Buff or Paint?
 

When do you think you should paint the gel coat a V20 vs. buffing it?

try and save the gel-coat finish . paint is only 2-5 mills thick and gel-coat can be as high as 15-20 mills. now you could do a lot of sanding on that surface but be careful around edges. providing you are not repairing any chips or scratched areas you should be able to save your gel-coat. start out with 400 or 600 wet sand paper. then go to 1500 and finish with 3000. then compound and polish.
ok here is the deal buy a 3m or finesse kit a little costly but well worth it!!!!!!!!!!!! you get the 1500 and 3000 on a Velcro pad along with the proper compound and polish. yes you need a 6 inch orbital sander. read and follow instructions from kit and you will be happy to see what you did.
when you start sanding only go till the surface is clean and smooth. stains or very light scratches could be removed safely. then use the polishing kit available from a auto body paint supply store. good luck take your time experiment on a small area first so you get the hang of it then go from there.:nice:

Mine is not that bad just has lost it shine, it is a 1989 v20 sport.
I have a HF 7'' polisher so I though to give that a try but not sure what the best suff to use with it.
Has any one use a product called "shine on" they say you won't need to buff if this product is used.

I have a friend that just bought a boat with black gel coat, the thing was almost white!! To coats of a coarse compound and a buffer then 3 coats wax and that thing looks like brand new!
NO TO PAINT when ever possible!!

Not sure what product "Shine on" is but any product where you supposedly wipe on and wipe off aint gonna do it....

Please use this product, buy good variable speed buffing machine from Harbor Freight
Use the 1000 grit first and follow with the 2000 you can expect to see results beyond your expectations.
During my restoration I was determined not to wet sand the Gel coat, I did not here is what the results were, it remove the orange peel and came out excellent.
I personally did a lot of reading and found this product I will recommend no other.

Here is the web site http://www.aqua-buff.com/

Here is a before and after shot using this product ...

how much aqua buff did you use?
is 16oz enough to do a v20 sport?

Another question is the floor is grey in my sport 20 would that be paint or gel coat? I have some patching to do so I didn't know if it would be better to just paint after my repair work.

Yes it should be enough..I use both 1000 & 2000...

NYMACK's gelcoat looks great, I saw it in person.

The floor of my 86 cuddy is grey gelcoat.....when I redid my gas tank hatch I wanted to wet sand a few old holes that I had filled from some cooler brackets that had been screwed down....if yours is like mine the problem was the wet sanding took down the non skid on the floor which stood out alot....you may have to paint it if you want to keep the non skid texture.

During my restoration I use Gel Coat simply because I had a lot left over, Just before the Gel started to get tacky I shot it with "Glass Beads" using the same spray gun. It finish the Deck with the consistency of may be a 150 grit maybe? soft on the feet and perfect for traction.
Here is picture of what it looks like on the Gel...

I used 3M Fiberglass Restorer and a varible speed buffer I bought from Sears. I used a wool pad with the 3M polish to remove most all the oxidadated gelcoat then a terrycloth pad and some cleaner wax that gave me a brilliant shine. Wash and rinse well between each application. Be careful using the buffer, don't hold it too long in one spot, keep it moving. Also fill a spray bottle with water and mist the surface you are buffing AT ALL TIMES! I got instructions and tips from my neighbor who has owned a bodyshop for 30 years and is the best I know of. After I rebuilt my transom he color matched the paint and sprayed Emron clear over it with outstanding results.