SPRING CLEANING: PROP AND DYNAPLATE

I don't put any anti fouling on my prop. I do occasionally dive over the summer and clean the prop by hand when the boat is in the water. But, late in the season the water gets a little too cold to do so. When I pull the boat there might be a few barnacles that have attached themselves to the prop. So one of my annual spring outfitting chores is cleaning and polishing the prop. I start using my trusty hand held Paint Scrapper to knock off what barnacles I can:

It easy to knock off the hard barnacle shells using this tool both on land and also when the boat is in the water too.

Once I've removed most of the barnacles that attached to the prop late in the season. I then switch to using an electric drill and an 3M Paint and Rust Stripper which makes cleaning and polishing the prop a fast and easy process as this video shows:



It also does a real good job cleaning and polishing the boats Dyna Plate ground plane too:

WHAT WORKS: 3M PAINT AND RUST STRIPPER

BIANKA is about to be splashed so I'm busy putting the finishing things that need to be done below the waterline. There are not too many things to do beyond fresh zincs and checking to make sure the through hulls are clear. One thing that needs to be done is to clean the prop and ground plate of whatever growth still remains. I use to spend a lot of time with a hand scrapper accomplishing this task. Then I discovered that a  3M 7772ES Paint and Rust Stripper and an electric drill makes this task so much easier and faster.

 Here is the before photo of the prop:

There are few pesky barnacles and some hard sponge like growth. Below is what one of the blades looks like with less than a minutes worth of work using the 3M Paint and Rust Stripper and my trusty Black and Decker Drill:

In five minutes you can have the prop nice and shiny and ready for the water. It might also uncover some important information about your boats prop as I did:

The above shows I have a 16 inch right hand turning prop with a 13 inch pitch. Important info if one wants to change or replace a prop. Props are not the only thing the 3M Paint and Rust Stripper can make shiny and new. It also does a great job on on the boats Dyna Plate grounding bar making it really shine:

My biggest concern here is that some landlubber yahoo wandering through the boatyard is going to think it is a gold bar instead of bronze and try to steal it off the boat. So it's best to get the boat in the water as soon as possible.