I've been gone for a couple weeks, so missed this thread, but since my name came up, I thought I would give my somewhat modified opinion of Penatrol. I originally used the product when I started restoring Tullamore. She was badly oxidized, and my attempts at buffing were not very successful. I read about Penatrol on the Trailer Sailor site and gave it a try. It did give the hull a nice shine, but my prep work was not up to par and the yellow gel coat was blotchy underneath. I had 2 different professionals assure me they could buff it out and it would look great. Both were wrong. They were surprised they couldn't get the oxidation off. I began to suspect the Penatrol. After reading Scott Grometer's comments regarding the Flicka groups discussion, I'm convinced of it. This spring I wet sanded the hull to get down to good color. That did the trick, but I had to change sand paper very frequently as something was plugging it up. I had de-waxed the hull, so it must have been the Penatrol. I belive Penatrol would have been fine to use then once the hull was completely deoxidized, but I decided to try Poli-Glow. Got a great shine. The hull looks like new. I still belive Penatrol will give you a good shine, but do not apply it over oxidation, at least on colored fiberglass. The white topsides looked great with the Penatrol, but I suppose that's because the chalky oxidation was the same color and the Penatrol just made it shiny again. Larry On Mon, 6 Jun 2005 15:04:42 -0400 "Craig F. Honshell" <chonshell@ia4u.net> writes:

It's the miracle restorer alright, Rik! I wonder if it works on the scalp. :-) Actually, you can thank Larry Yake, Tullamore's ( http://www.funtigo.com/MSOG?b=197153&c=1789789&p=start ) caretaker. I thought I recalled some threads regarding "marine" Penetrol versus "hardware" Penetrol, but I've only used what I could find at hardware stores. When I finally get the tarp off my 17', I'm gonna buff out the hull with a good waxless rubbing compound, then Penetrol, then wax. My gelcoat is pretty tired and I doubt I'll get a great result, but I'll do what I can to get the best possible result. --Craig

----- Original Message ----- From: Rick Langer To: montgomery_boats@mailman.xmission.com Sent: Monday, June 06, 2005 9:21 AM Subject: Penetrol

Hey Craig,

I used hardware grade Penetrol, as you suggested. Thanks for getting me started with it. I just gave half of what's left to a friend who was so impressed with the results that he's going to use it on an old Mercedes.

This Penetrol is the Marvel Mystery Oil of fiberglass finishes.

BTW, for all that have been following this hot story, after soaking my roto-till engine with MMO for three winters, it now runs very well. I was using MMO to free a frozen ring that I was guessing caused the low compression. I didn't re-check the compression because the engine runs fine.

Rick Langer M15 #337

Date: Thu, 2 Jun 2005 20:25:28 -0400 From: "Craig F. Honshell" <chonshell@ia4u.net> Subject: M_Boats: Penetrol To: "For and about Montgomery Sailboats" <montgomery_boats@mailman.xmission.com> Message-ID: <003701c567d2$c06c8e20$ce41b3cf@D89X0M51> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"

Did you use "marine" Penetrol, or just whatever you could find at the local Lowe's, whatever?

----- Original Message ----- From: Rick Langer To: montgomery_boats@mailman.xmission.com Sent: Thursday, June 02, 2005 10:03 AM Subject: Penetrol

This is an old thread, but I wanted to follow up on the advice I was given. Yesterday I compounded my very oxidized blue hull. The results were ok but not great. Then I put on a coat of Penetrol. The results are spectacular. Except for the dings and scratches the blue hull looks new. I wasn't able to wipe it off after application because it dried too quickly. Next time I'll do smaller areas at a time. The finish I got is high gloss.

Thanks,

Rick Langer M15 #337 Hudson River _______________________________________________ http://mailman.xmission.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/montgomery_boats