Shark Hide On New Pontoon Boat-Good or Bad Idea?

[Toon Crazy]

My pontoon dealer (Bennington) wants me to have a Shark Hide protectorant applied to my new never in the water toon boat. After delivery the boat will be kept in a boathouse on a lift and used frequently during the summer months.

Will the Shark Hide damage anodized aluminum rails if it happens to get on them?

Is applying the Shark Hide a good or bad idea in my situation?

Thank you.

[HandymanHerb]

NO it will protect it and keep it looking new

[Bryden24shp]

Depends on how much he wants to charge you? You can do it yourself very easily! Yes, do it! I love Sharkhide! Its on my 2nd pontoon boat and all my trailers, too! Makes a black sun faded trailer look like new!

[garygve]

I would recommend having it done before it gets tarnished, I should have done mine last summer when it was new. When I took it out in the Fall I had to polish the tubes to get them uniform a lot of work I don't want to do that again. I then wiped on 2 coats of shark hide, here is a picture after I got done with it.

[MamaToon]

Hey All-

In the next couple weeks we will be getting our new Sun Tracker (soooo excited!!) ... now the ice just has to clear from the MN lakes (:

Can someone let me know how long it took to apply Shark hide onto new toons? Would it be feasible to do in a half day? We are not purchasing a trailer, as it will be parked and only utilized on the lake our cabin is located. We do have a boat shop that we will make arrangements with to pull-out/winterize in the fall. The dealer is allowing trailer use for the initial drop off day. Would we have time to apply and let cure prior to dropping it in the water?

Thanks! I have been learning so much from all of the posts~

[Bryden24shp]

As long as they are nice and clean with no prep needed, its takes an hour or so. Go's on fast. Let it cure for a day or so and swipe on another coat. When you apply the 2nd coat, do it lightly and quick. It wants to remove the previous coat. So just go over it fast. I put 2 coats on mine. On my trailers, I just do one.

[Woody]

I will always have it on any toon of mine. Great product !

[Bamaman]

When buying a Bennington, get the Sharkhide applied by the factory.

If you wait a month or two and try to apply it yourself, you'll find it very difficult to get the toons clean enough with lacquer cleaner to keep black oxide smudges out of the Sharkhide.

My Bennington was bought 1 month after it was built, and it'd been kept in a dark, closed warehouse. The toons had already tarnished, and getting them polished was no big deal. I simply couldn't ever get the black out of the welds and welding slag enough to Sharkhide them. I just polish the toons 1x per year with a wool bonnet and a Porter Cable dual action sander/polisher.

[LadyGT]

I have been reading this and have been considering doing this. Our boat has been in the water twice for test drives. I do not think our new toons have such a shine as pictured above. I guess we would have to clean them really well before doing. I have noticed black stuff in areas of welding. I fussed about it with my husband until he wiped it off with something. Lol.

[LadyGT]

Depends on how much he wants to charge you? ThYou can do it yourself very easily! Yes, do it! I love Sharkhide! Its on my 2nd pontoon boat and all my trailers, too! Makes a black sun faded trailer look like new!

I thought this was only for the toons. Went to the website and got confused. It did not show shiney toons on home page. It seems I saw the cleaner not the polish which gives the shine. Do you use both products?

[Bryden24shp]

Whoa, my spelling was terrible! Ya, I use both the cleaner and the polish. Sharkhide's not just for pontoons. It can be used on any metal that you want to protect. I was going to do my polished aluminum valve covers on my old truck, but some idiot totaled it out before I could do it.

[bstat1020]

I will be applying Sharkhide to my 2011 Harris Flotebote this year. I bought it a couple of seasons ago and the toons are badly tarnished and dull.

Anyone have any guesses on how many hours it will take to get these back up to par?

What product should I get and how much?

[Mucho Gusto]

Alright...probably a stupid question, but here goes. My toons aren't tarnished or anything but they have dried hard water spots on them which seem to get worse with each use. Scrubbing with fresh water and towel essentially does nothing.

My question is this....before using shark hide, would it be necessary to first use some some other method to remove the spots or will sharkhide do remove them on its own? Second part is this....once sharkhide is applied, will it prevent the water stains on subsequent lake visits making it easier to use fresh water and a towel to clean?

Sorry if this sounds stupid, I just simply don't know. Don't want to spend the time and effort if the toons will go right back to looking crappy once it's in water.

[garygve]

You will need to use a cleaner first the Sharkhide is a clear lacquer and does not clean the surface. They sell a acid cleaner that you can apply first and rinse with water to try and get a uniform finish before you clear the aluminum with Sharkhide. I had the same situation with my pontoon on the post above and ended up buffing the pontoons to get a uniform look. I would not recommend buffing it unless you have a lot of time to devote to it. Before you clear the toons you need to wash the surface with lacquer thinner till your paper towel stays white without having a gray film, this takes a lot of time by its self.
I hear that some people take their pontoons to a semi-truck wash that cleans the tankers with a acid solution and they seem to know what there doing and the cost isn't bad you may want to check that out.
Good Luck

[mrlouis]

Hello All
first post on this great tooning forum.
Last fall I made a mess of my toons trying to get them cleaner after power washing them, I sprayed them with an aluminum cleaner but left it on to long before rinsing and they got badly stained, I had them polished to get them back an they look great, I wanted to put Shark Hide on them but because the boat is in the water from May till late sept. I sent an email to Shark Hide asking them if it would stand up being in the water that long, Clint Bland the manager of Shark Hide responded saying that Shark Hide wasn't designed to be submerged for that length of time .
Thanks for all the great info here