View Single Post
Old 05-06-2014, 02:06 PM   #7
Mike Phillips
 
Mike Phillips's Avatar
 
Status: Director of Training
Join Date: Apr 2013
Posts: 675
Default Re: How to wetsand, cut and buff a gel-coat boat

Sealing the Gel-Coat

After polishing the hull the next step was to seal the hull. For this we're going to machine apply the Marine 31 Gel Coat Carnauba Wax + Sealant.


Craig
Here's Craig pouring some wax directly onto the face of a soft, blue foam waxing pad attached to a 5" DA Backing Plate on a Porter Cable 7424XP.






Speed Setting
For machine applying a non-cleaning finishing wax, you don't need nor want the fast speed setting but instead just enough speed to maintain light pad rotating and that's just to make it easier to move the pad over the surface. For the Porter Cable this would be the 4-5 speed setting.






Mark you backing plate
Always mark your backing plate to make it easy for your eyes to verify that it's rotating. This is more important when compounding, polishing and using a one-step cleaner/wax than it is when using a finishing wax like we're using for this project.





John's turn...
Hey when you fly all the way from India and show up at Autogeek's Show Car Garage I'm going to put you to work.







First a quick lesson on correct machine waxing technique...





Your turn!





Meanwhile back on the farm Chris takes a Selfie...





Wax on - Wax off!
After letting the wax fully dry it's time to carefully wipe it off....












Remember the sides of this boat were WHITE with zero reflection when we started!








To help your memory....


Water Spot Stains & Oxidation
Not only is the entire hull filled with holograms from the misuse of a rotary buffer, (the normal practice by most boat detailers), the gel-coat is also oxidized and covered with water spot stains.






__________________
Made by boat people for boat people...
Mike Phillips is offline   Reply With Quote