bjmoose
Member
So in the off season, I'm trying to bring my faded, scratched up 75 laser back to it's firey bright "70's Orange-Red" glory. I pulled off my old vinyl CF numbers and a harbor sticker from 1978 to get a view of the original color. 70's retro is in, right?
Naturally, I started with Gouvernail's "How to make your bottom pretty" article at http://schrothfiberglass.com/LaserMaint.htm#How To Make Your Bottom Pretty
Now, the Gouv talks about "Every scratch that you can feel will need to be filled." Uh, riiiiggggght.
You've gotta understand that I've got a boat that sometime in a former life clearly needed to be dragged over a beach every time it went sailing. My best guess is that if I laid out all the scratches end to end, I'd have somewhere between 1000 and 5000 linear feet of scratches -- and this on a 14' boat. (I'll try and put up some before/after pix)
So I've got a brand new 5" random-orbit sander dedicated for the job. I started in on the 320, just to see how it would go.
Maybe we need some 220.
Maybe we need some 120.
Maybe I should jump to the 80.
OK, so I'm sanding the thing out with the 80 grit, and I'm starting to reduce the number of scratches to something I can possibly imagine maybe trying to fill. I've done maybe half the boat in a couple hours. But I'm burning through lots of 80 grit discs, and lots of fairly superficial scratches remain. And that late-fall sun is heading for the horizon.
Hmmmm. ...still lots of gelcoat depth left.
I've got a couple sheets of 40 grit lying around. Maybe I'll try a small area, just to see.
Maybe it'll work.
Maybe I'll grind straight through to the glass and make even more work for myself.
But I tried it out, and yep, for this particular boat that's gonna be the ticket.
Now, my laser was built in 75, and it's possible the builder was using a thicker gelcoat layup back then than they do now. I can see how thick the gelcoat is by examining a couple of chips that go right down to the glass, and it's clearly a LOT deeper than the gelcoat on the deck.
So starting next weekend, I'm going to flip it over again, and go to town with the 40 grit. I figure I need to take about half the gelcoat down in order to have a prayer of getting a decent looking finish. After I'm done, I'm hoping there will be less than 100 linear feet of real and serious scratches to fill. Maybe a lot less.
Yeah, I know; Fred says fill first, then sand. I figure I need to do my major sanding first just to find the scratches worthy of being filled in. Then I'll touch up the filled scratches.
To be continued...
Naturally, I started with Gouvernail's "How to make your bottom pretty" article at http://schrothfiberglass.com/LaserMaint.htm#How To Make Your Bottom Pretty
Now, the Gouv talks about "Every scratch that you can feel will need to be filled." Uh, riiiiggggght.
You've gotta understand that I've got a boat that sometime in a former life clearly needed to be dragged over a beach every time it went sailing. My best guess is that if I laid out all the scratches end to end, I'd have somewhere between 1000 and 5000 linear feet of scratches -- and this on a 14' boat. (I'll try and put up some before/after pix)
So I've got a brand new 5" random-orbit sander dedicated for the job. I started in on the 320, just to see how it would go.
Maybe we need some 220.
Maybe we need some 120.
Maybe I should jump to the 80.
OK, so I'm sanding the thing out with the 80 grit, and I'm starting to reduce the number of scratches to something I can possibly imagine maybe trying to fill. I've done maybe half the boat in a couple hours. But I'm burning through lots of 80 grit discs, and lots of fairly superficial scratches remain. And that late-fall sun is heading for the horizon.
Hmmmm. ...still lots of gelcoat depth left.
I've got a couple sheets of 40 grit lying around. Maybe I'll try a small area, just to see.
Maybe it'll work.
Maybe I'll grind straight through to the glass and make even more work for myself.
But I tried it out, and yep, for this particular boat that's gonna be the ticket.
Now, my laser was built in 75, and it's possible the builder was using a thicker gelcoat layup back then than they do now. I can see how thick the gelcoat is by examining a couple of chips that go right down to the glass, and it's clearly a LOT deeper than the gelcoat on the deck.
So starting next weekend, I'm going to flip it over again, and go to town with the 40 grit. I figure I need to take about half the gelcoat down in order to have a prayer of getting a decent looking finish. After I'm done, I'm hoping there will be less than 100 linear feet of real and serious scratches to fill. Maybe a lot less.
Yeah, I know; Fred says fill first, then sand. I figure I need to do my major sanding first just to find the scratches worthy of being filled in. Then I'll touch up the filled scratches.
To be continued...