Gel coat or flow coat???

[Calis]

Hey guys need some more advise.

I've built a foot rest/crash barrier for the driving position in my boat.
Its made from 4mm marine ply.

Im going to seal with resin and then apply some cloth to strengthen it up.

On the outward facing side I was planning on finishing it with the same colour gel coat as the boat. Plan was to just brush it on, get it to the right thickness then sand it back even, polish it up and all done.

However my FG guy says I cant use gel coat... it must be flow coat.
He said the gel coat would stay tacky can cant be used this way.
Is this right?

I understand flow coat has very similar properties to gel coat but has the sealing agent in it so its the perfect final coat like the application Im describing.

The next question is can flow coat be sanded back ok and polished up to a near mirror finish like gel coat?

Cheers,

Calis

[tunnels]

Hey guys need some more advise.

I've built a foot rest/crash barrier for the driving position in my boat.
Its made from 4mm marine ply.

Im going to seal with resin and then apply some cloth to strengthen it up.

On the outward facing side I was planning on finishing it with the same colour gel coat as the boat. Plan was to just brush it on, get it to the right thickness then sand it back even, polish it up and all done.

However my FG guy says I cant use gel coat... it must be flow coat.
He said the gel coat would stay tacky can cant be used this way.
Is this right?

I understand flow coat has very similar properties to gel coat but has the sealing agent in it so its the perfect final coat like the application Im describing.

The next question is can flow coat be sanded back ok and polished up to a near mirror finish like gel coat?

Cheers,

Calis

The flo coat here is almost the same as plain gel coat just has a little more pigment so it covers better and has wax to float to seal the surface when it goes hard .Small trick is to thin it a little with laminating resin to make it flow out better if you intend to brush it !.
The sticky on Gelcoat can be cleaned off with styrene or acetone or you can simply mix wax in it and have no sticky !!
Yes they can both be sanded and polished ! .

[Calis]

yean thanks mate. Im still learning about some of this stuff.
flow coat seems like its best in my case then.

I just wasnt sure what he was meaning when he mentioned the sticky on the gel coat cause I just thought like in a mold the surface wouldnt be sticky

[RobF]

rolled gelcoat with wax added will be a tough thing to sand, consider spraying PVA over the gelcoat instead.
Another benefit of this is you can roll 2 coats and allow it to flash between coats and not have to worry about sanding or removing the wax.

Spraying PVA over the gel will let you sand it easier

[Calis]

thanks guys, well Im almost ready to flowcoat.

any advice on using a roller for application.

I've been gelcoating and well my brush skills still seem to be a bit to be desired.
If I could roll this stuff on I'd feel much better about an even coat.... but I've been advised that rolling it on isnt as good as using a brush....mainly due to the thickness you need to achieve? although I have seen some posts saying you can roll it on... let it set then sand it and roll it on again??

[power of one]

thanks guys, well Im almost ready to flowcoat.

any advice on using a roller for application.

I've been gelcoating and well my brush skills still seem to be a bit to be desired.
If I could roll this stuff on I'd feel much better about an even coat.... but I've been advised that rolling it on isnt as good as using a brush....mainly due to the thickness you need to achieve? although I have seen some posts saying you can roll it on... let it set then sand it and roll it on again??

4 inch nook and cranny roller fluffy not foam put it on thick and long even strokes will give you desired finish top off with speckle use pait brush short bristles thin flowcoat with acetone for desired thickness the finish with speckle all comes down to how you flick the brush have a practice first.

[Calis]

4 inch nook and cranny roller fluffy not foam put it on thick and long even strokes will give you desired finish top off with speckle use pait brush short bristles thin flowcoat with acetone for desired thickness the finish with speckle all comes down to how you flick the brush have a practice first.

ta mate. I'm actually doing something out of the norm and going no speckle.
although I've always wanted to try it so I might give it a go on something else so thanks for the tips.

the parts of the foot rest/crash barrier you see will have the same polished gelcoat look as the rest of the boat hence wanting to roll it on.

I'll grab one of those rollers and try some test rolls.

might take two coats and some sanding but I'll get there!!

[ondarvr]

You will most likely need more than two coats to get the surface thick enough to sand down and polish. You normally get around 10 mils per coat with a roller, so two coats will get you about 20 mils, but with the irregular surface a roller leaves a great deal of what you just put on will be sanded off and you may sand through.<O</O
<O</O

Depending on the size and shape of the part, a good method is to apply the first two coats with a roller or brush and use a squeegee for the final layer. A squeegee will force gel coat into the low areas, but not add any to the high spots, this makes sanding the surface smooth much easier.<O</O

[stokernick]

what about oven paper[parchment] and roller method?

[ondarvr]

what about oven paper[parchment] and roller method?

This works well depending on the shape of the surface. If the surface doesn't have compound curves heavy mylar works great, it will follow the profile, but is still stiff enough to create a smooth surface.

[Calis]

crikey!!! a new website..nice

ok Im now thinking of spray puttying the front of my footrest/crashbarrier just to make it easier to get flush and ready for flowcoat or 2-pack paint.
Im thinking of going down this path cause getting the flowcoat level and perfect by itself is proving tricky (experimenting with the different ways to apply it)

The putty is a poly spray putty called Reface by FGI, great product but really my question is....

....would it hold up to the bashing taken once in the boat?????

surface areas is about 1sq meter.

Cheers..

[power of one]

great product mate should be fine i used it on functional plugs

[Calis]

just wanna say thanks to everyone who gave advise on my newbie questions when it came to FGing and Gel. My foot rest and console are now finished and came up great.
You all gave informative info which I used and learnt heaps in the process.

I ended up spraying gel coat on both for the final finish. On the foot rest for the same gel finished as the rest of the boat and also on the console to cover up my earlier thin gel mistakes

here it is.

[stokernick]

looks great,well done!!

[traderbob1955]

Nice work that came out great and I love that color.