Gel coat still tacky after a few weeks? What are my options?

[Trooper82]

I asked this in my thread but got no responses....hoping someone can tell me what it is I need to do...


I mixed plain white gel coat at 2% mekp added 1% surfacing wax..mixed these quite well with a mixer...laid it down using a 9" mohair roller...seemed to go on quite thin...it has been 3 weeks now and the surface is still a bit sticky...as in if I sit on it, I leave parts of my jeans behind...

What do I need to do to fix this?

Thanks for any help!

 

[Scott Danforth]

Re: Gel coat still tacky after a few weeks? What are my options?

try spraying with PVA

 

[ondarvr]

Re: Gel coat still tacky after a few weeks? What are my options?

At this point there is nothing you can do to make it tack free other than put on another layer.

Some newer low emission gel coats don't cure as tack free on the back side as the older high styrene versions did, so this sort of complicates things. Many times the supplier won't know if it?s a low emission product, so there may be no way to tell.

With all gel coats sometimes the wax doesn't come to the surface before the gel coat cures, most of the time this is from doing the work in direct sunlight or if the surface is too warm.

If you leave it the way it is it will continue to collect dirt until the sticky surface wears away, but it will still look dirty for a long time.

You can add more wax than before (2 to 4%) and do a test sample to ensure it will cure correctly, you can also try spraying PVA on it right after finish applying it. if it still won?t cure tack free you?ll need to get another batch of gel coat.

There isn?t much R&D done on making gel cure well on the backside because 99.9% of it is used as an in mold coating, not like a paint. It just happens to work well most of the time when wax is added, it?s not really designed to though. Duratec clear can be added to help with the surface tack if needed.

 

[ondarvr]

Re: Gel coat still tacky after a few weeks? What are my options?

Sometimes threads get long and many things are discussed other than the technical aspects of the project, when this happens many of the people giving advise don't have time to read through the many pages of post on topics they may not be able to help with, so they stop reading and responding. Not a good thing, but it happens.

 

[Trooper82]

Re: Gel coat still tacky after a few weeks? What are my options?

Thanks Scott and ondarvr.

Can I just give it an acetone wash, new layer of gel coat and spray the pva? It sounds to me that you are saying I will have better luck with the pva.

 

[Trooper82]

Re: Gel coat still tacky after a few weeks? What are my options?

Sometimes threads get long and many things are discussed other than the technical aspects of the project, when this happens many of the people giving advise don't have time to read through the many pages of post on topics they may not be able to help with, so they stop reading and responding. Not a good thing, but it happens.

I fully understand and no worries.

I will just edit the post in my thread to point here to the solution

 

[ondarvr]

Re: Gel coat still tacky after a few weeks? What are my options?

Thanks Scott and ondarvr.

Can I just give it an acetone wash, new layer of gel coat and spray the pva? It sounds to me that you are saying I will have better luck with the pva.

I would just put another layer over what's there, no acetone wash, the surface is still sticky and the new gel coat will bond well to it.

Do a test panel and see which works better for you, wax or PVA. You can use both, but what typically happens when PVA is used over wax is the PVA beads up and does nothing, but it doesn't hurt.