper affects the life of an antifouling coating but the sophistication of the resin-binder system to hold and release copper is far more important to the effectiveness of the antifouling effect. Smooth Sailing Antifouling will release biocide at a nearly constant rate throughout its life. For this reason, the highly efficient Smooth Sailing Antifouling is less dependent on large amounts of copper to deliver the best possible performance.

Fluorourethane
Fluorourethane was originated by the U.S. Naval Research Laboratories (NRL) in the early 1970s. It was a combination of a fluorocarbon (Teflon) molecule with a urethane molecule. The material was unique in that it provided a surface with approximately the same coefficient of friction as the Teflon, was hydrophobic, UV resistant, and at the same time provided an abrasion resistance four times that of Teflon. The fluorourethane was originally tested on several ship hulls for the U.S. Navy. One boat tested was a harbor tugboat in Chesapeake Bay. The coating lasted 11-1/2 years compared to a conventional hull coating which lasted only 18-24 months. Of major interest was the fact that no rust or corrosion occurred under the coating. And biofouling, such as barnacles, could be removed with a high-pressure water jet instead of chipping or shot blasting.

Boat bottom preparation
Your free cost analysis will provide you with step-by-step instructions for coating your boat bottom. In addition, the kit of materials suggested will include everything you need to do a professional job. Buy just the items you need, but the list provided will ensure that once your project is started you will finish without delays.

Order your choice of Smooth Sailing boat bottom paint today!
Our price is significantly lower than competing paints because we manufacture Smooth Sailing coatings right in our own facility. You are buying directly from the manufacturer and cutting out the middlemen. You may like to read some recent comments from customers.

We offer fast handling and a variety of shipping options. You may like to try a quart of one of the following specialty coatings. You can coat your mooring buoy, boat cradle, or dock braces. It's a great way to see how easy Smooth Sailing goes on and what a great finish it creates—while protecting those small parts and making the removal of slime buildup much easier. We ship to anywhere in the continental United States.

Call NOW 612-226-5200 24/7. A sales assistant is standing by to take your order. Please select from these specialty coatings:

• Classic Copper Teflon

• White catalyzed Teflon Urethane

• Navy catalyzed Teflon Urethane

• Charcoal catalyzed Teflon Urethane

• Yellow catalyzed Teflon Urethane

• Zinc Chromate Primer

• 100% Heavy Body Epoxy Blister Filler