Home

Diary and photos

Design and spec

Related Links

I'd like to thank everyone who has emailed me in the past year with all the very positive comments about my website. My site has proved quite popular with approximately 1,000 hits a month (I lost track of the exact numbers when I moved to a new web provider, hence the new hit counter).

Some of you have been asking me when the next diary update would be. Until today, the last update was back in December. I've now remedied the situation with this and two backdated updates. You will also notice that the whole site has been re-structured for ease of navigation and that it has a professional new look. I have to thank Chris Ridgen for the her excellent suggestions that helped a great deal in putting the new site together. Enjoy.

The freezing conditions over the Christmas holidays caused light surface condensation on the uninsulated areas of the hull around the water tank. This in turn caused corrosion so in March we took the tank out and re-painted the steel in rust inhibiting primer. With hindsight, I should have got this part of the hull sprayfoamed with the rest of it. The best way to insulate this area subsequently ourselves seemed to be to sprayfoam it using cans of PU foam from Screwfix. I could barely move under the front deck and so Heather did most of it.it:

An initial coat had to be smeared on to ensure a good seal and adhesion to the steel.

A reasonable finish was achieved by spraying a single layer of foam on top of the smeared coat. When trimmed back it actually looks quite neat. A word of warning though - it was a horrible job. If you're fitting out and having sprayfoam, think carefully about what to get done.

The first bit of final panelling is in with halogen downlighters. Looks smart.

This is Uisce preparing to be lifted out. There's been quite a lot in the press recently about new boats corroding prematurely. Mine seemed to be rusting badly in one or two areas too so I thought I'd better do something about it.

There's nothing electrical installed yet so I know it's nothing to do with that. The paint that was on it was International Intertuf and was applied by Reeves just over a year ago onto untreated steel. We then added a couple of coats on top. As you'll see from the following pictures, a lot of the Intertuf below the waterline came off using only the pressure washer.

The accepted reliable remedy seems to be sandblasting to remove scale and provide a surface key followed by epoxy pitch... so that's what I'm doing. It's expensive initially but it should last significantly longer.

I phoned International to ask about their VC epoxy pitch and came away mildly confused about what I needed to do and how much it would cost. I don't think I was asking the right questions but I then phoned the supplier of the paint for Uisce's topsides, Newguard Coatings. They offered to come and take a look and have since been able to recommend a two pack coating system that didn't seem too expensive. They also advised me on how to go about applying it.

High and dry.

Disgusting gunge - like something out of Star Trek. Note the orange blisters. These were distributed all over, with the largest on the underside of the baseplate. I'm intending to paint the baseplate - hence the trestles. As Uisce is on a river, the bottom will not be scraping along canals so it shouldn't wear off too quickly.

Cleaning off the gunge with a pressure washer.

The worst section cleaned off. Note the brown waterline and the silver grey colour covering much of the immersed steel. I believe the latter is plating from the anode.

The now pitted anode.

A close-up of the waterline rust. Not too bad. In fact, I was pleasantly surprised by the condition of the hull. I'm glad I had it lifted now though.

Next jobs are to scrape the remainder of the blacking off. Then it'll be sandblasting and painting...