Dick Nite Pealing Off

[stratos201]

I decided to try some dick nite top coat (clear). First lure I coated with it I was impressed. Here is what I did. I have a lure that was coated with devcon 2-ton epoxy. It had some hook rash so I decided this would be the lure to try out. I cleaned the lure with some denatured alcohol and then set the lure in front of a small space heater to evaporate anything that was left on the lure. Coated the lure with DN and let it cure a week at room temperature inside the house. Fished with it for a few hours and then the coating started to peel off. Came off in sheets. Anyone else experience this problem?

PS.... did not bounce lure off and rocks or stumps.

[RayburnGuy]

Try giving the next bait you try a light sanding with 400 grit sandpaper. Don't sand all the way through to the underlying paint. Just enough to give the DN something to bite onto. When applying DN to freshly painted baits it seems to penetrate through the paint and bond with the underlying surface. I've reworked a couple of baits that have had DN applied as a top coat and it's much harder to sand all the paint off than on store bought lures.

[stratos201]

Try giving the next bait you try a light sanding with 400 grit sandpaper. Don't sand all the way through to the underlying paint. Just enough to give the DN something to bite onto. When applying DN to freshly painted baits it seems to penetrate through the paint and bond with the underlying surface. I've reworked a couple of baits that have had DN applied as a top coat and it's much harder to sand all the paint off than on store bought lures.

Thats an idea I thought about also......... will give that a try. Would you also do that to the devcon 2-ton epoxy also?........ I use the devcon 2 ton as an undercoat to seal the lure and give it some durabilty against dents. Then I paint over top the devcon then use DN as a top coat. Thanks for your input

[BobP]

I agree with RG. Cured epoxy is pretty inert stuff and won't chemically bond with other finishes. You need to provide some mechanical grip by sanding it. I degloss D2T undercoating with 400 grit paper before I paint. As to whether a coat of DN over the D2T will cure hook rash, I'm less sure about that. DN is harder and slicker than D2T but it is also a lot thinner, so it's a guess which coating would withstand hook rash down to underlying wood longer. The DN would look better longer, but eventually....

[Lure--Prof]

First of all, denatured alcohol is a solvent and has different characteristics, and different reactions than isopropyl, or rubbing, alcohol. About the only thing I use denatured for is for thinning epoxy. Isopropyl is much better for cleaning.

I normally coat foil with epoxy. After it cures, I sand it or scuff it very lightly to remove the gloss. Then I take it to the kitchen sink and scrub it with Dawn dishwashing soap and a toothbrush. Dry it with a lint-free cloth that wasn't dried in a dryer with fabric softener sheets. Don't use conventional paper towels which contain oil. You can use those oil-free paper towels made for window cleaning. The whole point of this cleaning is to remove any oils from the lure which might interfere with the bonding of paint and DN on the epoxy.

All of this information was learned at the University of Hard Knocks, and if you follow it you will have no problem bonding DN to epoxy.

DN protects better against hook rash than epoxy. Ultra sharp hooks may roughen DN slightly, particular if the lure is used in the first 3 weeks after application. For lures which are trolled, your only perfect defense against hook rash is to Tee your hooks.