Merits of preserving gelcoat?

Once the finish is worn to the point that it doesn't look good any more, paint the thing. I see no benefit in keeping the "original" finish if it's worn. These cars are all about doing what you want with them and having fun. Al

Speaking of Gelcoat, I was driving on the highway today enjoying my Speedster when a dumb *ss cement truck driver did not like me doing just 70 mph in the right lane, so he decided to pass, went over a bump, and left me a nice paint chip on my hood from the small piece of crap that flew off his truck. Grrrrrr!!!

Are there any nice and tasteful decals or emblems that can be put in place to coverup the cement truck's kiss? I don't know if I want to go through bringing it to a body shop, leaving my car there and whatever else. When I asked Kirk about touchup paint, he said there was none, and it would have to be computer matched.

Any highway where trucks are found, I find it best to keep the fast lane, but just make sure you do not block traffic flow, otherwise you get everyone trying to go around you and they get back into the slow lane. This happens even if your going at a good clip, you know, they just have to pass you, and then they come back in the slow lane 5 feet in front of your nose and send you a nice stone fest. Inevitably, they slow down to the same speed or lower than what you were doing and the dance starts again.  my 2¢ Ray

The gel coat is fairly thick.  Chips can be filled with a boat colored gel coat repair kit. It is hard to touch up and blend in a painted area though.  The "orange peel" can be gently wet sanded out and the remaining gel coat polished.  Key is gently with 1200 or finer WD sand paper and then an orbital buffer to bring back the shine.

 

It also saves you $1200-2500 - the cost of a non-MAACO paint job.

It just kills me, because now this is the only blemish on the car. The paint was flawless.
No more highways for me. Going forward it's going to be local streets, back, and side roads.
I don't want to mess with the paint so I was hoping there was some sort of a little custom sticker, racing thingy, whatever, to hide it. That may look just worse than just letting it be, or just trying to touch it up with the closest possible red, like Porsche Guards Red. Like they say, "the first cut is the deepest".

Other than bragging rights ("Hey!  Look at that!  Original Gel Coat from 1988!" I can think of no good reason to try to preserve the finish of gel coat if it's beyond starting to lose it's luster.

 

Gel coat can be pretty thick and it often can be brought back from near death by the usual wet-sanding with 1600-2000 and then buffing back the sheen.  Find a good boat dealer near you and ask the guys out back what they use to bring boat gel coats back from the dead - they can do absolute miracles at times with the right products.

 

But if it's gone beyond that (and the color coat is wearing out/through in places) then just bite the bullet and get it painted.

 

Oh!  and I was heading to Gloucester a couple of months back to a local 356 meet and one of the guys arrived with a serious ding in his hood on an otherwise gorgeous, original '60 356B cabriolet.  He said a brick fell off of a bridge undergoing reconstruction.  I would have liked to hear THAT chat with Hagerty.......

Someone here vinyl wrapped their hood with a flowing black and white race finish flag.  Looks sharp and protects the rest of the hood.  Sorry couldn't find picture - think it was a West coaster?

 

There soon will be a lot of FREE political posters you could adorn you car with.  Express yourself!  

Steven,

 

I urge you to reconsider your plan to limit use of your replica, in order to avoid paint damage in the future.  Of course, we all have a differing level of personal involvement with our cars, but, hopefully, we can all agree that "drive 'em" is our motto.  These cars are meant to be driven, not garaged.  Hope you can get over it and move on.  There are lots of touch up paint kits available on line that work well.

So many touch up kits, so few exact matches.

No vehicle shaped like a 356 can get away from stone chips.

And bras help but Nothing is able to keep things perfect, even in city driving a guy spins a bit you get hit with a stone, life is NOT perfect, sorry, drive it, drive it drive it    

That would be Larry Bull aka labull.

 

I've been told you can take your car to NAPA and they have a color reader they take out to your car and use it to read the paint color then mix you a small amount for touch ups.

 

Otherwise see if MAACO would do that.

Steven if you an OEM paint color go here.

 

http://www.drcolorchip.com/

 

or here.

 

http://www.langka.com/

 

Good one - LABull! He has no fear driving his car.

 

And then, after many rock chips he gets to change the flag due to it looking like swiss cheese ....    Actually it looks good on an outlaw.  

 

On the other hand, I have bubble wrap for you to try out... you might need sun glasses due to the glare. 

 

 Here is an artsy shot of the hood. The wrap has worn well. Some have had the clear material put on the front and behind the wheel wells. It's time to the car painted as the finish is getting tired and time to make the car all one color again. Paint chips are aggravating.

 

 

Larry

 

I like the checker hood look, but I might just try the NAPA paint custom mix idea to keep it more original as a minor touchup. The Dr.Chip works well but getting a match would be difficult.

 

What really hurts is that the speedster is relatively new, only 900 miles, and I paid a premium for the exceptional mechanical and cosmetic condition it is in. No bandaids will work unless it has Micky on it. I do drive this Speedster like my other Porsches, just that it was so flawless until today. Sh*t happens, but I'll survive.

Gelcoat in good condition is more durable than a painted surface. NAPA and other body shop supply houses has the color camera that can formulate an exact color match...I have done this for chips and also did an entire hood in paint 

 Thank you. Now that's what I wanted to hear. 

If you do not want to leave your car at a paint/body shop to have the hood chip repaired why not just remove the hood and take it in instead? I had a similar incident with the Cobra about 15 yrs ago while following a dump truck in Seattle...a fist size rock came off the truck and hit the hood, leaving a pretty good sized ding and paint chip. I just pulled the hood off and a friend of mine and I repaired/repainted it. The body shop will more than likely pull the hood off anyway so they do not have to mask the whole car off.

 

Ever thought about the fake 'bullet hole' stickers to put over the ding?...LOL, they do work to cover dings.

Good idea on bullet hole stickers. East Coast Bruce's cling vinyl racing bubble numbers might be another cover up.

I want to get paint jobs where you do, Paul. Nice ones are WAY north of that up here.

Sherwin-Williams Paint stores can match any color with you bringing in some parts off your car or drive it there and they can use their device to photo it, then see what their computer shows.  I don't know if my spelling of the paint place is correct, but close enough. I know, in Texas, they are everywhere and sell really good quality paints.  I got some to match past cars, in a spray can and cost me $15 for one spray can, but that was cheaper than having some paint shop try to match and paint the rock chip.  Fiberglass is easy to work with. My gel coat on my CMC is not pretty and I will try the 1500 sandpaper, maybe, after some buffing with light buffing compound.  They sell that as O'Reilly stores and it comes in different grids or grinds , depends on how bad he paint is.  My the way, if anyone followed my past rant about my new purchase of this unfinished speedster kit, it was advertised as Fibefab, but decal on the firewall inside the front hood by gas tank area, clearly shows the CMC label.  The man had no idea what he was selling.  Brand makes little difference to me. It's an old body, never finished and seems rather thick on the fiberglass.  There are some small surface star cracks, but I think I can fix those.  Yes, matching up old paint , you need the latest computer system. O'Reilly auto parts also can do a match with a sample of your car's body.  They can come out to your car, in the parking lot and use their device to get somewhat close to matching up the color.  Modern tech stuff, just amazing.  I stay far away from pickup trucks, construction trailers, dump trucks and garbage trucks.  But, one day a small stone flew from across the highway, some fifty or more feet from my car and I watched it hit my windshield on another car I owned at the time and you feel so powerless and cannot move out of the way, to avoid that "tossed" stone.  Right in front of driver's view and scared me.  I now stay away from the inside or fast lane, due to that one event.  Take the hood off and bring it to the repair shop, really good suggestion.  I had some touch up done recently on my non-kit car and they kept the car in their dirty paint and body shop for one week. Even with a wash job, there was body dust everywhere I am still cleaning from the interior and other areas of that car.  Body shops are dirty places.  Good luck with the chip repair. I like the idea of keeping the paint close to the gel coat color.  If you get a chip in the paint job, under it, is about the same color. 

MAACO... As I have now and then, to save some money, do your own prep work , take the car to MAACO  bargain for the best price for one of their upscale jobs,  THEN...talk to the actual person that will be doing to paint , hand him some bucks asking him to do it up right !

I've lost a couple of windshields (not speedy) do to other vehicles kicking up a rock. Seems like slow motion each time and not a damn thing you can do about it...

I don't know if anyone has posted this suggestion, but if you do your own body work, with fiberglass, one can mix the paint with the fiberglass resin, the stuff which makes the fiberglass hard and NOT use the fiberglass on small chips but just brush on the resin with paint mixed in and you can fix small chips and dents in fiberglass . I used to do this all the time with surfboards. It's all fiberglass, same stuff. Just need to match the color of your speedster and that's that.
Try this sometime on a spare junked piece of fiberglass to practice. If it works, you know that might be a low cost and easy way to fix small chips.

---George K. ---

George- Are you saying to mix automotive paint with resin? At what ratio? (1-1, 2-1, etc)

Sorry, don't recall the ratio.  But, not joking about this.  Ask any body shop doing boat repairs or fiberglass repair or surf shop and see if they have a ratio.  I was doing this about 45 years ago, so memory is gone.  You know, think about this.  Surfboards don't have paint on them.  What you see is the paint mixed with the resin or they apply the paint, then put clear resin over it.  I said, for very small chips, I think this would work.  ----   I guess you guys, 1,000 miles away from surf don't have any surf board shops close by you.   I would have problems knowing anything about snow skis, but hate snow.  It always looks better in pictures.  You get the idea I am not a cold weather person. Stay tuned and I am going to try to post updates on my speedster complete build, which I started today.  --George K.--

Evercoat and others make gel coat repair kits with coloring agents - targeted for boats.

 

http://www.boatbandit.com/ever...z9N8Su4icaAvN38P8HAQ

 

Thank you, see not kidding. ----George K. ---

If you can't get an exact match, keep it on the lighter side (less noticeable) 

I ended up calling a body shop, who referred me to a body shop supplies store, who scanned the paint  while I waited, and provided me with a half pint of touch up paint. All for $30. The scanner is connected to a computer that searches the entire Dupont database and other auto paint databases, and then provides the closest shade of red, along with an update to the formula, that is mixed while I waited to create the closest match possible. That worked for me.