fibre glass repair

[johns]

i have recently bought a nicholson 30 on one side at the middle of the boat above the water line there is some cracking in the gelcoat it looks like stress marks which could have been caused by the boat being squeezed,but i dont know i have takenthe paneling off from the inside and the hull looks perfect could i scrape and fill the cracks and repaintor what should i do . i saw the damage before the purchase but at the price i wasnt complaning

 

[snowleopard]

can\'t fill cracks...

You must gouge out the cracks to give a clean surface going back to the glass layer, then you will get adhesion. less fun is to grind off the gelcoat throughout the cracked area and build up again with filler, finishing with a longboard (giant sanding pad). either way takes a lot of work to get a professional finish. incidentally commercial gelcoat touch-up kits can be a very different shade of white to your original. if the damage is extensive you're probably forced to paint the hull.

 

[sjohn_gibson]

I purchased a B&D wizard and using the equivalent of a crude denist's drill, I was able clean and open up the cracks with ease. It was equally simple to fill and smooth off the 1.5 mm wide cut with gel coat.

However, I have now got spiders on the trial areas! Matching the gel coat colour is a problem I have yet to solve.