steel tank

[LKunze]

I checked into this a couple years ago pretty extensively. There was one place in town that I contacted that said they'd do it but that they were planning on getting out of painting scuba tanks. The reason was that the paint doesn't hold up that well. After researching it more via the internet I discovered that the easiest and cheapest option was to just remove any loose paint and to treat the bare metal with a product called Exrust by Kano Labs . Once I treated the bare metal I sprayed three coats of Rustoleum Cold Galvanizing Compound (available at Ace Hardware) over the bare spots. This has held up for me for two years now with absolutely no new rust spots. It's not pretty but it's effective. If you want the tank to look pretty I'd have the tank blasted with a nutshell media and then apply a few coats of ZRC to the tank. No need for paint. The ZRC is not cheap but it's very good stuff. All you have to do then is touch it up if you get any dings in the tank and since it's zinc it won't look like crap when you touch it up like paint does. Zinc coated steel tanks offer a much better exterior finish than paint. Hope this helps.