Doing a 'search', I discover that between 2011 and 2018 I banged on intermittently about something called Seacoat, a one pot clear finish, which appeared on the market just when I was finishing my build of Cavatina (Trouper 12), and had a favourable review in Water Craft. I remember it for two reasons - 1) I used it and it was fantastic; 2) the firm who supplied it (and made it? - that was unclear) were exceptionally amiable and helpful people to deal with. Then suddenly nothing - website disappeared, phone number unobtainable. I searched, enquired, drew a total blank (it's all there in 'back numbers of this forum).
The spars on my boat are still done in the original 2011 Seacoat, and DO NOT NEED RE-DOING!! Amazing. What needed attention 3 seasons ago (2017)were the seat slats, also done in Seacoat back in 2011. The wear was due to abrasion, sliding my backside up and down them over the years (in perfectly normal sailing activities, you understand). I looked again for Seacoat, nothing again.
Someone - whose name I cannot recall, but to whom I am truly grateful - suggested something called 'Bonda Seal Clear, made by Bondaglass-Voss in Beckenham. It's described as a 'tough, flexible plastic coating for wood, metal, brick, concrete' (I quizzed the firm about Seacoat, and they denied any knowledge of it.) And, to judge by my now gleaming (but not glassy-gleaming) seat slats, that is what it is. No sign of wear after 3 seasons of bum-sliding, it might be Seacoat. Perhaps it is.....So I strongly recommend it.
Incidentally, commenting on the earlier contribution from Germany and the suggestion that 'wood needs air to breathe', I don't think it's that simple - or perhaps it is, and that statement isn't true. My first Swallowboats build was in 2004 (I think) - Cadenza, a Storm Petrel. I asked Nick and Matt Newland whether coating the ply panels in epoxy before assembly would be a good idea. The answer was, 'no, because wood needs air to breathe'. Seven years later, at the time of my second build, Swallowboats made a sort of policy statement in which they said they had reconsidered that previous view, they no longer held that 'wood must breathe' necessarily, and, in line with boat-building practice virtually everywhere (they emphasised that) they now recommended preliminary epoxy coating - and still do it so far as I know, when they are building with ply and epoxy (which is seldom these days). I suppose you could still argue about ply versus solid timber spars?
Michael Rogers (Trouper 12 'Cavatina'
