horror of horrors

[sonny1]

cleaning under my rib i noticed 2 smallchips in the hull which are about the size of my finger nail. the white surface has been chipped to reveal a dark sub surface probably no more than 2mm deep. i suppose something has come up off the road when travelling . now i can build you a house or cut a complicated traditional roof but this is outside my comfort zone . can you put your heads together and point me in the right direction, what should i do?

[sonny1]

Your hull is fibreglass with a gel coat coating. It will be the gel coat which is chipped. You can buy some gel coat and paint it into the chips. If you put more in the chip than you need to fill it (so it stands proud of the hull) then you can flat it back with some progressively finer wet & dry and then polish it with T-Cut.

[sonny1]

thanks chris ,sounds easy. where do i buy gel coat,do i build it up in layers, how do i coulour it ? ps i dont do " buying online"

[harrison]

Hi sonny,

As Chris said, just a chip in the gel coat. Easily repaired so no worries. Loads of vids on YouTube for how to info.

Might be easiest to get a tin of gel coat and hardener from Barnet Marine, as they’ll know the correct shade of white to match your hull.

[Roy54]

@sonny1 That's a bummer mate , just as a sub note ,a lot of the guys, myself included, fit a sacrificial sticky back keel tape ,on the keel to help protect it from grounding . I think it was about £50 for 5 metres. Sounds a lot until you see a gouge in it and realise it could have been your gel coat! When I did mine , I ran it from just above the waterline to about a foot past the lowest point of the bow. You can get more expensive keel strip which is thicker but I understand it's a bitch to fit.

[PeterM]

Not a great feeling , but in all fairness fairly standard in owning a small RIB. You can get white gel coat filler - ready to go in a tube from most chandleries. Exactly as Chris Described - work it in and then sand it back to level & polish up - and you'll never know .

[sparerib]

Gelcoat repair from any chandler, mix it up slap it on sand flat bob is your proverbial etc.....easy repair