Coating Tuneup

Posted on by mike

This 20+ year old Traffigard acrylic/fibreglass deck was due for a new topcoat, it had one split at a corner plywood joint and several nails pushing up out of the plywood.
The specification was to; scrub the deck surface with diluted XPlus biodegradable all purpose, heavy duty cleaner/ degreaser. Carefully waterblast roof surface and flush off degreaser.
Repair the cracked plywood joint at the intersection of the narrow walkway and the main deck, grind/sand out where plywood sheets butt together a recessed chase (approx 60mm x 2mm). Also create a V groove between each sheet approx 10mm at the top of the V.
Mix and apply Hitchins’ Formrok 802, which is a flexible two-component epoxy filler, into the recesses.
Bed-in Flexitape and flush over using more Formrok 802. Ensure the chase is completely filled and flushed out, sanding if necessary for a smooth finish when hardened.
Bandage the filled joint with 300gm/m2 fibreglass chopped strand mat at 200mm wide bedded in Traffigard Bodycoat Resin.
Lightly sand entire deck surface to roughen and to blend in the edges of the new bandage .
Apply a filler coat of Hitchins Traffigard Bodycoat FD Resin over all deck areas and allow to dry.
Apply first coat of Hitchins’ Traffigard Unisheild Topcoat of selected colour to all deck areas and allow to dry
Apply a further/ final coat of Hitchins Traffigard Unisheild Topcoat, with a small percentage of fine silica sand added for a non slip finish.
Unishield combines epoxy and acrylic polymers to produce coatings with excellent water resistance, good chemical, weather and wear resistance, flexibility and adhesion.

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the split at the corner closer view of the split fibreglass the deck is washed with Xplus Degreaser later the crack is ground out down to the plywood substrate Formfill802 epoxy filler and reinforcing tape filled over flush one of several nails which had pushed up almost through the Traffigard another nail pop, ground out ready for filling with Formfill 802 epoxy filler the deck is dry and applying Formstick hydro epoxy primer around the edges whole deck is coated with Formstick and allowed to dry overnight view down on the corner of the deck, Formstick coating visible next day the narrow walkway has been coated with Traffigard FD, then 1st coat of Unishield 3 part epoxy acrylic coating same to main part of the deck view of corner where the crack has been repaired applying the Unishield coating over the Traffigard FD first coat walkway has been coated with the first coat of Unishield view of repaired corner with first coat of Unisheild, second coat on edges edges coated with second coat of Unisheild coating the whole deck with second and final application of Unisheild coating the narrow walkway with second and final application of Unisheild