DaySailer.org Forum

I am taking a 94 sunfish Daysailer down to gel coat and refinishing the hull. Found it interesting that gel coat was applied to the bottom but not the sides of the hull. In stripping the barnacles and bottom paint off I found good gel coat across the hull up to the waterline. Very definite line from bottom to side then only paint on primer and fiberglass. Deck is good gel coat.

Now that is very weird! I can't imagine how that came about. It's hard for me to believe that that would be original, as it would be much easier to manufacture the usual way using gelcoat. I also can't imagine why anyone would strip the gelcoat on the topsides above the waterline. Quite the mystery you have there.

The gelcoat on mine had tiny cracks all over. Somebody had painted it without taking care of the issue. All the cracks printed through the paint. I can imagine someone giving a boat like this a radical treatment by grinding off all that gelcoat. When I refinished it, I decided to spend the time to enlarge the most visible cracks and fill them. Then I used an epoxy coat and fairing compound on top of that. So far, no indication that any cracks have survived.

I have no idea what the cause of the cracks was. Some were localized and clearly related to some damage. Looked like a bullet hole from a '22 (rather inexpertly patched). But mostly they were all over without pattern so I think they must simply have been shrinkage.