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1978 Convincer restoration

OK, here is what has been going on lately with the project.
The trailer was a mess so we cut the old tongue off and wellded in some new square tubing, added all new rollers, replaced all the bunk brackets and in the process of installing 4 new bunks to the trailer.

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Next, we started to tackle the metalflake/gelcoat. After getting some bogus info on the amount of catalyst to use, we found a company called Composits One that had the Duratech and the correct catalyst to use for gelcoat. After grinding out all the gouges and scratches and filling them in, we scuffed the entire hull with 320, masked off the areas we didnt want coated and began spraying the blue metalflake.

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After getting the metalflake to have an even coverage we went back in with the clear gelcoat and duratech blend and applied several coats of this.

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These photos dont do justice to the finnish,this clear/duratech coating has really made the metalflake look so much better than wet sanding and buffing could have ever done.
Next will be wet sanding and buffing the entire hull.
 
wow mr bryan. i can only look with envy in my eye. mine was gona be the same blue flake. it looks awsome. makes me sick i lost mine to mother nature and poor planning on my part.
 
Thanks Ezflyer, I am sorry to hear about your boat, from what I saw on your earlier posts it looked like you had quite a bit of it done before the weather decided to play a mean trick on you.
Thanks for responding to my post about needing a center door for my windshield.
 
We have started sanding the hull starting with 180 grit dry to start taking the edge off the orange peel that occurs when you spray gel coat. Then followed up with 320 wet, then 400 wet and finally 600 grit wet. After that we buffed a small section to show what the finish will look like. Here it is:

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I think this test area shows it will look like a new boat when done. Now back to sanding and buffing.... Hopefully the entire hull will be sanded and buffed this weekend.
 
The entire bottom has now been wet sanded with 600 grit wet. I will be finishing up sanding the sides and transom and then buff out the entire hull this weekend. Here is a photo of the bottom ready to be buffed out.

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Thanks for the compliments. Hopefully the things we are doing on this rebuild will help someone with a future project.... I have learned one thing from this project and that is that sanding clear gelcoat is like sanding a piece of granite! this stuff is incredibly hard. I have blisters on my fingers and we still have to flip the boat over and clear gelcoat the deck!
 
Well the hull is FINALLY sanded and buffed out! I will post some photos this weekend when I get back over there to take them. Right now we are going to get ready to flip the boat back over using the 3/4" plywood wheel idea that jponfrank listed in his post about flipping your mate. Will post photos as this goes along. The new rubrail and insert are here as well.
 
Was applying the Gel-coat difficult? I really want to re-gel the bottom of our boat but heard it was difficult. Could you also give me a quick list of the products used....

Your boat looks great and is coming along nicely
 
Thanks for the compliments.
Spraying the gelcoat is not much more difficult than spraying paint. You have to grind and fill in all the gouges with chopped glass and sand this smooth, then prep the surface by sanding the entire area you are wanting to re gel coat. If you are applying metalflake along with the clear, you will need to get the correct spray tip to handle the flake. I used a .015" x .015" flake that was purchased from a company called TCP global (858-909-2110) They seem to have the best selection of colors to match all the old metalflake that Checkmate used. I used #180 clear gel coat purchased from Fiberglast.com (800-821-3283) and we mixed it with #904-004 Duratech high gloss additive purchased from Composits one (800-457-7949) we used #925 MEK peroxide also from Composits one. DO NOT use the hardener that Fiberglast.com sends with their clear gel coat it will take forever to set up and they will just tell you you are not mixing it right. Their hardener contains a 30% mix of MEK and the #925 is a 45% mix (this makes a huge difference in curing time) This mixture is sprayed on like you would paint. After it dries, you will need to sand the orangepeel out. We started with 220 then went to 320, 400, 500, 800, 1000 and then 1500 ( all wet sanded) being careful not to sand through the clear and turn the flake silver. After all that sanding we buffed it out using Wizards Turbo cut compound, it is made specifically for gel coat.
There may be other materials and ways of doing this that take less time, but we have had excellent results doing it this way. The boat looks better than the original factory finish. I will post pictures of it this weekend so you can see what I am talking about.
 
Gel looks amazing, any chance you would PM me your phone # so I could call you and get some advice for re-gel coating mine instead of painting? Very very very nice job!
 
Thanks for taking the time to talk to me, gives me a warm fuzzy that I can do it! Hope mine turns out half as nice as yours.
 
Hopefully George gave you some of the detailed info you were looking for. Good luck with your project and let me know how it turns out.
 
The prep work (other than fixing all the gouges and scratches) and the actual spraying of the gel coat was about the same as if you were going to paint it. The labor intensive part is all the sanding that it takes to get a mirror like reflection and a smooth surface. We have about 40-45 hours just in sanding the hull in preparation for final buffing on it.
 
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