The £10,000,000 Sunken Boat Restoration Problem

Added: 2026-05-30

[00:00:07]I've got some good news and some bad news.

[00:00:10]The bad news is I can't get the right diameter pipe to go on the nose of my rudder.

[00:00:16]The good news is... And there we go.

[00:11:18]That is the inside of the new rudder.

[00:11:24]All we need to do now is just put the skins on them.

[00:11:28]And I don't think that's going to be as easy as it sounds.

[00:11:31]The best way then to put the nose on here is to cut some pipe down the center.

[00:11:38]So you've got a semicircle.

[00:11:42]That can go over the tip. In order to do that The pipe would have to be 70 mils in diameter, and I just assumed I could get 70 mil diameter pipe stock.

[00:11:53]It turns out you can't.

[00:11:55]I can get 60 mil and I can get 76.

[00:11:58]But I'm told if I want 70 mil, I have to get cold drawn steel which is much more expensive.

[00:12:04]In actual fact, it was about £230 plus VAT to have it delivered to the local stockholders.

[00:12:11]I considered it, but that's a lot of money.

[00:12:13]Buy cheap, buy twice. Probably!

[00:12:16]But I bought a load of 60 mil, which is a little bit too small because it was only £35 So I’m down at Milford Steel again just waiting for them to cut the steel So I get it in the back of my car.

[00:12:29]I've asked for 1.5m strips, but it’s 7.6m long, this steel pipe that I've asked for.

[00:12:38]It's not quite as big as I wanted.

[00:12:41]I've had to go for 60 mil, and I really wanted 70 mil.

[00:12:45]So we've got a bit of work to do on that.

[00:12:46]But you can't get 70 mil, not without paying an absolute fortune.

[00:12:50]So we'll make do with the stock stuff and see if we can figure it out.

[00:12:57]I made a little template just to have a look, and it does look a little bit tight.

[00:13:02]You've got an inside and an outside that represents the thickness of the pipe.

[00:13:07]And on the outside I can show you here.

[00:13:13]We'd cap to about here.

[00:13:15]So it's not much of a tip.

[00:13:16]And the inside if you look at the inside diameter it’s similar down here because that goes on the outside and meets under here.

[00:13:26]I can do two things, I can either just slim the profile down a little bit, which is doable.

[00:13:33]That's fine.

[00:13:34]There is some tolerance in the maths to be able to do that.

[00:13:38]Or we can try and widen the pipe, which I think might be challenging.

[00:13:44]So I think we'll try widening the pipe first and slimming that down second.

[00:13:48]I think it's going to be a combination of the two, to come up with a profile that fits. Let's see how we get along.

[00:13:55]I'm not hopeful, but let's see it warts and all.

[00:18:28]What I've been doing to be making these rudders is I've been making them one at a time.

[00:18:31]And the reason behind that is that all the learning points from making the first rudder, I can apply to the second rudder.

[00:18:38]if I do them at the same time, I make the same mistake on both rudders.

[00:18:42]Okay, that's the nose on one.

[00:18:45]Let's get the nose on the other one.

[00:20:03]All right, so just to help me line this up.

[00:20:06]I've got this pole here that goes up there.

[00:20:11]That's nice and straight.

[00:20:13]And I've just put this elastic between.

[00:20:16]And the idea is I can make sure that it's centered then.

[00:20:20]And it just helps me line everything up.

[00:20:22]Because I can stand back and I can line up the nose, I shall call this, with the pipe.

[00:21:43]Right.

[00:21:44]That's the nose cone on the second one.

[00:21:46]A few mistakes made.

[00:21:48]A few essons learned.

[00:21:50]Which is what it's all about.

[00:21:51]Let me show you the lessons that I learned.

[00:21:53]The first lesson was when it came to Ade and I drilling out and boring out the profile's. My fault, definitely not Ade’s fault.

[00:22:04]He just did what I asked him to do.

[00:22:08]The first thing I did was we bored a hole in this end plate, and, of course, that's supposed to be capped off Not a big problem.

[00:22:18]I've got a better solution, but I could have just welded that up or welded a little circle into there The second problem that I did, and I did try and stop this from happening, but... This was the first rudder that I actually built up with the frame.

[00:22:36]It's the second one that I put the nosecone on and I learned from this one.

[00:22:41]The second one went much better, but... If you look.

[00:22:47]That's not straight.. And I did measure up.

[00:22:50]So I think it is when I welded, it distorted and I didn't check it before I did this welding on the top.

[00:22:58]The next thing is alignment. Alignment is important.

[00:23:02]If we don't align these properly, then we end up with a twisted rudder.

[00:23:07]And I spent a lot of time lining up the vertical spacing of these, which is less important, and more luck than judgment.

[00:23:14]I managed to get the alignment right on these.

[00:23:16]I had relied on this eight mil bar here to align the back of the rudders, but in retrospect, that's not thick enough because it's quite flexible.

[00:23:25]And it wasn't perfect.

[00:23:26]If I did it again, I'd probably use 10 or 12 mil bar to line it up.

[00:23:29]But I'd also pay more attention because what happened was this top one is not aligned.

[00:23:36]I don't know whether you can see, as we look down, this is off kilter.

[00:23:44]And a few of the others aren't perfect neither, but they're within what we can work with when we actually put the skin on and do a little bit of grinding.

[00:23:51]The top one I can't.

[00:23:52]So there's three mistakes on the top.

[00:23:55]We've got a hole where we don't need one.

[00:23:58]We were on a slant, and we're twisted.

[00:24:02]Luckily it's just that one rib, and luckily it is the top one.

[00:24:07]That's easy because what we can do is we can just chop it off here, which I'm going to do, and then we'll make another rib and we'll just put it on the top and weld that to It.

[00:24:17]So we managed to save ourselves with that.

[00:24:20]Luckily I learned that mistake as I went along.

[00:24:24]And on the second rudder I made sure everything was in line.

[00:24:28]A few people have mentioned making a jig.

[00:24:30]That would have been a good idea.

[00:24:32]A bit complex for me.

[00:24:33]I think maybe, certainly a bit complex for the small area that I've got.

[00:24:38]And the final error.

[00:24:40]Again, it was when we were drilling was we drilled this hole for the eight mil bar.

[00:24:46]But of course that was in line when that was flat.

[00:24:49]And when we bent it, it was out of line.

[00:24:51]So it doesn't go through there.

[00:24:54]That's not a biggie. We can weld that up.

[00:24:56]But in retrospect, I would have been better off not even putting a hole in that at all.

[00:25:00]So a few mistakes were made.

[00:25:02]But part of the fun is rescuing it.

[00:25:05]And I think we're going to manage to do that.

[00:25:07]You can see how out of line that is now when we look from the top, because that's lined it with the other ribs and that needed to go that way.

[00:25:17]This one's fine, but I don't know.

[00:25:22]We've got this hole in the top.

[00:25:24]If I’m making one, I may as well make two.

[00:25:27]Same plan, and just replace that top.

[00:25:29]And then we’re 100% Well, there we are.

[00:25:35]It's hot today. Shouldn't moan.

[00:25:38]Everybody's out in the paddling pool today.

[00:25:39]I can hear them, all the kids splashing around, and the dogs are barking. They’re all out too, What's pretty miraculous is they actually turned out to be the same size.

[00:25:49]That's incredible.

[00:25:51]Next job that we will be getting on with very soon, is the top of the rudder - this... Do you remember this?

[00:25:58]So this is going to need a good old clean up.

[00:26:05]We’ll strip the paint off this.

[00:26:07]Clean it in here.

[00:26:08]Clean the keys up. The keys were left on the boat, and they’ve got a bit rusty.

[00:26:15]That's my fault.

[00:26:16]Leaving them on the boat where it's a bit damp, The good news is we've got permission to do hot works.

[00:26:55]What an absolutely glorious day.

[00:26:57]Look at that.

[00:26:58]Summer's here already, I knew it would come on a weekend.

[00:27:01]I'm on the iPhone because I forgot the battery for my camera.

[00:27:06]I brought my camera with me down here at the boat and the battery's flat. I keep spare batteries, but they're in the van.

[00:27:13]I didn’t come in the van today, so I'm just going to use the iPhone.

[00:27:17]I've only come here temporarily, I’ve come down because we've got some good news and that's we've got permission to do the hot works.

[00:27:24]We have to get a daily permit, from the office every time we do hot works. But that's fine.

[00:27:30]So a couple of prerequisites are: better public liability insurance. I’ve had to have public liability insurance for £10 million, which cost me extra.

[00:27:38]There's nothing around here that's worth £10 million. I’m not sure. why it needs to be that high But anyway, 1£0 million public liability insurance, which has cost me nearly £500.

[00:27:50]Anyway, it's been approved.

[00:27:51]Thank you very much to the guys at the Marina that helped sort that out.

[00:27:55]So we had to submit a risk assessment to make sure I’ve thought about fire safety.

[00:28:00]It is all about fire.

[00:28:02]It's about things catching fire here and causing problems to the marine around me.

[00:28:07]There's nothing here.

[00:28:08]There’s nothing to catch fire.

[00:28:10]But anyway, because I have a risk assessment.

[00:28:15]Obviously, I've got to follow what I've suggested in the risk assessment.

[00:28:21]And part of that has been about fire control.

[00:28:24]We've had fire extinguishers anyway.

[00:28:26]I think we've got enough on the boat.

[00:28:27]We've got water, but, the fire extinguishers kind of work.

[00:28:33]They're in the green, but the dates are old, and I'd probably end up having to send them away for testing.

[00:28:42]But by the time you send them away for testing, you may as well have bought some new ones.

[00:28:46]So I've got a couple of fire extinguishers, a new fire blanket as well that are brand new.

[00:28:51]And I'm just going to stick them in the boat for the time being.

[00:28:54]Right? Heck of a contrast in here.

[00:28:56]Beautiful sunshine outside.

[00:28:58]It's all cool and shady in here.

[00:29:00]Which, for those of you that live in a hot country, is probably lovely.

[00:29:03]But for those that live in, cold, wintry West Wales, we like the sunshine.

[00:29:09]Anyway, let's get these fire extinguishers up, and then I can carry on with the rest of the rudders.

[00:30:09]So we've got a fire extinguisher here.

[00:30:11]We've got a fire blanket here.

[00:30:13]We've got another fire extinguisher back here.

[00:30:16]And right at the end. Up there somewhere.

[00:30:19]Can you see it? It's another fire blanket.

[00:30:22]We've got the welding fire blanket here just for extra protection.

[00:30:26]We've got the water.

[00:30:27]We've got the bucket.

[00:30:29]We've got the risk assessment.

[00:30:31]We've got the welding dude.

[00:30:33]So we're all set to go.

[00:30:35]The one thing I haven't got, though, is my welding apron.

[00:30:38]And this is the third time now I’ve forgotten it, and the reason behind it is - it's locked up in the storage container there, and the keys are in my van.

[00:30:48]And because I haven't been coming down here working, I've been driving around in my much nicer car, and I've got here to get the welding apron and realized the keys are back there, the same place I've left my battery for my camera.

[00:31:01]I apologize for not having my apron.

[00:31:03]We'll have to get that next time.

[00:31:06]I also apologize for a very short video this week.

[00:31:09]Look, I prefer to get you something out there than nothing at all.

[00:31:12]Sadly, I have to work all week and that's from Monday.

[00:31:17]I set off on Monday, and then I come home Friday afternoon.

[00:31:22]So by the time you watch this video, which will be this short, I'll actually be driving home, making my way back home, ready to make some more content for next week.

[00:31:31]In the meanwhile. Thanks for watching.

[00:31:32]Don't forget, please hit that subscribe button.

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[00:31:37]Hit the hype button as well and I'll see you very, very soon in the next video.

[00:31:41]Thanks for watching. Bye for now.