Javelin
Well-known member
A bit of a learning experience today.
I checked out a raised bit of gel coat on my bow yesterday.
After a prod and poke I realised I had trouble.
At some stage in my boats history she's had a major front end shunt.
After clearing the delaminated gelcoat it revealed a repair from two feet back on the port side and 1 foot back on starboard all the way to the bow.
So the stemhead fitting was removed along with the fairleads and a temporary forestay to keep the mast up.
On closer inspection the repair was made using epoxy and kevlar which matches the hull construction but I could see that some of the surface was still shiny and had not been keyed at all before the gelcoat was painted on.
It's a pretty major repair and from the inside it appears to have been done pretty well, although to my mind not enough glass was added but it boggles me why they (whoever it was??) couldn't spend the 30 minutes required to remove the blush and wax from the epoxy finished surface.
Polyester gelcoat will adhere to epoxy but only if you get the prep correct and even then I reckon on a 25% failure rate, however this had no chance.
All the rest of the hull has been Gel coated on a very thin layer of polyester faring filler and all seems very good.
(I guess they used gelcoat because its a 1/3 of the cost of paint but who knows?)
Today I ground clean the inside and reinforced the bow with a lot more glass and epoxy.
Tomorrow I'll do what they should have done years ago and provide a good key to give the gelcoat half a chance of staying put.
It's funny that even when you thought you know your boat pretty well something pops up giving you a story of her history you knew nothing about.
I checked out a raised bit of gel coat on my bow yesterday.
After a prod and poke I realised I had trouble.
At some stage in my boats history she's had a major front end shunt.
After clearing the delaminated gelcoat it revealed a repair from two feet back on the port side and 1 foot back on starboard all the way to the bow.
So the stemhead fitting was removed along with the fairleads and a temporary forestay to keep the mast up.
On closer inspection the repair was made using epoxy and kevlar which matches the hull construction but I could see that some of the surface was still shiny and had not been keyed at all before the gelcoat was painted on.
It's a pretty major repair and from the inside it appears to have been done pretty well, although to my mind not enough glass was added but it boggles me why they (whoever it was??) couldn't spend the 30 minutes required to remove the blush and wax from the epoxy finished surface.
Polyester gelcoat will adhere to epoxy but only if you get the prep correct and even then I reckon on a 25% failure rate, however this had no chance.
All the rest of the hull has been Gel coated on a very thin layer of polyester faring filler and all seems very good.
(I guess they used gelcoat because its a 1/3 of the cost of paint but who knows?)
Today I ground clean the inside and reinforced the bow with a lot more glass and epoxy.
Tomorrow I'll do what they should have done years ago and provide a good key to give the gelcoat half a chance of staying put.
It's funny that even when you thought you know your boat pretty well something pops up giving you a story of her history you knew nothing about.