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A cautionary You Tube post.


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2 hours ago, LadyG said:

Sign of the times, people who have had a nice cushy life, now comfortably off, sit behind their screen sniping at folks who are struggling. If this was your daughter would you feel the same.. I suspect you might, if you are a selfish self centred type of grumpy, but hey, no one ever helped you.... 

I am comfortably off because my 43 year working life was anything but cushy and no, no one gave me anything and i am happy with that. If that was my daughter she would not have bought that boat, this girl had a gut feeling in the beginning that all was not well but she never went with that. Unfortunate situation now but to try and blame a 3 year old survey i dont think is right.

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2 hours ago, john.k said:

I looked at the video,the few seconds actually of the boat,the rust was substantial,to say the least,in fact so substantial........I wondered if maybe the surveyor was looking at a ring in....another boat in better condition.

 

If it was a 'hull only' survey I can imagine the surveyor looking at the wrong boat, but I'd have to imagine quite hard given boats usually have names and numbers on them so finding the right boat would not have been all that difficult.

 

Unless it is called "Kingfisher" of course. Every yard has several of these. 

 

Had it been a full survey, the surveyor would have needed keys to get inside so hard to get the wrong boat then. 

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A very sad story but not at all unsurprising. A hull only survey when the surveyor doesn't look even look at 50%( the inside) came as a surprise to me when I commissioned one for insurance purposes. I am with some others on here that surveys are almost always a waste of time since they don't carry any sort of guarantee. This a particular case with narrow boats where the inside of the hull is difficult to access and do a proper assessment.

Most older narrowboats were poorly built by normal boat building standards and now some are getting towards 50 years old. Most without any proper paint system on the inside and are going to be in a bad state, due to leaks and condensation. Add to that a lack of paint on the bottom and only starting with 6 to 8mm in the first case they are essentially worthless. The cost of strip out, replating (Which will only give a limited life extension unless the old bottom is taken out) and refit is not cost effective unless the boat has some sort of heritage.

I am still not convinced that these ultrasonic testers, on which some surveyors entirely depend, can always distinguish between metal and hard scale on the inside. Those 'old school' surveyors who used a very large hammer to test the plating, and knock all the scale, seem to be a thing of the past. I have come across a number of people who sadly buy a boat without having a clue about the underlying structure only to find they are landed with liability rather than an asset.

I hope this young lady has some success against the surveyor but I rather doubt it. The truth is boating has always been an expensive activity and an old boat at the end of life is hardly ever a good option, unless you the skills set required and the time, and especially at the inflated prices being asked now.

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It appears from the video that the surveyor has a professional indemnity insurance,and she is relying on a payout from this policy......to me this indicates the surveyor isnt a shonky ,and raises the question why he would pass a hull so obviously severely wasted by rust.........you dont need any ultrasonic device to see the depth of metal loss .....As a comparison ,the welded patch plate has virtually no loss,and we assume it was there at the time of the survey.

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11 minutes ago, john.k said:

As a comparison ,the welded patch plate has virtually no loss,and we assume it was there at the time of the survey.

The patch plate is new and has just been put on and that’s all the welder could do as he says he was blown through when trying to weld, as the base was 1mm where he was welding.

Edited by PD1964
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18 minutes ago, PD1964 said:

The patch plate is new and has just been put on and that’s all the welder could do as he says he was blown through when trying to weld, as the base was 1mm where he was welding.

Had that on Fulbourne a few years back. Surveyor identified an area on the bottom to be patched, welder said he couldn't do it as the weld kept blowing through, so we ended up with a significantly larger patch attached to some sound(er) metal.

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18 minutes ago, sarahavfc said:

 

 

Not quite, the owner has owned the boat for 8 years, she has known that it is in need of hull works for some time and her move to land has prompted her to sell the boat. With this in mind she approached me about doing the works on the boat to get it ready for sale. I suggested she had the boat surveyed to understand the extent of the works required, which she did. The works needed are extensive and I advised the owner that the cost would be in the region of £12-15k. Based on this she made to the decision to sell. Both the owner and I have tried to be as upfront and honest about the condition of the boat as we can, which is why we have made the full hull survey available online so that potential purchasers can make a decision with a clear idea of what works are needed.

I would also say not quite as I describe, as you say, your being upfront and honest with the description and the price is fair and you’ll be contactable after the sale. Good luck.

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26 minutes ago, sarahavfc said:

 

 

Not quite, the owner has owned the boat for 8 years, she has known that it is in need of hull works for some time and her move to land has prompted her to sell the boat. With this in mind she approached me about doing the works on the boat to get it ready for sale. I suggested she had the boat surveyed to understand the extent of the works required, which she did. The works needed are extensive and I advised the owner that the cost would be in the region of £12-15k. Based on this she made to the decision to sell. Both the owner and I have tried to be as upfront and honest about the condition of the boat as we can, which is why we have made the full hull survey available online so that potential purchasers can make a decision with a clear idea of what works are needed.

Pleas read that in connection with the post it was in reply too. I fully agree that you are doing nothing under hand, you have put forward the survey and priced it to reflect condition, My reply was  to the interior which looks very good and doesn't reflect the condition of the rest of the boat. The comment was not about you selling it which you are very up front about. This was in no way a criticism of you or the owner, just pointing out how one part of a boat doesn't reflect the condition of the rest.

The post was not made to offend you 

 

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5 minutes ago, ditchcrawler said:

Pleas read that in connection with the post it was in reply too. I fully agree that you are doing nothing under hand, you have put forward the survey and priced it to reflect condition, My reply was  to the interior which looks very good and doesn't reflect the condition of the rest of the boat. The comment was not about you selling it which you are very up front about. This was in no way a criticism of you or the owner, just pointing out how one part of a boat doesn't reflect the condition of the rest.

The post was not made to offend you 

 

 

Not a problem. 

 

I just wanted to make it clear that it perhaps wasn't the best example of a "the seller never to be seen again😂" situation.

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44 minutes ago, sarahavfc said:
18 hours ago, ditchcrawler said:

Here is a good example of that For Sale: Ramble On (nortoncanesboatbuilders.co.uk)

 

Good for them to be upfront but the insanity of spending £15k plus (it always costs a lot more!) on a worn out boat is crazy. Everything else is going to be at end of life after 40 years and you will end up with something, in a normal market, would be pretty much worthless in reality since overplating a hull with holes in it is going to cause inter - plate corrosion and possible plate cracking and welds fracturing. Someone needs to find a field and just put these boats in and use them as low cost housing. If they sunk them into the ground it would keep them warm, stick a on couple of wheels and they could be 'mobile homes.

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1 minute ago, Mike Adams said:

Someone needs to find a field and just put these boats in and use them as low cost housing. If they sunk them into the ground it would keep them warm, stick a on couple of wheels and they could be 'mobile homes.

You have never heard of "the field of broken dreams" at Red Hill Marina then...🙂

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2 minutes ago, Mike Adams said:

Good for them to be upfront but the insanity of spending £15k plus (it always costs a lot more!) on a worn out boat is crazy. Everything else is going to be at end of life after 40 years and you will end up with something, in a normal market, would be pretty much worthless in reality since overplating a hull with holes in it is going to cause inter - plate corrosion and possible plate cracking and welds fracturing. Someone needs to find a field and just put these boats in and use them as low cost housing. If they sunk them into the ground it would keep them warm, stick a on couple of wheels and they could be 'mobile homes.

Glamping pod

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1 hour ago, matty40s said:

You have never heard of "the field of broken dreams" at Red Hill Marina then...🙂

Yes - I moored there for a few weeks once and didn't they have a sell off a little while ago? I've worked on boats in various boatyards doing up boats and you are right and I would estimate some 80% of these project boats never get finished. In the good old days they were mainly wood and would just end up on the bonfire but now the steel and fiberglass ones hang around forever. Labour and materials are so expensive now and borrowing money(if you can) so cheap that it makes no sense to buy a worn out boat.

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A couple of weeks ago the brokerage phoned me about the survey the, then, prospective purchaser had payed for. All was as expected until they read the part about the large rust hole where the cabin side met the gunnel, estimated at £500 to repair. It was the drain from the former gas locker, now used for general storage, and still needing a drain.

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Whilst feeling sorry for the owner of 'Ramble On' the survey report surely would suggest fixing all those issues is not an economically viable proposition?

 

A shame given in other respects its a tidy looking boat inside but effectively it needs a whole new hull?

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Perhaps that is because it is pure iron. The non-iron metallic constituents of modern steel, that, when including recycled steel, can include traces of other metals that cannot economically be removed during recycling, are liable to support  electroytic corrosion cells that do not form in pure iron.

Edited by Ronaldo47
typos
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30 minutes ago, Ronaldo47 said:

Perhaps that is because it is pure iron. The non-iron metallic constituents of modern steel, that, when including recycled steel, can include traces of other metals that cannot economically be removed during recycling, are liable to support  electroytic corrosion cells that do not form in pure iron.

 

Oddly, it's almost the opposite. The iron in wrought iron is usually pretty pure, but the material is a composite. The iron forms fibres (stringers) through the structure, with each fibre surrounded by silica. The silica, being an oxide, is completely impervious to corrosion and protects the iron fibres from exposure.

 

By contrast, mild steel has no protective structure. It is true that poor homegeneity in a steel melt does lead to electrolytic cell formation and the more complex the steel, the more likely that is to happen.

 

Alec

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