802jollyhawk
New Member
I am a rookie at Sunfish repairs and could use some advice. I have an old Sunfish that had large gashes in the sides, was waterlogged and had much of the gelcoat scraped away. It had been used on a rocky shoreline on Lake Champlain in Vermont. I made a port on the topside (not shown in the attached photos) and dried it out over a four year period. I repaired the defects in the hull using the West System. As you can see from the photos there are multiple areas of fiberglass repair and the rest of the hull has nearly worn through it's gelcoat.
My shoreline is rocky and I have no place to lift the boat out of the water - so my best option is just to moor the sunfish in front of my house. Getting itchy to sail, I just painted over the hull with VC 17 bottom paint and sailed the boat from a mooring for a summer. It sailed very well and did not leak (I did do a leak test as best as I could first). Unfortunately I could not get over the fact that the brownish bottom aestetically looked awful so I have since removed the VC-17 (quite annoying to do, but now done). I want the hull to be white. Now - what to do? It will be in the water from June, 1 until October, 1. Do I try to re-apply gelcoat? Do I use a 2 part epoxy paint meant for under the waterline (such as Interlux Protect ) or do I use an above waterline product like Rustoleum or Easypoxy (all options over the appropriate primer)?
Most of the threads I have read involve repairing small cracks in the hull. This hull was a disaster!!
I greatly appreciate any advice from you experienced veterans....
My shoreline is rocky and I have no place to lift the boat out of the water - so my best option is just to moor the sunfish in front of my house. Getting itchy to sail, I just painted over the hull with VC 17 bottom paint and sailed the boat from a mooring for a summer. It sailed very well and did not leak (I did do a leak test as best as I could first). Unfortunately I could not get over the fact that the brownish bottom aestetically looked awful so I have since removed the VC-17 (quite annoying to do, but now done). I want the hull to be white. Now - what to do? It will be in the water from June, 1 until October, 1. Do I try to re-apply gelcoat? Do I use a 2 part epoxy paint meant for under the waterline (such as Interlux Protect ) or do I use an above waterline product like Rustoleum or Easypoxy (all options over the appropriate primer)?
Most of the threads I have read involve repairing small cracks in the hull. This hull was a disaster!!
I greatly appreciate any advice from you experienced veterans....