Conference unifix::sailing

    Just how toxic is copper?  Most of our drinking water comes into our
    homes through copper pipes.  Some people even cook using copper pots. 
    I'm not sure if the toxic mechanism by which copper does its thing is
    known or not.  But the big advantage of copper is that it's a selective
    poison.  Kills certain types of plant and animal life but doesn't
    affect other kinds.  People and most commercially important fish I
    think are on the exempt list.  TBTF, on the other hand, is
    indiscriminate and long lived.  There have been human deaths attributed
    to applying TBTF based paints.
    
    I've used VC-17 paints for several seasons.  The only kind available
    for the past few years has relied on copper as the active ingredient. 
    The teflon only variant was found to be useless in salt water.  The
    theory was that teflon was too slippery for barnacles to stick to.  But
    the barnacles were up to the challenge.
    
    I've seen advertisements for a latter day version of copper sheathing. 
    Copper foil with a plastic backing that gets glued to the hull.  Sounds
    like it'd awkward to fix if you hit an underwater object.
    
    One of the Etchells in our fleet did have a permanently anti-fouled
    hull.  The owner said it was laid up using ant-fouling gel-coat.  It
    apparently became illegal shortly after his boat was built and no more
    hulls were similarly constructed.  He didn't know the formulation of
    the resin but I suspect they put DDT or some other pesicide in the
    mix.  It worked.  He never had to clean his hull as much as the rest of
    us.
    
    The new polymer sound intriguing.  Hope it works out.  But based on
    much experimentation, my anti-fouling toxicant of choice will be
    aluminum oxide applied at a concentration of 600 grains per square inch
    to a waterproof paper backing used once a week.  Completely non
    injurious to the environment but applied with considerable discomfort
    to the user (the water in M'hd NEVER warms up).
    
    - gene

    One other thing about tin vs copper:
    
    Copper can be passed out of your body if absorbed or injested. Tin
    remains over time to do all kinds of nasty things.
    
    Gene,
    
    Do you have on of those suction cup handles for underwater wet sanding? I 
    just bought one from West Marine. Should make the job of staying
    in place easier
    
    Paul

    Earth Day, if nothing else, should remind us of the need to find safe
    substitutes for this stuff.  Who would want to build a playground over
    a former boat yard??  That stuff has been going into the soil for years
    and must be having some effect.
    
    And the copper, though it passes through some organisms does have a
    chance of being injested by another.
    
    Another sailor reminded me the other day that:
    
    	dillution is no 
    	solution to 
    	pollution.
    
    Ron

    Saw that Baltiplate is still being offered in the West Marine catalog.
    Does anybody know if this is a new formulation, or is this stuff
    illegal?  Our boat has Baltiplate and only needs to be touched up where
    we had some work done around the prop strut last year.
    
    I feel towards the banning of tin based antifouling like I do about
    through hull heads.  They're chasing after the wrong people. 
    Commercial applications are still legal as I understand.  Tell me a
    tanker using this stuff doesn't shed more of it than all of M'head
    harbor does in ten years.  
    
    At any rate, we use the same method a Gene.  Once a week I don my scuba
    tank and plunge into the cold murk of the harbor to discourage growth. 
    The handles are great for cleaning your topsides from the water but
    I've found they slow me down too much when I have a whole bottom to
    clean.
    
    BTW, you should see all the non-biodegradable mess left behind by the 
    200,000 plus celebraters of Earth Day in my neighborhood.  What a joke.
    
    Dave

    re.  the cups
    
    Yes.  I bought a suction cup handle a few years ago.  Couldn't sand
    without it.  Just remember to retrieve it before sailing off the
    mooring.  I forgot one time and only remembered when some one kept
    pointing at my hull when the boat heeled enough to expose it.
    
    In the times before Earth Day, some of the environmental recidivists
    who sailed Etchells in the Long Island Sound area used the following
    method to keep their bottoms clean.  With the boat on the mooring, draw
    a large tarp UNDERNEATH the hull and pull up the ends and sides to form
    an enclosure around the hull.  Then pour a gallon of Clorox into the
    tarp.  The Clorox kills the marine life and the tarp keeps the Clorox
    in contact with the hull all week.  When you go for a sail, just tie
    the tarp up to the mooring.  A gallon of Clorox a week was cheaper than
    hauling out or hiring a diver.  They'd still be doing this if it
    weren't for the motor boaters in the area who love to trash the tarps
    with their props.
    
    - gene

    I heard the tin bottom paint on a tanker is several INCHS thick. If you
    knew the surface area, thickness, and time between coatings: it'd be
    easy to convert into average sailboat seasons. I bet the number is
    huge.
    
    In Narr. Bay we've got untreated sewage from Prov. and heavy metals from the
    jewelry industry. When they dredged the Balckstone river (where it
    enters the bay), they couldn't dump the stuff in a landfill because
    it was classified toxic waste!
    
    In contrast, the impact from sailboats is insignificant. Even so, I
    don't mind doing my part and giving up tin. I always wondered if I
    was killing myself when working with it. What bothers me is - it's one
    more example of picking on the little guy.
    
    Paul

     I'll admit, after writing the base note later that day I thought about
copper water pipes. Threw a question mark in my mind. But reading the warnings
on the can had me believing this is some pretty nasty stuff. Unfortunately
I haven't seen an MSDS for bottom paint, but I'd like to. Those are very
interesting sheets of paper to read and if you buy the product the supplier
has to supply the info. (I buy lots of chemicals here)

     Yah, this bit about tankers and the paint they use is not a comfort. 
Dredging hazardous waste out doesn't sound too comforting either. My thoughts
on the tankers is not so much showing picking on the little guys, but the
big guys have the big bucks. 

     I don't know what to say or do, but to minimize toxins where I can 
will make me feel a little better.

     Geoff

    What was it the Earth Day people were saying??
    
    "Think globally, act locally"
    
    The world is drowning in this crud and it's future depends on taking
    care of the whole enchilada - one piece at a time.
    
    A friend was telling me the other day the safe limit for eating 
    fish from the Penobscot is now down to a maximum of six per year.
    
    Ron

    
    
    	The latest issue of Sailboat Racing & Cruising (?) (you know, the
    	mag that changes names more or less annually...) showed a hull
    	being made with some kinda copper-gelcoat slurry; spray this into
    	the female mold, then build as per normal. Lotsa these boats in
    	the UK, only about 100 (?) in the US.
    	Two obvious appeals to this; looks more enviro-concious, and no
    	slopping/sanding/ingesting bottom paint. Oh boy! 
    	The copper pipe comparison, I'm not so sure about. I suspect
    	the copper in paint is not just 'hunks' of copper floating 
    	around in some metallic state, but rather Cuprous Oxide;
    	finer than dust. No carcinogen, probably, but nasty in the
    	lungs, especially mixed with binders, plasticisers and solvents.
    	Of course, 20 years ago, nobody said that the acetone was 
    	pushing that epoxy right thru my skin. Oh well, live fast,
    	and leave a stiff corpse with a nice patina. Fine garden
    	statue. 
    	Bleeaaaahhh!!!
    
    	Now where's that wet/dry sandpaper.....
    
    	Scott   >8^{
    
    	

>    	being made with some kinda copper-gelcoat slurry; spray this into
>    	the female mold, then build as per normal. Lotsa these boats in
>    	the copper in paint is not just 'hunks' of copper floating 

	There is a small little note in Cruising World ( May 90) that talks
about permanent antifouling called Crystic CopperClad that can be applied either
in the mold or on existing fiberglass or steel hulls.  It contains '70 %
pure copper metal particles (not copper oxide) (sic) suspended in an epoxy
modified isophthalic polyester resin' which is non-conductive, and is 
'registered and approved by the Envirionmental Protection Agency'.

Protection life is 'more than 20 years'

	Ferro Corporation
	5150 East 56th St.
	Cleveland, OH 44105
	phone (800) 332-4778


Lets see, this year I used 1/2 gallon of regular paint at 75$/gallon 
times 20 years =

	$750 to break even on materials, and a heck of a break on labor.

	Dave

RE: .9, 

>>>	I suspect the copper in paint is not just 'hunks' of copper 
>>>	floating around in some metallic state, but rather Cuprous 
>>>	Oxide....

FWIW,  typically cuprous oxide is used in red-pigmented paint, since 
that's it's natural color.  Cupric oxide is often used in green and blue 
paints, since that's its natural color.  From the point of view of a 
barnacle, they mean about the same thing, though molecular weight 
differences between the two compounds may vary the effective copper
concentration per unit weight.  Copper-colored paint, once popular, used 
free copper, but tended to corrode into a greenish cast in salt water -- 
not what aesthetically-minded yachties liked to see.

J.