General Paint Question

I painted my Florida boat because the gel had gone bad, no way to save it + a PO looked like they painted it with a broom. Painted it my self with Imron, primer and paint alone was close to 1 k. You will never get those cracks out without removing the gel or other major work. Just polish it up put on new decals. It will truly be a 20 footer- stand back 20 feet and enjoy it.

GottaSki wrote: Yeah. avoid paint if you can learn to do spot the repairs with reinforced filler and matching gelcoat.(its not white, its ivory. a good multi-step wetsanding and HD compounding then polish then topcoat will go very far and look   for a long time. Then it can get refreshed with a fraction of the effort. Pait looks great for a museum boat, until it gets used then it only goes one way.

Do you have a system or product that you would recommend? When you say "then topcpat" are you talking about gelcoat or a clearcoat?

No sir, i havent tried anything. Some cracks are the surface spider cracks, others are between 1/64" and 1/32" wide and just deep enough to see the fiberglass. Looks like just the gel coat cracked enough to see the glass.

Much like painting cars the gel has to be matched on site by the person doing the work. Too many variables- sun damage,age, brand of new vs original manufacturer of the gel It's not easy it's more of an art. Good thing about it is it does not change colors as it hardens, so you can mix and get color correct before you add hardener. A number of years ago I had MiniCraft of Florida color match mine,cut out a piece from the deck behind the rear seat. Didn't match when received,close but no cigar. Was able to tint to get it close. No need for fillers if your only repairing gel damage

FFImarine wrote: I have painted plenty of boats in my life. The first thing is paint in by no means even close to as strong as gel coat ( one dock bump and it’s scratched ).. imron is a good paint but it’s not made anymore But there are some good option out there like        lusid 777 Or lusid 798, for a round about idea on how much it would cost to paint it your gonna be looking at $6-8,000 for an entire top to bottom, bow to stern paint job and that’s with all spider crawling repaired

So upon further review, painting I now know is not what I meant when I didn't realize what I meant. A statement of ignorance. I know that Gelcoat is the only real option. I will get in touch with a local boat shop and see if they have a way for me to identify the gelcoat color. The website that I linked in a previous post has a specific Correctcraft ivory color that I am hoping is the way to go, though very expensive it seems to be the only specific correct craft Ivory that I have been able to find

Gary S wrote: Much like painting cars the gel has to be matched on site by the person doing the work. Too many variables- sun damage,age, brand of new vs original manufacturer of the gel It's not easy it's more of an art.

Don't know if you saw my post.I have learned a little about gel on my own boat. You are not going to find an off the shelf color to match,YOU have to adjust the color to match. Even the Spectrum "match" for my '95,cloud silver, did not match and they supposedly source the gel from the original manufacturer. Very much like dyes on fabrics, they vary from lot to lot
Here are some pictures of a chine repair on mine- the hardest part of the repair is the color match. I used Minicraft of Florida for my gel,bought their color wheel and got the color that was the closest to mine and adjusted from there. I believe Phil used their gel in the restoration of his beautiful boat as well, link

Before-


bad stuff ground out new gel on-


Another view showing tape used to keep gel in place before it hardens-


Sanded but not yet polished-