Shipyard blog-6 !!!
These pages are designed to share the work in progress on the shipyard. They cover the work that needs doing to restore and convert our lightship. We decided to do some work ourselves, and leave the "heavy work" to the shipyard people who are much more capable than we are with steel work and such. On these pages you can follow our progress and frustrations...
This blog is split into several pages now, since it took too long for all those pictures to load at once! For the previous one click HERE. For the next page click HERE. Enjoy!
By the way: feel free to leave comments on our project HERE!
28 May 2010: The Chippies are almost finished with the living room and will move to the bathroom next. The ceiling, like in many other rooms, cannot be replaced yet since the fire alarm system needs to be installed first. This contract covering the fire alarm, intruder alarm, and CCTV systems, has been awarded today to Force-3 Security and they will start soon. In the mean time, Adam and John wired the main training room (see Adam way up the ceiling) and the girls are on a inspection mission of all the boys on board..
27 May 2010: My sister Elly flew over from Holland to view the ship and have a good time on the top-deck together with Agnes. Of course we could not allow that so with a new red coverall we set her to work to paint the blocks for the life-boat and the stairs to the fog-horn. Well done Elly! And.. we noticed two MCA guys in a little boat paddling for dear life.. O dear..
24 May 2010: Yet a new member on the team! Rob started with tiling the wall of the shower room. Not easy with these heavy natural stone mosaic tiles but it starts to look great!
21 May 2010: Summer has arrived in Sharpness!! Temps went up to 25C during the afternoon. So after a hard days work, it was time for a group photo with well earned ice-creams in hand! From left to right: John, Lee, Agnes, Mark and Adam. During the day, Steve and John fitted the solid teak kitchen doors and dishwasher. It starts to look fantastic! We are now waiting for the delivery of the freezer, fridge, and top for it all to be completed. And who are these two naughty boys behinds that new treatment room-2 door?!? The sun brings out the best of people, right?
19 May 2010: Although it has been a while since the last update, a LOT has happened on the ship! In fact it was so busy that I simply couldn't get myself to do the updates; shame on me.. Anyway, Lee and Mark made excellent progress in the treatment rooms. All walls are (sound) insulated and boarded up. The doors are made to fit the original frames and will be installed on Friday. In the mean time, the cabinets for the galley have been installed by Steve Potter and John. Over the next couple of days, the teak doors will be fitted. Agnes made great progress painting the hallway to the big training room, and our electricians are going strong as well. Here's John pulling cables for the shop area, and Adam was found almost inside one of the galley cabinets for wiring the connections for the dish-washer.
5 May 2010: The final work on the training room floor has been completed. Mark and Lee placed the chip-boards on top of the floor-heating system and all that's left is the carpets to be fitted. But for obvious reasons that will be done only at the last minute.
4 May 2010: Today the floor heating in the training room was installed at last. On top of the 50mm insulation that we put on the steel floor yesterday, another 38mm layer with a profile for routing the pipes was installed first. With it's blue colour, it looked like Lego-Land! On top of that, metal sheets with groves were put down where the actual pipes were pressed in later on. These metal plates ensure the heat is transferred to the flooring. It was amazing how fast it all went: it actually took more time to get all the stuff from the van into the training room then to install it!
3 May 2010: Despite it being a Bank-Holiday Monday here in the UK, we were back at it today at 8am! Over the weekend, Steve and Adam had cleared the engine room floor so that we could put the 50mm floor insulation boards down. Mark made sure they all fitted and he sealed them with tape. We discovered we had to raise the old switch panel of course to accommodate the raised floor. I had to do a lot of welding jobs as well: making brackets for the panel where the floor-heating manifold will be installed tomorrow, and a support for the switch panel. Not much space behind the panel as you can see!
30 April 2010: The treatment rooms walls are going up in a fast pace. The wood's grain is looking great and it hasn't even treated yet; looking good! We also started preparing the old engine room for the installation of the floor heating system next week Tuesday. So out came the old bilge pumps. Adam has finished wiring the cabins. New boxes with wires appeared everywhere!
28 April 2010: Our Chippies are working their way through the treatment rooms. The first panels went up and although it may look simple, have a look at the curve of the hull on the right hand side! They even had to cut around the rivets, a very precise job indeed. Next, one of the original door frames was made to fit. As mentioned before, we try to re-use as many original features as possible to preserve the atmosphere of the ship. It takes time, but will be worth it at the end. Lee and Mark prove to be a golden team for sure!
23 April 2010: This week we also saw the arrival of a new team member: our Sparky (electrician in ship's terms) Adam! He has strange working methods.. rips ceiling plates down and before you know it, cables dangling down from it.. Adam is a great guy and will work in the cabin area for a while to pull new cables. Needless to say we couldn't use the original 110V DC cabling anymore!
22 April 2010: Summer is here... I hope it's a temporary slow down of work Agnes!
21 April 2010: The foam crew was back again, for the third time! They finished the treatment rooms, the shop, and the last bit in the engine room. An action photo of Tony applying the foam, and Ian cleaning the wooden struts afterward. In the mean time, Mark was working on the new teak frames on the outside of the wheel-house. Marc and Lee are an excellent team of Chippies who worked together on the outfitting of the famous Queen Elisabeth-2 (QE2) luxurious liner. Only the best will do! ;-)
18 April 2010: We LOVE the weekends on board! Nobody around to ask questions, so you can do some work YOU want to do ;-) Today I removed a redundant vent pipe from the deck above the galley, welded a plate on top of it and cut a new hole in the deck above the cabins corridor with the plasma cutter. I then welded the vent pipe onto the deck, and voila: a new vent!
14 April 2010: LOTS of activities on board! The Galley and Heads floors have been tiled and grouted. And the foam crew is back as well. They started foaming up the bilge of the new training room and then moved to the treatment rooms to insulate the walls and ceiling. Our chippies made racks into the storage rooms for the stacking of containers. Yesterday we lowered the boiler for the central heating and hot water way down below into the ship. Today, Dan and Chris installed it on it's new foundation. In the mean time, I was testing my new plasma cutter on deck. This little machine cuts through steel like butter. I had it running on our Lister generator that you can see on the left.
12 April 2010: Graham and Nick are making great progress throughout the ship. One of the first projects was to level the floors of the treatment rooms. The floors are on a slight slope upwards but had all sorts of irregularities in it from previous attached / welded bits and bobs on the steel floor plates. So we tried (wait for it..) self-levelling compound on a sloping floor to smoothen it all out. With Dragon Alpha cement across the docks, we had plenty of supply! With that job behind them, Graham and Nick are now on a tiling mission in other parts of the ship.
7 April 2010: Who is that way up on the dome of the tower?!? It's Jan, installing bird spikes. The upper dome proved to be a perfect vantage point for seagulls. And although we like those birds, we don't like their droppings! Sorry guys!
6 April 2010: A very busy day today! At 8am promptly, a concrete pump arrived on the quay side to pump extra concrete into the bow section of the ship. Last year we already pumped 16 tons into the ship to compensate for the weight loss of 3 full length of anchor chain and we thought we had the ship level. However, in drydock we discovered we were still not correct with the water-line. So an extra 16 tons was added today to bring her level. The first pic shows Graham guiding the concrete hose onto the bowels of the ship. A big concrete pump on the quay side pumped all the stuff down. Agnes in the mean time was preparing the tiles for the shower-room. These natural stone tiles need to be made water-proof before they go onto the walls and floor.
2 April 2010: Lots of work on the new wheelhouse: Dan and Mattie worked on a new ladder to the walkway around the fog-horn. Agnes is back to her good old painting routine attacking the inside steel with primer so that Lee can fix the window frames for definite next week or so.
26 Mar 2010: The lightship is back at the quay side on her new mooring system. We had loads of people lined-up to start various jobs: Lee has completed boarding up the shower room and is continuing with the wheelhouse. Mark is on board restoring the blocks of the life-boat. And yesterday a new company joined our team who started to spray-foam the steel walls from the inside. This foam will prevent condensation and obviously helps with the insulation of the various rooms. The Heads, living room and bathroom were completed. It's a Willy Wonka scenario: it looks like candy against the wall!
23 Mar 2010: The ship is back afloat! This morning, Steve and Mattie opened the gate valves to let the water pour into the dock. Slowly but surely the water level rose and the ship started to come off the blocks. Many checks were done during this process on the ship, last but not least to check if no water was coming in! But everything looked fine. Agnes was observing the event from a comfy chair.. In a way it was fun seeing the draft markings at the bow and stern slowly disappearing under water. Tomorrow we will be towed out of the dock, and the ship will take her old spot at the quay side for the final part of our refurbishing journey!
22 Mar 2010: THE SHIP HAS BEEN RENAMED!! With the flooding of the dock imminent, we performed a proper renaming ceremony today. Agnes said "We rename you Sula which means Peace. That everybody who enters the ship may find Inner Peace." Whilst Steve had a watchful eye, Jan smashed the champagne against her hull. Click on the first picture to see a short video clip of this event! With all the dock work being completed, she looks brand new and is ready to be re-floated tomorrow.
13 Mar 2010: No weekend for the wicked or for Lightship owners! We were up early again to collect our floor tiles for the Galley and Heads in Bristol. SBS was out during the morning as well to do some more painting. In the afternoon, Jan took the "cherry-picker" to do plate thickness reading on the port hull. (see pictures) The ship is in tip-top condition with plate thickness readings well above the required values. She was built to last and it shows!
12 Mar 2010: The fog horn on top of the wheelhouse got painted and Barrie installed two retractable units to the port side of the ship to keep us from the quay side wall once we are moored in Gloucester. Steve Brain welded the contraptions in the workshop over the past couple of days and it was nice to see it all connected to the ship. AND.... we decided to go ahead with painting the hull in it's final colour! Our lightship looks like new.. just as she must have been 51 years ago. The 2'nd coating will go on tomorrow!
11 Mar 2010: Today was taken by another fashion photo-shoot by Superdry. They have used our ship several times now and they loved the look of the bow and stern section of the ship at dock level. As always, it caused a bit of a stir from the male population in and around the shipyard! (Sorry Steve!) but everybody was well behaved. Mattie got an extra treat: he got an "action-shot" with one of the models! Lucky guy...
10 Mar 2010: All the way at the top of the light-tower, bright new red paint was applied. Before we knew it, the whole tower was covered in familiar red once again. And not only there, little red spots appeared all over the ship! A strange picture indeed. Lee, our "chippie" also returned onboard and was preparing the original window frames to go back into the new wheelhouse. The shipyard is putting every effort in to the final jobs as preparation for re-flooding the dock early next week. Lots of hard work going on!
8 Mar 2010: An exciting and colourful day indeed!! The SBS painters applied some of the red top-coat to parts of the hull. A strange view it is: parts of her are in the bronze primer, parts are black and now bright red spots appear everywhere! Dick practiced his "Picasso" skills with painting the draft mark numbers at the bow and stern. Barrie has welded struts to the hull to hang-off the anodes later on. This construction allows us to inspect and replace them in years to come without the need to go back into drydock. Overall a busy but successful day, thanks guys!
5 Mar 2010: With the ship in drydock, we will do a full plate thickness survey of the hull. The first picture shows Jan planning the many points where the ultra-sonic equipment will be used next week to take the readings. Lots of activity on board as well: a new man to our team is Graham who started levelling the floors of the Galley and Heads. He does a superb job: you can almost play pool on it! (as long as we are in drydock that is of course..)
4 Mar 2010: Flushing the engine room is still ongoing but it seems like it's going to work. Hopefully no more nasty whiffs in the future training room! In the mean time, SBS has started to apply the special under water coating to the hull. This thick black stuff is not only protecting the steel, but prevents growth to attach to the ship once back in the water. Dan and Matty are nearing completion of welding up the old stern access door.
3 Mar 2010: With the painting going strong, all hands are on deck to complete all little welding and grinding jobs. Barry is finishing up the repairs on one of the keel fins, Dan is cutting and welding on deck and Matt is grinding away as well. Can they keep-up with the painters though?!?
2 Mar 2010: We now have a bronze / golden ship!! The weather is kind to us so the spraying went fast, all around the ship. Click HERE for a short video of the spray-painting of the hull. It's a strange sight indeed, especially the 3 anchor cable entry points at the bow! Next, the waterline was marked (see 3rd picture). After we are ready with all work at the hull below the water-line the new black special paint will be applied that will protect the hull from growth.
1 Mar 2010: Painting is in full swing now! The superstructure and the tower were covered in bronze primer before we knew it. The old paint on the dome of the tower had to be removed by hand since it was too dangerous to get the high pressure blaster close to the glass. The weather was fine, so no complaints from the guys up there! Then the painting of the hull started.. It goes so quickly with the spray-gun! At the end of the day, the ship was almost completely covered. Some wide-angle pictures of the whole ship tomorrow!
26 Feb 2010: We burned two extra holes in the engine room area of the hull to drain the oily water that has been bothering us for a while now creating the unpleasant smell in that room. It took a while for it to slowly drain out. We will start flushing the engine room bilge on Monday. Today, my good old friend Geoff came along again to see the ship in dry-dock. He was well impressed with the shear size of the ship, only to be appreciated when you stand on the dock floor. Note the newly shaped rudder in the background. They cut the curved section off; see previous blogs. AND... the painting has started! The ship will soon be covered in bronze primer! More pictures of that next week.
24 Feb 2010: Barrie and Steve kept on welding away on the hull all day regardless of all the other activities. Our ship was built the old fashioned way with welded steel plates riveted to the ribs of the hull. There are THOUSANDS of these rivets and they all need to be checked to see of there is no gap between the plate and the rivet itself. If there is, they need welding to seal them. For a ship her age (51 years this month!) she has very few rivets that need attention! But with so many of them, it's still a lot of work. The guys also welded clearer numbers on the draft markers at the bow and stern. Good work indeed! We have now removed all bilge plugs to allow the bilges to drain. There are quiet a few of them! Nice brass plugs protected by a doughnut shape piece of steel. We just need to ensure they will be re-installed one by one before we flood the dock again...
22 Feb 2010: Blasting has returned... Not much left to do though, so we should be out of the noise within a day or two. In the mean time, Chris started to fit some of the central heating radiators in the cabin area. We selected old-style looking column radiators to match the original ones that were fitted before. They look great against the dark teak wood!
21 Feb 2010: The blasting crew had the weekend off and how quiet it was indeed! But no stopping work on the light-ship though. With the paint being gone, every weld and every rivet is inspected one by one. With some water in the bilges, you can spot the problem areas where the water is coming OUT rather than water coming in later on. We found one little crack in one of the welds. Not bad for a 51 year old lady! So Barrie and Steve (yes... another Steve) started to weld on the hull. We think the welding will take several days. No stopping the shipyard crew!!
The previous blog page (click HERE) Enjoy!