You might look into having the piece galvanized first and then paint it. I've also heard that there are some coatings specifically designed for marine environments, so you might try looking that up or calling some paint manufacturers and ask them.

Jake Balcom
Mettle Design
Lincoln, NE

I am a 1 man band, fabricator of railings, mostly ornamenatl. Virtually all are powdered. I've had very good luck in harsh environments and have a nice set I just added to afetr 2 years and they are holding up great. A couple tricks the pc guy uses; all are zinc primered (powder)before finish coat. They must be sandblasted and perfectly clean prior to coating. ALL joints must be welded 100%. If there are acute angles or similar tight spots or overlaps heat the entire piece first and the powder will slump into them better. These angles are subject to a phenoenon similar to arc blow. On real tight angles (like a basket twist) you can dob a bit of paint into the joint by hand if you can match a color or just a clear lacquer will work well. The only other real problem is minor uncoated spots on holes the rails are hung from for coating and you can clear lacquer them as well. Stainless steel washers with attached sealing washers will help there too.

I agree that a zinc coating would be the ticket. Hot dip, painting with a high zinc coating (95% zinc coatings are available). If you were near me, I would suggest a sprayed on zinc coating (100% zinc metal no carrier)as I have a metal sprayer that applies metal to most any other surfaces. Then overcoat the zinc to what ever you need (be sure you use a covering material that is ok to apply over zinc as some products will not adhere well to a zinc surface.

One thing to be sure of doing on the piece is have a good radius on all of the edges. A sharp edge will NOT accept any sort of coating to the same thickness as a flat surface. Paint, powder coating, metal spray, what ever, a sharp edge will have a very thin coat compared to the flat surfaces.

Good luck,

John Dach
Sequim, WA

Patrick,

Have you ever heard of metallizing? www.zincnation.com I've been around fence industry for years and metallizing is the way to go. Especially along the coast. You can powdercoat over it as well.

Ryan Mudd

Hot-dipped galvanizing is the best way, followed by proper etching and painting with top-quality automotive paints. If you don't have access to a facility that can do the HDG work, then start by sandblasting, the3n do a phosphate-conversion process (Ospho or similar) and prime with a 90-95% zinc primer, followed by an oxide primer, then the two or three coats of automotive paint.

In my experience (island in the Caribbean), powdercoating is a terrible finish for steel in a marine/coastal environment. It never completely covers every single micrmeter of the surface and rust starts under it and suddenly blisters it off. When that happens, is simply cannot be touched-up or repaired; it must be completely stripped and re-coated form scratch. I've seen this happen is as little as three months. Properly painted cars (or ironwork), on the other hand, seem to routinely last ten or twenty years before degrading to the point of needing a re-coat.