Hello. In addition to working on my first generation Commander, a 1953 35'er, I am also restoring a 1970 23' Lancer and I want to paint the boat and match the original gel coat color. And even though Lancers were built in the newly- aquired- by Chris Craft Thompson Boat plant in Cortland, New York, The white Lancer gel coat seems to match up to the gel coat on Commanders from this time period in both color and consistency. This is my second Lancer and the gel coats rub out really well considering their 36 years of use and abuse. On my other Lancer I was pretty lucky, after rubbing it out and waxing, you couldn't set a paper McDonalds cup on the curved surface near the edge of the deck without it sliding off and it had a minimum of gouges and etc. I bet that new boats from other builders won't be able to say that 36 years from now! Unfortunately the "new" boat has had previous owners drilling too many holes in the deck and hull structure and it has too many dock rash gouges for a simple buff out and wax to make it serviceable again.
So, I am wondering if any Commander Club members have ever painted any parts of their boat to match the original gel coat, and if so, what type and color of paint did they use? To me it seems like the gel coat color is a really nice white but not- quite- white shade. It almost reminds me of the color of a white sand beach or something rather than a pure white. Under certain lighting conditions you would almost think it was a light tan or beige. But in direct sunlight it definately looks white. On the Lancers I really like the way that the original gel coat coloring and the bright red deck stripes and boot top stripes really compimented each other. Then on the first Lancer, copper bottom paint really made it all come together. So if anybody has any ideas about color matching the Chris Craft gel coat, please let me know. I'm not too sure that my new membership registartion is all set up correctly, but I can be reached at Mechanicer@aol.com. Thanks.
Bret Kiddey
Kent, Wa (Originally from the Lake Erie Island area near Sandusky and Port Clinton, Ohio and missing it terribly).