Mad River Gelcoat (gel coat) Repair/Questions

[mwaalen]

If all went well in constructing this post, along with the attached photos there should also be a link to a prior conversation on this old MR Sunrunner. In case anyone is interested.

Along with re-caning the seats, I am contemplating a bit of repair to the hull exterior as I go over it removing rub marks with compound. The first photo shows the overall shape of the hull which is quite excellent however in looking close there are some possible spots of concern. Thus far I have watched a few repair videos on "Me"-Tube and searched a bit for gelcoat repair kits with intent to find a color match for this hull which is called "Sand". NOTE: This is a fibreglass boat.

My questions are...

1. Should I just leave it alone aside from a protectant top-coat of some sort?
2. Do some blemishes appear to need attention and others possibly not?
3. Is it possible to purchase this color (Sand) gelcoat or would I need to color mix myself?
4. What about clear gelcoat?

Thanks in advance for any and all suggestions.

Peace,
Micah

 

[mwaalen]

Clarification...Some of the photos show just black rub marks which have already been removed so don't need any help on that front.

 

[Jatfomike]

If you want to do it the "right way", You can buy kits from places like West systems to repair the gel coat. Seeings as how old your boat is, they may have a hard time matching your color. I believe they have a kit that you can blend the colors yourself to match. It is a very labor intensive process with a lot of sanding/blending/polishing. In the end if done properly, looks brand new! With that said, I went the easy route and filled in the deep scratches and chips with 5-minute epoxy. I used a plastic putty knife to apply/level the epoxy. It worked real well with a couple of long gouges like in your photo. After curing for 24 hours, I spray painted with a color similar to original. Of course, I wasn't too worried about appearance. Hopefully at the end of next Summer, It will need some more chip/gouge filling and paint. That means I got out and used it!

Mike

 

[snapper]

Mike - Thanks for your reply because I'm looking at the same set of issues with a canoe I picked up locally. Glad to hear the 5 minute epoxy worked because that's what I did with the larger chips. I still have to replace the gunwales and seats but now I won't worry about the hull; although it still needs to be painted.

Speaking of paint; what paint did you use? A standard spray paint or did you roll it on? Any particular brand you would recommend?

That's all for now. Take care and until next time....be well.

snapper

 

[dogbrain]

Micah, My issues with past gelcoat repairs were with getting a color match. Using clear gelcoat would be worse because you need to chip out all that old gelcoat around the spider cracks which will show the underlying fabric. There are some good youtube videos that show how to do this. If you could get a gelcoat kit a little darker color than your boat and have something white to tint it incrementally until you get close to a match would be best. You can also get gelcoat kits with a variety of different colors and try to match as best you can. My experience is mostly with the Wenonah gelcoat kits, and they don't match the older boats that may have changed color with age. That being said, I think their cream color would be close to the color of your boat.

Either way with an older boat I think you'll end up seeing the repair. But maybe you don't care so much if they show? With an older fiberglass boat it probably doesn't matter anyway. You could do the epoxy thing described above, but that stuff may be more brittle than the gelcoat and could crack again in the future, and with paint you won't get a perfect color match anyway, but it would be the least expensive way to go. A good color matched gelcoat repair is invisible if done properly.

If all the damage is above the waterline I would probably hold off on the repairs until you have more spider cracks, which you will get over time with an older boat. If that big spider crack is below the waterline, it's probably best to go ahead and repair it. Those deep scuffs that don't go through to the fabric are nothing to worry about, but you may as well fill them when repairing the deeper cracks. The wenonah gelcoat kits have a very short shelf life (< 3 months), and I assume other manufacturers are the same, so don't order one until you're ready to do all the work.

Mark

 

[Guest]

I would at least patch the spider cracks and odd bulls eye puncture (rebar?). I am not experienced with gel coat, but having seen your previous work on that canoe, a proper gel coat repair is probably the way to go.

The gouges and scratches in the stem gel coat, I dunno, at some point, now or in the future I would install Dynel skid plates.

 

[Jatfomike]

Mike - Thanks for your reply because I'm looking at the same set of issues with a canoe I picked up locally. Glad to hear the 5 minute epoxy worked because that's what I did with the larger chips. I still have to replace the gunwales and seats but now I won't worry about the hull; although it still needs to be painted.

Speaking of paint; what paint did you use? A standard spray paint or did you roll it on? Any particular brand you would recommend?

That's all for now. Take care and until next time....be well.

snapper

I used permatex 5 minute "gap filler" epoxy and for paint, found a Rustoleum 2X on sale for $2.99 a can that seemed a fairly close color match. The 2X means it was a combo primer/paint and according to the label it adheres to about anything. I got two full coats from 1 can. Hopefully the next time I launch I won't leave behind a red slick....

Mike

 

[snapper]

Mike - Thanks for the information. I'll check into the paint and the filler you mentioned for future jobs.

That's all for now. Take care and until next time....be well.

snapper

 

[mwaalen]

Sorry everyone but my Gmail did not flag me (as it had in the past) that I had any responses. I will go through them tomorrow and reply shortly there after. THANKS!

 

[mwaalen]

Gellcoat repair just seems difficult without more practice and right now I am perplexed not knowing the ultimate purpose of this boat. The hope is to come across another canoe that may serve my tripping purposes a bit better (hopefully something lighter and more beat-up) and keep this one as pristine as possible for use as a pleasure cruiser/HotRod. If I can't find that right deal come spring, will probably go after the hull fixes a bit more aggressively and get the thing ready for tripping. My guess is that odd, round, divot is a shot from a BB gun.

Thanks again everyone.
Micah

 

[Guest]

Gellcoat repair just seems difficult without more practice and right now I am perplexed not knowing the ultimate purpose of this boat. The hope is to come across another canoe that may serve my tripping purposes a bit better (hopefully something lighter and more beat-up) and keep this one as pristine as possible for use as a pleasure cruiser/HotRod. If I can't find that right deal come spring, will probably go after the hull fixes a bit more aggressively and get the thing ready for tripping. My guess is that odd, round, divot is a shot from a BB gun.

BB gun or pellet gun make sense for that ding. dang kids.

Despite having little previous experience with gel coat repairs my/our first attempts at it didn’t seem all that difficult. Provided you are smart enough to properly count drops of hardener, which we somehow managed to screw up not once, but twice (half as much as needed the first time, twice as much the second time, both set up but the first batch took a week).

Gawd knows there are enough gel coat repair videos to watch, although none stress the importance of the ability to count accurately.

The gel coat repairs we did are holding up better than the cloth and epoxy repairs in an especially abusive use environment (oyster bars, lime stone, worm rock); much better than those repairs covered with glass & epoxy, and at least as well as those done with Dynel.

Gel coat is essentially a sacrificial layer, and if you keep the Sunrunner as a Pleasure Cruiser/Hotrod it would be worth practicing/learning proper gel coat repairs rather than continuing to pack spider cracks with epoxy or filler

Matching a (faded) gel coat color is dang near impossible, but at least a white/sand hull is easier to get close to matching than a faded red or green. I would use a white or off white gel coat and if necessary for a better color match top coat that with some enamel or epoxy sand-tinted paint.

https://www.google.com/search?q=eas...KHQkUBCsQ9QEwAXoECAAQBA#imgrc=59acO5vl-yMaKM:

An oil based enamel works fine, and you could probably take a gel coat chip to the hardware store and ask them to mix and match some enamel paint.

 

[BWCA66]

Using Duratec mixed with gel coat helps it harden and greatly reduces the orange peel effect thereby reducing the amount of sanding needed for a smooth blended look.

 

[mwaalen]

Looks like I've got more homework to do.

May have mentioned this in an earlier post but a lifetime ago I worked (one summer) at a fiberglass canoe manufacturer in Bemidji MN called Core Craft. Bad news is I never got a chance to work on the canoes as was hired to buff/polish the fiberglass cherry picker booms they also made. A friend of mine was the main "artisan fixer-guy" for the plant that did all the repair work. I remember him showing me how not to mix resin/gel coat/epoxy (or whatever it was) by adding too much accelerator/hardener (or whatever it was) and actually boiling the product as it was setting up. I recall smoke, heat, and loud "snapping". Possibly even a small fire??

I've got faith in most of my hand skills and aptitude however am still leaning towards attempting my first gel coat repair on something other than this hull. When that next canoe is finally in-hand (hopefully soon as the winter solstice is today!) I will revisit all this information and have a go. Hopefully that next canoe is more of a wreck which would make this easier on me...

Thanks again for all the help and tips.
Micah

 

[mwaalen]

RAL numbers anyone?? Finally back to this and committed to doing the gel coat repair as the way-to-much-deliberated maiden voyage (10 days in Quetico) of this old boat is on for August! My son can't go this round...freag'n jobs...but found a porteaur 10+ years my junior who stands 6' 4" and weighs a lean/strong180...perfect!

Found a local outfitter that will mix me a quart for $40 which seems super reasonable.

To best match, they asked for RAL number of the color (Sand). Anyone here know where to find this? I suppose I could call on Mon but possibly there is a chart online someplace?

Thanks as always.
Micah

 

[Guest]

Even if someone from the Vermont days could be found who remembered the gelcoat color it would now be different now from UV fade.

There are RAL color charts, with multiple “shades” of white.

https://www.google.com/search?q=ral...5QQ9QEwAnoECAgQBg#imgrc=Fv7jxdJi3or40M:&vet=1

 

[mwaalen]

Thanks Mike. Good point on the fade variable. The novelty of having a "show-boat" has finally wore off so now focussed on function. Thus I will pick something close and go for it. Unless...

Just found a MR Minstrel for sale near me for $175. The FG version is heavy but if it happens to be one of the other lay-ups it may make a nice tripper as the hull dimensions seem to suggest this. It is misshapen due to broken alum. gunwale and missing thwart. They did not originally make these with yokes and not marketed as a tripper but...???

 

[Guest]

Just found a MR Minstrel for sale near me for $175. The FG version is heavy but if it happens to be one of the other lay-ups it may make a nice tripper as the hull dimensions seem to suggest this. It is misshapen due to broken alum. gunwale and missing thwart. They did not originally make these with yokes and not marketed as a tripper but...???

Thanks to Hans Solo the Minstrel catalog page can be seen here:

https://bwca.com/index.cfm?fuseacti...99&journalname=Mad River Canoe Specifications

Looks like a decently fast lake tripper to me

MRC lists Minstrel production as:
Fiberglass – 1990 – 1991
Kevlar (or KE, the heavier weight of MRC’s kevlar layups) – 1988 only(?)
Kevlar Hybrid (KH, foam core) – 1990 – 1991

The Sunrunner (1994 – 1997) seems close dimensionally to the Minstrel and may have been the replacement model.

The year on the HIN might help narrow down the Minstral construction, especially if it is a 1988, but I wouldn’t count on MRC’s list of production years, and because of the way HIN’s run the model year and HIN year can be off by one.

I want nothing ever again to do with installing aluminum gunwales, what an enormous PITA. But for $175 it would be worth re-gunwaling with wood (or even vinyl with aluminum inserts), especially if it was a 50lb kevlar hull.

Which would be an opportunity to install a yoke, and seats/hangers/thwarts of your choice.