The clear is normally sprayed over a color coat or base coat. I used it to redo my mast and beams on my Mystere. It came with the powercoated white finish which was peeling badly. I removed that and used an etching solvent on the aluminum and then cleared the mast and beams. No other primer. You don't need to prime a gelcoated surface to spray Imron.

I still think Gelcoat is the best. You can use gel putty first to fill and shape and then spray with a preval.

PVA is a parting compound which is sprayed on a mold prior to lay up to help in releasing the part. Sort of a water based wax. Some people will spray it over gelcoat that doesn't have wax in it. This has the same effect as gelcoat with wax.

A little on gelcoat. It's normally used to spray into or onto a waxed mold. Obviously you want the glass layers to stick to the gelcoat,so you would use gelcoat that has no wax. It remains tacky after it has cured so the glass will adhere to it. If you ever tried to put gelcoat without wax on something and then tried to sand it you'll know what I mean. It's impossible to sand. With the addition of wax or sanding aid as it's somtimes called the gelcoat surface cures hard allowing it to be easily sanded. One thing about gelcoat with wax is it needs to be sanded between coats and I recommend useing a wax remover before recoating.

So knowing that, when I spray gelcoat I do the repairs with gel putty and I don't bother to even sand the the putty. I leave the excess there and then decide how many coats I want to spray on. If it's three coats then I will put the first two on without wax and then on the last coat I put the wax in. Then I sand and shape.

I don't use PVA as a curing agent. Since it's put on after, if the gelcoat starts to kick before your ready you can wind up with spots that cure hard and spots that don't.

Paint is easier to spray and you get a finished product when your done. Gelcoat requires some sanding and polishing depending on how nice a finish you want.

If you want to talk about it PM me here with your ph# and I'll give you a call.