Gel-Coat Verification
 

I am looking at repairing a few scratches in my gel-coat and am trying to verify my gel-coat color. I have a good idea, but would like others to offer their opinion. The attached picture shows the true color fairly well.

As has been reported by others, mini-craft is not able to help verify the color or supply samples, but they are able to mix up the correct colors for these classic Mariahs.

Thank you for your time,

Kris

Re: Gel-Coat Verification
 

I'm venturing a guess it's the "Wine" color, as the only other red color was "Ruby", which is a bit brighter of a red.

PM me your hull ID number, I may be able to get you the exact gelcoat color name from the build sheets. I only have up to production date of January of 95, but if yours was built prior to that time, I'll have the specs!

Re: Gel-Coat Verification
 

We used Lilly (now Valspar) gel coat...it is Ruby Red...You might want to try contacting them.....Also try Wounded Rig in West Frankfort,IL...they have all the original Mariah colors...

Re: Gel-Coat Verification
 

Thanks for the info here..... I am buying a swimdeck and they are making it "Ruby red" So I hope it matches the color of my Red 1997 210 LE. Ruby Red is the color they came up with from my HIN Number and description.

Re: Gel-Coat Verification
 

Thank you all for the information, I greatly appreciate it!

Re: Gel-Coat Verification
 

Bob (drnil73) is our Gelcoat Guru, he worked at Mariah, most likely gelcoated 3/4 of our members boats, and definitely knows his stuff! I knew he'd be able to help! :wink_thumbup:

Re: Gel-Coat Verification
 

So, I was all set to order the Ruby gel-coat from minicraft and it turns out there are two Ruby colors provided and they have different formulas.

They are:

RT643 RUBY/ MARIAH
RT560 RUBY/ MARIAH

If there is no way to know which is the Ruby for my Mariah, I guess I am inclined to go with the smaller number assuming the later years had a higher number?

Please let me know if there is anything that can be done to verify which Ruby was used.

Thank you and have a great day,

Kris

Re: Gel-Coat Verification
 

A quick update on this thread:

Minicraft confirmed that the two Ruby codes were actually the same color, so I ordered the quart paste kit.

I have since completed touching up all the spots where the gel-coat was dinged or scratched over 16 years of service and now I am on to wet sanding.

To my unfortunate surprise, after removing the tape around the largest scratch, it appears the gel-coat supplied to me was too light (or the build sheet was wrong and my gel-coat is not Ruby, but instead Wine). With false hope, I was holding out that after wet sanding it would somehow get darker, but the pictures show that is not the case. They were taken after wet sanding at 400 and then at 600.

Anyways, I still have to polish and wax, but I doubt these will change the color either. Honestly, it still looks pretty good and I am sure after a time or two out it will be less noticeable after the surface is not perfectly clean.

BUT, I am definitely upset after seeing how it turned out, because if the color matched exactly, the touch-ups would be virtually un-noticeable.

I'll probably add a few shots of the finished project when I am all done, including new white pinstripes, but it could be a while yet.

A few things to note:

* Filling a syringe with gel-coat works the best to apply to scratches. Have a few syringes on hand as they only last about 25 minutes before they cure too much to be useable.

* I would recommend starting with 600 grit for wet sanding, as it did the job well enough and makes it easier to get back to a glossy shine. 400 may be required on tougher raised areas though.

* Adding a small amount of ammonia to the wet sanding water helps the process. I just filled a large 90 degree water bottle (think Hockey water bottle) with this solution and sprayed it over the area I was sanding when needed.

Have a good one,

Kris

Re: Gel-Coat Verification
 

Thanks for the update! and sorry it wasn't a perfect match, thats a disappointment for sure after all that hard work.