Re: spraying gel coat
Do you want to gel coat it to learn how, or do think it will cost less and be easier than painting?
To re-gel coat the hull it would be best to flip it over, because sanding upside down is no fun and will take about 4x as long, but at least on the hull you're sanding large somewhat flat areas.
To do the deck it can be a nightmare to sand around all of the details and contours, so look forward to many hours of sanding and raw finger tips.
Cost wise, gel coat and paint (depending on the type of paint) may be about the same up front, but after you spray the paint you're about done, after you spray gel coat is when the real work and additional cost begins. Good sand paper is pricy and you'll go through a bunch sanding the gel coat and if you sand through, you need to respray that area.
For a rookie spraying gel coat can be very difficult, the main reason is that you don't have much time after you add the catalyst to get the entire batch sprayed. It may only be 15 minutes or less until it gels and even less time in the heat of the summer, so people tend to destroy their spray gun when it cures in the pot. With paint you have a very long pot life even with two part products.
Gel coat also needs more air (CFM and possibly pressure) when spraying than paint does, so if the compressor can't keep up it slows down the process causing more problems.
Respraying a small area isn't that difficult with gel coat, resparying an entire boat is a huge project.
