Will this buff out of hull... or?

[knoxboatin]

Last year I think we dragged across a submerged tree or something when we ventured out in the dirty Tennessee river after hurricane Helene. I have not done much maintenance to this hull in the 4 years we have had the boat other than cleaning, bought new in 2021. Does this look like something I could buff out with some compound and polishing wheel? Or am I through the color layer and have to get gel-coat or something to restore it? I have never worked with gel-coat or fiberglass finishes so any tips on what to try first are appreciated.

 

[FSH 210 Sport]

Is that the fork lift arms????

 

[knoxboatin]

Yeah it's in the air by the dry storage in the picture. The drivers are really good though and the scratches appeared all at once and I heard it happen. So I don't believe it has anything to do with dry storage fork-lifting. The arms are not as beat up on the top.

 

[FSH 210 Sport]

Yeah it's in the air by the dry storage in the picture. The drivers are really good though and the scratches appeared all at once and I heard it happen. So I don't believe it has anything to do with dry storage fork-lifting. The arms are not as beat up on the top.

Well when I first looked at the pic I that gouge was on your boat LOL!

As far as your scratches go, itll depend on how deep they are, the gel coat is pretty thick on the bottom of the boat.. at first glance I thought those may buff out. You could get a polishing wheel and use a light cut and see if they will come out..

 

[knoxboatin]

HAHA wow I did not realize, guess I should have called that out. Thanks for the tip, I'm hoping it rubs out but I'm much more familiar with regular paints like on auto or guitar bodies and know how they respond. The gel coat concept is new to me and I don't want to screw it up worse than I am starting with.

 

[Madman]

Looks like most of that would polish out. I’d leave that there as reminder and not do anything until something serious happens. Once you’re over 60, you don’t crawl under your boat without a damn good reason! But then again, I have a KeelGuard on my to-do list that isn’t going to self-install….

 

[drewkaree]

But then again, I have a KeelGuard on my to-do list that isn’t going to self-install….

I have a kitchen sink that self-washes the dishes I put in them, although my wife rolls her eyes when I tell her that this happens. I don't think she believes me. Maybe if you buy the keel guard, and just leave it on the kitchen counter, something similar will happen. Those places are filled with magic and sorcery, that's why I try to leave it to my wife.

I forget who all has some serious experience on here, so if I accidentally tagged someone, sorry. I'm old and forgetful Hopefully some of these guys are the correct people to give you some great advice. To my eye, those seem like they should be able to be buffed out, and it sounds like you've got the tools and some experience - but that experience you mentioned WILL translate to this. I don't know squat about auto paint and whatnot, and I was able to do several unfortunate patch jobs to my boat. So easy, even a drewkaree can do it1

@suke
@MrBubbaGump
@mrcleanr6

 

[Madman]

It really depends on your expectations. I’d start with the least aggressive approach first and then evaluate your next steps. I’d start with a medium fine compound, which I think will remove the appearance of the white scratches and the majority of the damage. If you’re satisfied with that, follow up with a finer grit of compound and light wax. I think doing that will take care of 90% of the damage and you won’t even see the remains imperfections unless you get down on the ground to look at. To fix the last 10%, you’d need to lightly sand the gel coat to remove the scratches, followed by compound.

I had similar scratches on my old boat. I started by lightly wet sanding the area with 2000 grit wet/dry sandpaper. I then used Festool’s polishing system with a foam pad. Their system is color coated, meaning you match the compound to the pad, starting with the most aggressive compound/pad and finish up with finest compound/pad. There are many systems that are far cheaper, but I used Festool’s since I already owned the sander/polisher.