Getting ready to spray gelcoat

So I'm just about ready to re-gelcoat my new to me old 18. I've removed 98% of a PO bad paint job. The only spot's I'm chasing are the radius into the center board wells and the valley where the hull meet's the deck. I can sand the small amount of paint in these area's but not remove it all. What do you guy's think? Will this be a problem if I gelcoat over these spots. You will never see it unless you really look. just want to do the best I can, as gelcoat is new to me.
Any advise is useful.
KDJ

I'm not a gel coat spraying expert, but I'd think if it was scuffed a bit and cleaned with some solvent, it will probably stick just fine. Good luck!

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Blair T

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'02 Hobie Tiger USA 1152

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Jeremy on spraying Gelcoat

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Rich Vilvens
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Whatever you do, make sure that all of the paint is removed! At the very least, do a sample area to make sure that the solvents in the gel will not dissolve the paint.

If you spray over paint, and it starts to dissolve, you will swear...alot. The whole time that you're sanding the junky paint off, be sure and curse the guy that slapped it on there in the first place.

Don't finish Hobies with paint, ever!

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Edit: When you do a test area, you'll know that it's going wrong by the paint getting a sort of raised spider web look to it. After the gel goes off the whole mess will peel away if you look at it wrong.

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Thanks, for the advice. I've got all the paint off the hull so I'm not worried about that. What would you suggest to do about the anti-slip on the deck? Sand it off and gelcoat, or mask it and repaint with an anti-slip paint? Who ever painted it, stripped the the boat down to do it. Even painted under the cross bars. I will keep sanding the hard to reach spots. It come's off with elbow grease just not fun.

KDJ

Bummer about the deck.

Here's what I would do...

Do a search on stipple rolling gelcoat. Basically, you thicken gel with something like 404 high density filler until it's to your required consistency, and roll it on with a foam roller. The thicker you mix the gel the bigger the texture, the thinner the finer. Once the gel kicks, take a block with 80G paper and knock off the peaks. Thick milkshake consistency works well.

Mask the deck with some fine line tape to make a professional looking pattern. I've even darkened the deck gel with a drop or two of pigment to set them off. Be sure to pull off the tape before the gel goes off. Be sure to remember the quantities of filler and pigment, so that you can reproduce the results if need be.

The texture looks like this:

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What do you need to do to prepare the old gel coat for a new coat?

Slight sand of area 240-400 grit. Clean with soap and water. final wipe with acetone or MEK and away you go. More tips wecome as I'm no expert.