how to buff gelcoat

[hemi ram55]

Hey all. Got a job coming up that i have not done before. Its a guys work truck that has a fiberglass bed on it. The paint is a gelcoat that they normally use on fiberglass. The guy just bought the truck and it was used from another company so he wants me to buff out all the old reminants from the previous stickers that were on it. Is there a special buffing compound i need for gelcoat or do i treat it like normal paint. Also any tips would be great. Thanks crew!

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

If it's oxidized pretty bad then generally speaking, Marine Compounds are more aggressive than Automotive Compounds for two reasons,

1. To quickly chop off the dead, oxidized gel-coat

2. Because gel-coats tend to be thicker than the clear layer of factory paint you have more material to work with with less risk of buffing through the pigmented layer to the underling material.
​

We buffed out a boat yesterday and used Pinnacle XMT 360 Cleaner/Wax as the boat only had light oxidation.

You can get buy with auto products if the oxidation is light but if it's heavy and has been neglected for some time then the fastest way to remove the dead material and get down to a clean, fresh base of material is with a heavy duty compound with a wool pad on a rotary buffer.

Can you post a "before" picture?

 

[hemi ram55]

Yeah il deff get some pictures before hand. Ill see if he can send me some. From what he says the truck was repainted last year so the paint is good, just has some outlines from the old companies stickers. Thats what he wants taken off. Doesnt want the whole truck done just a clean slate for when they put new stickers on it for his company.

If it's oxidized pretty bad then generally speaking, Marine Compounds are more aggressive than Automotive Compounds for two reasons,

1. To quickly chop off the dead, oxidized gel-coat

2. Because gel-coats tend to be thicker than the clear layer of factory paint you have more material to work with with less risk of buffing through the pigmented layer to the underling material.
​

We buffed out a boat yesterday and used Pinnacle XMT 360 Cleaner/Wax as the boat only had light oxidation.

You can get buy with auto products if the oxidation is light but if it's heavy and has been neglected for some time then the fastest way to remove the dead material and get down to a clean, fresh base of material is with a heavy duty compound with a wool pad on a rotary buffer.

Can you post a "before" picture?

 

[hemi ram55]

bump...

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

From what he says the truck was repainted last year so the paint is good, just has some outlines from the old companies stickers.

Thats what he wants taken off.

Doesnt want the whole truck done just a clean slate for when they put new stickers on it for his company.

Strangely enough, after a graphic so some type or an emblem has been attached to a painted or gel-coat surface for a length of time it will leave a physical impression in the surface, usually an outline of the graphic or emblem.

Also, the coating or material under the graphic or emblem may be a different color as the coating or material not covered will become,

• Faded
• Stained

You can usually abrade the surface to remove the faded and stained paint or material so you have a uniform appearance but impressions don't always remove 100%


With car paints, (coatings), you are limited to what you can do by the thickness of the layer of paint and normally it's thin, so there's not a lot you can do if you run into problems.

With gel-coats, (a material and a coating of sorts), it's usually thicker so you can abrade more material off in an effort to remove any uneven appearance in color and any impression left by the graphic or emblem.


Like I tell my son...

"You don't know what you can do until you try"


Or in your case,

"You don't know what you can do until you go out into the garage and start doing some testing"

 

[hemi ram55]

Ok well i did the job and it turned out perfect. Customer was very happy with the results. i plan on doing a full write up with all pictures and procedures i used, plus a list of what i used. hopefully it will help some others that may be in the situation i was in. be up in a day or two. Thanks for the help mike!

 

[Bates Detailing]

Ok well i did the job and it turned out perfect. Customer was very happy with the results. i plan on doing a full write up with all pictures and procedures i used, plus a list of what i used. hopefully it will help some others that may be in the situation i was in. be up in a day or two. Thanks for the help mike!

I definitely cant wait. 50% of RV customers tell me it is a painted surface when in all actuality it is gel coat lol. Have one this week that says it is painted.... but Im almost positive it isnt! Cant wait to see the pics :dblthumb2:

 

[hemi ram55]

My Write up on buffing Gel-Coat!

Ok here is the write up on the job i just did for the gel-coat. The truck was an 06 F-450 with a 10 ft bed and a work box on the back made of all fiberglass.

Objective: my cousin just bought this truck from a previous owner and is using it for his own company he owns. The previous company of course had the truck all lettered up for their own company. When all the previous stickers were removed, they left a nasty outline from being so sunfaded. He wanted all the sun faded spots removed so you could not see the previous sticker outlines.

Tools used:
PC 7424 DA
Orange 5.5 pad
Yellow 5.5 pad
White 5.5 Pad
Red 5.5 Pad
Microfiber towels
Dual spotlights on a tripod stand
Ladder (truck is about 9 foot tall)
My sore and achy arms after I was done :xyxthumbs:

Detergents:
Mothers professional rubbing compound-81132
Mothers professional Heavy duty compound-81232
Mothers professional machine glaze-82332
OPC diluted to 5:5 (half concentrate, half water)

Step 1: A good bath with a power washer and some dish soap.

Step 2: Some OPC, just gave the surfaces some good cleaning because for this obviously being a work truck, grease, chemicals etc... were on through out the paint that a normal bath didnt really clean.

Step 3: After all surfaces were cleaned, I ran my hands across various parts of the truck to check what condition the paint was in to see if clay barring was needed. Turns out the truck was painted about a 2 years ago and the paint was already pretty smooth. Decided clay bar was not needed.

Step 4: I started with some Mothers 81132 and an orange 5.5 pad to see if it was aggressive enough for this truck. Turns out that it did work on some spots, but not all. Worked well on some of the smaller sticker imprints but the larger ones not so much.

NOTE* When using the PC, my personal preference is to put the compound on the pad, smear it across the surface while the machine is still off, turn it to level 3, and work the compound into the paint and pad for about 2 min. Then boost it up to level 5 and go to town. You may all do it different, but its worked for me so far rops:

Step 5: I moved up to a yellow 5.5 pad and stayed with the 81132 to see if a harder cutting pad would help speed up the process. I was finding that i would have to go over the same spots 2 or 4 times to completely erase the imprints. Def a good choice! 1 to 2 times and the imprint was completely gone using the yellow pad instead of the orange!

This is what many of the spots looked like. You can see a lot of fading and a clear outline of the previous sticker

Here is another

The back doors

And the worst one on the truck which was located above the truck cab.

Using the PC 7424 first of all is a gift from god lol. Its a great machine. I used about medium pressure and worked a 2ft long by 2ft wide section for approx. 3 to 5 min depending on how bad the section was. Then i would wipe the area clean again and check the spot tilting and twisting my head at every angle to see if it was clean.

NOTE*-when doing imprint removal, i noticed you have to look close, far, above, below and every angle you can imagine to notice if the spot was completely gone. When you think you got it all, you didnt, check again! There were many spots i was sure i was done with until i looked at it from a new angle and noticed something that i missed. Most of the time i had to look at it with a magnifying glass to really see it. Call me nuts pulling out the magnifying glass but no one will check your work harder than family :dblthumb2:. I would also recommend constantly cleaning the pad throughout the entire job when working with fiberglass. Seemed to really gunk up the pad quickly rather than working on regular paint. I did this by just taking a microfiber towel and pressing it against the pad with my hand while the machine was on.

NOTE NOTE!!!! if using this technique, do this at lower speeds please, you can really hurt yourself if the machine is turned way up. I did this on level 3 on the PC 7424 and it still made my hand tingle for quite some time. Also, this method will only work on the PC 7424 and other DA's cause the pad will not spin if too much pressure is applied, just vibrate like crazy. DO NOT DO THIS WITH A STANDARD ROTARY POLISHER!!!!! Sorry had to put this on there for safety reasons!!

After moving all the way around the truck at about ground level and completing the side panels, it was time for the big hoss on top of the truck. Grabbed the ladder and up i went.

I tried a small section using what i was previously using before, Yellow pad with 81132. Faded it out some, but not enough. So i decided to move on up to the heavy duty rub 81232. This seemed to be the perfect combo for this particular spot.

A pic of me working on it (and yes this was with the yellow pad and 81132 which did not work very well)

So after the outlines were completely removed, i went back and used the Machine Glaze 82332 to clean up some swirl marks that were left over. With the truck being yellow, it did not swirl too badly, only on some areas that needed some heavier pressure.

Now i did not wax all the fiberglass after the buffing only due to the customers request. He was going the next day to have new stickers applied in all the spots i buffed so i saved the sticker company some time by not having to remove the wax when they applied the stickers. I did wax most of the spots after that did not have plans for stickers.

Wax:
I am a big fan of 3M's waxing products so i used them with the red 5.5 pad. Standard wax method, no different procedure on the gel-coat.

All and all this job took me about 8 1/2 hours total time. The pictures below are the finished pictures from above. Same spots, different angles.

Logo was on bottom set of screws

As you can see, no sticker imprints, the yellow has gone from streaky and faded to bright and shiny.

Hope this write up helps everyone out who may have questions or looking to find out some good techniques that worked for me!!! :cruisin:

 

[hemi ram55]

My first write up! Think i did pretty well

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

My first write up! Think i did pretty well

I think you did an AWESOME EXTREME MAKEOVER and and awesome write-up!

:bowdown:


That was a HUGE undertaing... very nice work. You're cousin is lucky you've educated yourself in the art of polishing paint and saved that paint job.


:xyxthumbs:

 

[hemi ram55]

I think you did an AWESOME EXTREME MAKEOVER and and awesome write-up!

:bowdown:


That was a HUGE undertaing... very nice work. You're cousin is lucky you've educated yourself in the art of polishing paint and saved that paint job.


:xyxthumbs:

Thanks Mike! Its a great thing hearing it from a pro such as yourself!

 

[hemi ram55]

:bump2: