Need some help on painting my rub rail. Which holds the paint and wear better , aluminum or vynil ? Shoud an additive be used for the vynil? Need this to last ...

neither, you should not paint the rubrail because . . . . well . . . . its there for rubbin



rub rail should not be painted for any reason. Not only does it serve a very specific purpose (see above) there isn't much that will stick or hold up in any reasonable way.

I am not saying one way or the other about painting rubrails. But if you are painting anything aluminum. Scuff it first with a scotchbrite disc than alodine it, prime and paint. But aluminum anything on a boat??? Corrosion is a B*****. But if you are looking for colored rubrails I was thinking about that and found Barbour Plastics. They had some different colored rubrails.

How about powder coated aluminum that's what I'm doing to mine.

Even powdercoatimg doesn't hold up in salt..

I painted my aluminum rub rail with a 5 dollar can (black) of spay paint from local hardware store. It looks very good. It's a class 6 OPA raceboat-so its on/off trailer alot. When the rub rail rubs aginst a piling and scrapes off the paint, I tape it off and spray that section again. If you want to see pics-go on www.OPARACING.org and look under class 6 for 606 Lock'd Up, from 2 years ago. I havent raced it the past two years-since Sandy flooded my house. Spraying is a cheap way to make it look good-not perfect but pretty good. I'm computer illiterate-if someone can drag over a picture-that would be great. Thanks.

OPA under race teams has 602 and 607 listed no 606. FYI

I believe Cigarette paints and or uses some colored rub rails on their current boats - not all but some. Possible Outerlimits as well

BUP- I didnt race the past two years-so I'm not listed as a current team. If you go to the gallery section, look under 2012, Bull on the Beach Grand Prix-there are several pics.