Gelcoat oxidation damage??

[CJK440]

I'm bringing a badly neglected Four Winns back from the dead. The gelcoat was very chalky but it really comes around after hitting it with a wool pad and compound.

What I am facing though is the dark blue gelcoat that is on front of the bow (close to horizontal surfaces) the gel has white specs in it after polishing. Almost looks like white overspray mist. I hit an area with a red scotchbrite and scuffed it up then compounded again and still there.

I'm wondering if these specs are many tiny pits in the gelcoat from oxidation that is collecting compound and appearing white. Also why the gelcoat in this area doesn't pop with gloss like other areas. Does this make sense or should I keep at it? I just don't want to go thru the blue gel.....

 

[AZQCBoater]

Can you post pictures

 

[QBhoy]

Has it maybe went through to the underneath layer ?

 

[CJK440]

I would think of the blue was getting thin there would be areas where the blue is lighter. But the blue is pretty much as dark as the blue that was protected by the pinstripe.

Perhaps when the blue gel was sprayed in it had fisheyes bubbles or pin holes that got backfilled by white and I am cutting into those?

I'm not going to go too crazy and risk irreversible damage. I'll probably go to polish and was as is. You have to be close to notice it.

Just curious as to what I was seeing

 

[crazy charlie]

Based on the irregular border ,it was surely redone at some point and prob had the specs in it from then.polish it up good and then look for a wax kit that probably is not made anymore.it consisted of a bottle of white wax and several small bottles of color/dye in several colors and you mix the color of your gelcoat and it worked pretty good.

 

[CJK440]

Based on the irregular border ,it was surely redone at some point and prob had the specs in it from then.polish it up good and then look for a wax kit that probably is not made anymore.it consisted of a bottle of white wax and several small bottles of color/dye in several colors and you mix the color of your gelcoat and it worked pretty good.

The irregular border is typical all around the boat, it was covered up by the factory pinstripe which I removed. I assume thats how the factory masked the blue off. You can see the "stripe" of solid blue gelcoat between the irregular border and the gel with the white specs.

 

[CJK440]

So after some more interweb research it appears that this is porous gelcoat and the compound fills the pores and looks like white specs. Not really much of a fix other than spraying new gelcoat or paint but I tried a trick that minimizes it. I had a can of dark blue vinyl paint and sprayed it into a paper towel and rubbed it on. It essentially dyed the white specs blue and hides them much better. I'm going to continue my gelcoat buffing and polishing and see how it turns out in the end.