I'd suggest seeking out Tony Condon or Steven Leonard and picking their brains. Between them they have a lot of practical experience doing worklike refinish projects with relatively simple tools and processes. Also, Bryan Evans can give you some good pointers, he probably built your ship in Zimmerman's shop.

Of course, it all depends on what the current condition is and what you're trying to achieve. But assuming that you have a lot of cracking and checking gelcoat, typical basic steps a

[Warning: I am not an expert. I have done this exactly once. It turned out OK.]

* Sanding all the bad gelcoat off, probably all the way down to (but not into!) the fiberglass (this part I've done on several gliders back when I was young)

* Inspecting the inevitable un-logged repairs to make sure they are not dangerous

* Spraying the glider with a primer/filler such as Duratec (we use their vinylester primer on the HP-24s; good stuff)

* Sanding the primer/filler smooth and wave-free up to 220 grit (you want it that rough so the finish paint has some texture to stick to)

* Getting your favorite car painter to spray it with a seal coat and three wet coats of Toyota White acrylic urethane. They'll tell you they can do it with a fog coat and two light coats, because they're spring-loaded to try to conserve expensive paint while keeping orange peel and finish work down to a minimum. But the difference is that a Camry or Lexus doesn't need laminar flow. Get those three wet coats and pay extra if you have to, tell them it's OK if there are a few runs.

* Wet sanding the urethane 800 grit almost to the bottom of the orange peel, then on up through the grades to 2500, using primarily diagonal strokes and progressively smaller sanding blocks. On the leading edge you'll carefully use a diagonal half-strop motion, always working with one grade finer grit than the rest of the wing. It's too easy to sand right through the finish paint on the leading edge.

* Buffing and polishing with a rotary polisher, taking care to angle it so you always sweep off of trailing edges, never onto them. You can tear up a control surface or surface cover really badly that way.

* Always judging your work under sunlight, never under fluorescent lights. Fluorescent photons are the cruelest, they show every tiny flaw.

--Bob K.