The roof is primed

Today was another day spent on the roof of the bus. It wasn't an early start because of condensation but once the sun had dried all that up, I could get up there again. As this bus has no roof hatch, getting on the rood is a case of putting a stepladder up as far as the bonnet then putting a small stepladder on the bonnet to climb onto the roof. This is pretty tiring and when one has a leg cramp on top of the roof, getting down again can be interesting.

The elastometric paint on the roof came up in big flakes. It was not well attached for the most part. Some was well enough attached that it would not come up with a wire brush in an angle grinder. The grey paint underneath was so well attached that wouldn't come up with heavy brushing. 

The flake in the picture is pretty typical - it's full of cracks and holes. Exactly the kind of thing that is not required in a roof coating. I am very disappointed in this Rustoleum Elastometric paint. 

There wasn't much left of the elastometric paint when I went on the roof - it seemed to have flaked and peeled off quite well all on its own. Still I removed a lot more and worked on one of the seams with the new vehicle seam caulk. This stuff is phenomenal. It smells like an epoxy, squirts like a caulk from a caulk gun and can be worked with a putty knife. I have to say this is probably a good move. 

After treating one seam and finding the grey roof was painfully hot to work on, treating the other seams was abandoned for this weekend. The new plan after priming the roof with a rust-killing primer is to paint the roof white then tape over the seams with duct tape about 8 hours later. Then it will be left for next weekend to remove all the silicone caulk and put the new caulk in place. I've heard of people using Eternabond tape but my understanding is that's inferior because it's too easy to get ripples in the tape that will let water in.

Well, tomorrow is white day. Once the roof is white - if there's time - I might also paint white the last bit of the front of the bus.