Need Advice Repairing Gelcoat

P

Pat

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Jun 7, 2004
1,250
Oday 272LE Ninnescah Yacht Club, Wichita, Ks.
Our O'day 272 LE has many hairline cracks in the gelcoat in various places...I want to fill these with some product that will at least come close to matching the gelcoat color....Any ideas...
btw...the O'day gelcoat colors white...maybe a little gray.....does anyone sell small quanities of
matching gelcoat......I've done the Tolley routine....nothing ever fills us....the cracks that is..
Thank you for your help and suggestions.....Patrick
 
V

vhoisington

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Mar 13, 2011
175
Islander Freeport 41 Longmont
You can get gel coat coloring kits most places that sell gel coat. Its somewhat of an art but sort of fun trying to get that perfect match for you gelcoat. Even though the manufacturers will tell you its white every boat seems to age just a little different and so white is not always white ....

Depending upon the area you need to cover you can work to be exact or just show spider veins and let people wonder.
 
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P

Pat

.
Jun 7, 2004
1,250
Oday 272LE Ninnescah Yacht Club, Wichita, Ks.
Thanks Shane....did not think of Dick....I had a qt. can of gelcoat (white) in the fridge for 4 years un-opened then threw it out..at the time I did not need to use it so much....10 years ago at least.....it was pretty expensive...O'day's were / are full of funny blends of whites and grays....we never had any cracks when I left the boat in the water over the winter w/ a bubbler...
sitting on the trailer w/ the strong Kansas winds puts a lot more pressure on the hull...thanks again, Patrick in paradise.
 
Panta Rei

Panta Rei

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Nov 3, 2010
564
Oday 39 Lake mills WI
Pat, I have good and bad news for you. First the good news. They have a product that is called Magic ezy hairline filler. http://magicezy.com/hairline-fix/ It works reasonably well. Doing this type of work takes some skill, patience and practice. The bad news is that I do not think they have your color so you will need to purchase a gel coat coloring kit as VH suggested above. Color matching is also a very difficult process. You will need to remove the captain Tolley's from the crack as that stuff has a very low surface tension and will prevent the Crack filler from entering the crack. The EZY video suggest a needle or a pin for that job. The Magic EZY hairline filler is very soft . Much softer than gelcoat. This makes it easy to level or remove excess after it dries. I purchased some last year and was successful on about 50% of the cracks I attempted. I failed to mix the contents of the tube properly before application.(a real MUST) Here is the process I used.
  1. I use polyglow on my boat to maintain the shine on smooth gelcoat surfaces.
    I removed it prior to crack filling with ammonia a 400 to 600 grit sandpaper. This also cleans up the gelcoat.
  2. I then applied the Magic EZY and also their 9 second chip fix on larger dings. The cream color was the closest match to my O'day 39. Not perfect but close enough for a 30 year old boat.
  3. I then used 3M schtch brite pads. http://solutions.3m.com/wps/portal/...-Sheets-and-Sponges/Hand-Pads?N=7581709&rt=r3 to clean things up, I don't recall the exact ones but I keep an assortment.
  4. Then re-apply polyglow. Your other choice is using gelcoat. A much more difficult process. Fiberglast has color fan decks to that they will send you so you can get the best match. http://www.fibreglast.com/category/colorgelcoat?gclid=CPbQx-W3nNICFdm6wAodwQ0Cow
Get Don Casey's book "Sailboat deck and hull repair" if you are going this route. I have some gelcoat work to do this summer. I'll post a few pictures.
 
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P

Pat

.
Jun 7, 2004
1,250
Oday 272LE Ninnescah Yacht Club, Wichita, Ks.
Panta Rei, thank you for your advice....it's interesting; my cracks did not appear until we started using a trailer for winter
storage.....for many years we used a bubbler and kept the boat in the water all winter.....never a crack......my biggest issue maybe that many of my dings (not the cracks) were caused by impact from a whisker pole...there are probably 10 or 15 of these impact points where the pole was dropped on the deck or hit the cockpit coaming, etc. they are maybe 10 of them, all about 1/4 inch in diameter, these are gelcoat surface impact points, the underlying fiberglass is not damaged ...the other hairline gelcoat cracks are so fine the Capt'n Tolley's just stayed on the surface, never getting into the cracks, although the Tolleys did at first appear to seep into the cracks.....what tool would be best to apply the gelcoat, if I can find a good color?
Thanks for your help.. I will look at the attachment you sent above......Patrick
 
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