2012 Oceanis 45 Epoxy barrier coat

[kellysails]

Nearing the completion time of my new boat. It is my desire to have a epoxy barrier coat applied to the new hull. Getting some push back from the dealer stating that the sanding of the hull required by epoxy barrier coat will violate the Beneteau blister warranty. Looking at previous Beneteau owners manuals it simply states that you can sand the hull with 400 grit prior to applying a barrier coat.

Ultimately I want to apply an epoxy based antifouling paint to the boat which requires this barrier to be applied.

Question
Any new Beneteau owners out there that have had this issue regarding the blister warranty?

thx

-craig

[kellysails]

Update
Apparently you can now sand new Beneteau hulls with 220 grit or higher then apply the epoxy coating of your choice. The epoxy company just has to sign off on whether that is suitable or not.

[PCP]

Hi! Congratulations for your new boat. It is a great boat.

I don’t understand that story of the void warranty to apply epoxy coat. The epoxy coat and the antifouling are a factory option how can they void the warranty?

Regards

Paulo

[kellysails]

Thanks, very exciting times, hull #26 is to be completed on 16 May, whew!

Hmmm, never saw an option for epoxy barrier coat. The new boats have a vinylester coating which is a type of a epoxy resin as I understand it, maybe that is it. And they expressly state that sanding anything lower than 220 grit paper will void the blister warranty. I was unable to find any epoxy barrier coat that did not require sanding with 80 to 100 grit paper.

My end goal was to get Copper Coat epoxy applied to the boat. Copper Coat first suggested that a pure epoxy barrier coat be applied first. So that plan did not work. Copper Coat then came back and stated they did support sanding the vinylester with 220 to remove the gloss then apply directly to the lightly sanded vinylester. All good now.