... no matter how hard you try and how well you do it will always look a bit different as time goes by and the angle of the sun hits it different. We moved our windlass & chain pipe location several years ago, I had an excellent fiberglass guy do the repair and paint matching, he did the best he could, also matched the non-skid pretty darn close. On some days you can't tell, on some it sticks out like a sore thumb, interesting how that is ? I had the option of covering the sins with larger base plates & trim rings, with another bead of caulk to maintain, and so on, but chose not to and don't regret that, it's clean & simple. Even though the colors and the fading are different, I simply got in my mind it didn't matter, I'd rather have the slight variations than the obvious cover up. Even if you match perfectly one day, it'll look different the next. It's a boat not a Bentley, and in my case a 27 year old one with a few of these here & there, but she still looks like she she's brand new. I suggest you do the best you can or get someone who's really good and have them do it and then forget about it. My bet is you'll get used to and forget about the color variations sooner than you'll forget about that piece of starboard.

Several years ago we had a shower pan failure in our home bathroom, water got under the nearby 10 year old patina'd cherry floors, stained & cupped them. They had to be replaced with new cherry flooring that was strikingly different than the older, aged wood. I talked to several painter and faux folks about trying to match the new cheery to the old. In the end, I simply finished the new cherry with the same products as I had done the old many years before. For the first year, it bothered me, I'd look at it every day, but less and less. Now I don't even notice it, you can tell if you really look hard but I've learned to live with it and forgot all about it, until now !

Cheers, John