Metal Protection at the coast

Last week we were called to give a specification at a coastal installation - literally at the water's edge. Salt spray, wind and high humidity all challenging the integrity of metal gantries and equipment. Design of structures seems not to include the ease of maintaining metal components, and as it often happens we are asked "what now". Good stainless steel would surely have saved the day - but mild steel had been used to construct large moulds for concrete ramps and a series of beams forming an overhead delivery system some 100 metres long, down to the high water mark.
Priming had already been done, after in-house sand-blasting, using two coats of a high build epoxy-ester based anti-corrosive primer. The beams and moulds have to be coated in-situ, limiting application methods, as well as product types. Fortunately, the business has a full-time painter, dedicated to the maintenance of the installation. His days will be filled with removal of dried salt from the metal, sanding, spot priming with the epoxy ester primer and over-coating with Chlorinated Rubber Enamel for the next three years. While this should be music to a paint manufacturer's ears, use of a better material at the outset would have saved a lot costs down the line.