Buffing & Keel Joint.

The glass over our keel joint was starting to look a little shabby, so we decided since the boat was out of the water this winter to go ahead and grind it down and re-glass it. Not a pleasant job, but nothing a grinder and a shop-vac can't fix. It's still too cold at night to do some of the work on it, so it is going to wait patiently until the weather gets a little warmer- but at least it's ready to go when it does warm up.

Then the buffing.

The last time the boat was out of the water, I was working on painting the mast on days where it was warm enough to do any good buffing work- so the buff/wax job was utilitarian, but not stellar. This year I have enough time to really work at it and get it right. I've also found the right combination of products and methods to get a really nice finish. 3M has a nice product selector guide on their website. Let's see: Oxidation + Gelcoat + General cleanup = 3M heavy duty compound with a white wool pad + 3M Finesse-it II with a yellow polish pad + 3M Scotchguard marine wax. The final product is STELLAR!

The Bow:

Before-

and the After (the odd shadow in the gelcoat is the reflection of my ladder and the ground)-

and down the side (note that I'm doing the work in sections to be sure that the compounded and finished areas don't sit for days without a coat of wax to protect them...)

Before:

And the after- you can see the difference of where I have done and not done yet...

Just a couple of quick notes- I found with the Finesse-it that after I was done with the initial polish that if I went back and did a second polish that it really improved the finish. Also, using less of this product at a time is best- I found a dollop about the size of a quarter worked well.

The weather is nice again today, so I'm off to do more compounding/polishing/waxing.