I am rebuilding my best friends Bell Fusion. I am good at woodworking and with building/repairing things. I have build one cedar strip canoe and several paddles. He gave me his canoe and said to just do whatever I wanted to it. I build new seats and a thwart. I am sanding the gunwales and getting ready to install the seats. The hull has many normal surface scratches and a few "dings" that are down to the fabric. My thought now is should I repair the hull or leave it. I do not want to add weight to it. Can I simply put epoxy over the "dings" and then sand and varnish the whole thing to make it look new again? There are 7 "dings" ranging from pea size to dime size. If I'm going to redo the hull should I go all out and do the gunwales too? Pix of gunwales are before and after sanding. Thanks for your opinions.

I had similar repairs to make to a Bell Blackgold Northwoods hull a few years ago. I chipped out the excess around the damage, put some epoxy in there, and taped over or Saran wrapped over the epoxy. It turned out great. I have some pictures of it in my photos on my profile. It was easy and turned out great.

Also, if the rest of the gunwales look that good I'd just oil them up and move on.

That's going to be a great boat!

Those look like just chips in the gel coat. Fix as amhacker22 did but skip the varnish. That boats in TOO GOOD OF SHAPE, no varnish needed, IMO. On carbon you will never get that factory finish, it will ALWAYS look like you painted over it. Remember to put a screwdriver on those gunwale screws, amazing how much they can loosen up over time.
CB


amhacker22, no pictures in your profile

quote Cedarboy: "Those look like just chips in the gel coat. Fix as amhacker22 did but skip the varnish. That boats in TOO GOOD OF SHAPE, no varnish needed, IMO. On carbon you will never get that factory finish, it will ALWAYS look like you painted over it. Remember to put a screwdriver on those gunwale screws, amazing how much they can loosen up over time.
CB



amhacker22, no pictures in your profile"

Sorry, it's in the photo journal as "Northwoods Gelcoat repair."