My first boat is an old plastic canoe from my garden. The surface looks like the moon.

My plan was simple: sand it, fill it, put epoxy on everything, paint it. I know that from construction.

Then I did my research. My canoe is polyethylene, a waxy plastic that nothing sticks to. It also flexes, and epoxy is stiff, so on a plastic hull it cracks and peels. That is probably why it looks so bad. Someone before me put epoxy and red paint over it, and it never held. Plastic is already waterproof, so it doesn’t need sealing anyway.

New plan:
Strip the old coating with a heat gun and scraper.
Look at the bare plastic.
Repair only real damage, if there is any.
Leave the rest.

I don’t want the most beautiful canoe. I want a sound, light one that I learn from.

The lesson I took away: find out what your boat is made of before you buy anything.

I made a free lesson about it in the Academy: almostcaptain.com/library/hull-repair

Next: the heat gun comes out, and we see what’s under the paint.