Any suggestions on removing scratches in the gelcoat?
1000 grit sandpaper a buff with with a GOOD rubbing compound. Reccomend a buffer not a polisher
Naah, wont work, scratches too deep, would remove too much gelcoat, how about covering the scratches, any suggestions?
how bad are the scratches?
if they are deep, they should be filled to avoid moisture wicking into the glass/foam. if they are minor, you can sand them out with 800/1200/1600 grit pads or paper (and or compound as mentioned).
a coat of carnuba will go far to keep your white gel coat white
fill the deep scratches with gel coat(bondo spreader works nice) and sand off the excess flush with the old gel coat. evercoat has a gel coat match and patch repair kit that has all the colorants to match most any color. the kit has everything you need(except bondo spreader). even if the hulls are white, they need to be matched(a million shades of white exist). kit comes with a full set of instructions. if you have a buch to fill you may need more material. now your ready for buffing/waxing!
Marine-Tex matches white gelcoat pretty close and its cheap seals out water and pretty easy to sand and dries hard as a rock in 48 hours so sand it down in the after 24 hours. I waited 48 once and it was a real pain to sand then. Otherwise West Systems sells a patch repair kit thats good for scratches but it dries red and you will need to spray some gelcoat not too hard it sounds like a small area so you can use a Preval sprayer and get good results with a little wetsanding it will look real good.
coastrat wrote: fill the deep scratches with gel coat(bondo spreader works nice) and sand off the excess flush with the old gel coat. evercoat has a gel coat match and patch repair kit that has all the colorants to match most any color. the kit has everything you need(except bondo spreader). even if the hulls are white, they need to be matched(a million shades of white exist). kit comes with a full set of instructions. if you have a buch to fill you may need more material. now your ready for buffing/waxing!
I tried one of the Evercoat scratch repair kits and was not too happy with the gelcoat paste when it dried it was like caulking and did not sand well but who knows could have been an old kit I got it from bass pro shops.
i played around with the evercoat but i had 2 colors to match. for small fixes it was ok. if it were a larger application i would up size to a different material