Congratulations!
Good luck on your new boat! I love cleaning new stuff. I am a fundamentalist in this area. I don't like to use anything that I don't know the ingredients of. I also don' tlike anything with silicone or other similar products, which can make it impossible to paint later. On my boat, I started with car wash soap, the blue stuff available in Wal-Mart for about $3.00 per gallon. A nice soft brush on a stick speeds things up. A large genuine chamois is great for drying. Have some mineral spirits handy for cleaning up glue and tape and such, as its pretty safe. Have some acetone too, but beware that it will disolve the gelcoat. For really tough spots, some Scotchbrite pads are helpful, but take it easy. I brought much of the gelcoat back to new condition by wet sanding through all of the grits from 220 or 320 through 2000. After 2000, rubbing compund is hardly necessary. I then waxed with the original style yellow can Simonize wax, which I don't think has any silicone in it (could be wrong on that). jv
