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Purchased a boat that's been out of the water


Dobhair chú

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Very new to boating. Please be gentle! I've probably made a huge mistake but it's too late now 

 

I recently purchased a 1972 Springer 38. It's on the side of the Canal. It seems okay except the floor needs replacing due to rainwater coming in. The hull looks to be in good nick. Needs blacking but not very rusty. I'm planning on bringing it over to Ireland (there's not much to choose from here.) 

I will be going over to fix the floor and install a new bilge pump to make sure she doesn't sink (obviously my biggest concern). Do you recommend getting more than one bilge pump? 

 

The engine is said to be in working order but I honestly don't know anything about how to check that. I'm wondering if there is any way to check that the boat engine is sound before lifting her in the water.  Obviously the crane is going to cost an arm and a leg. Some I'm wondering if it makes sense to hire the crane here in the UK and lift her into the canal and make sure she's running or if it's better to lift her in Ireland. I'm going to have to pay for the crane twice onto the lorry and then off into the canal here in Ireland and I'm trying to avoid doing it three times if possible. 

 

Any advice? 

(Aside from turning back time)

 

Thanks so much! 

 

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19 minutes ago, Dobhair chú said:

I'm planning on bringing it over to Ireland (there's not much to choose from here.) 

 

Are you talking Eire, or, NI ?

 

You WILL find that you will have to pay VAT on your purchase price, and, on the price of the freight if it is going into Eire.

 

You MAY find that you will have to pay VAT on your purchase price, and, on the price of the freight if it is going into NI (depending on if NI is still viewed as being in the UK or the EU for boat importation)

 

Have you got a 'certificate of location' for the boats location at 11pm on 31st December 2020 ?

 

(Redacted) Examples of ours :

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Screenshot (1568).png

Edited by Alan de Enfield
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1 minute ago, Dobhair chú said:

Very new to boating. Please be gentle! I've probably made a huge mistake but it's too late now 

 

I recently purchased a 1972 Springer 38. It's on the side of the Canal. It seems okay except the floor needs replacing due to rainwater coming in. The hull looks to be in good nick. Needs blacking but not very rusty. I'm planning on bringing it over to Ireland (there's not much to choose from here.) 

I will be going over to fix the floor and install a new bilge pump to make sure she doesn't sink (obviously my biggest concern). Do you recommend getting more than one bilge pump? 

 

The engine is said to be in working order but I honestly don't know anything about how to check that. I'm wondering if there is any way to check that the boat engine is sound before lifting her in the water.  Obviously the crane is going to cost an arm and a leg. Some I'm wondering if it makes sense to hire the crane here in the UK and lift her into the canal and make sure she's running or if it's better to lift her in Ireland. I'm going to have to pay for the crane twice onto the lorry and then off into the canal here in Ireland and I'm trying to avoid doing it three times if possible. 

 

Any advice? 

(Aside from turning back time)

 

Thanks so much! 

 

Before you waste anymore money, go over the hull with a ball pein  hammer with particular attention to the water line where they rust and the extreme bottom fold of the hull which gets worn away.  Be particularly observant on the area just behind the rear bulkhead where the door is, the lifting stop will go there and I have seen them crush because they are thin. Give it a good thump, like you were breaking ice, if it dents or sounds dull it is paper thin and you need to sort it before you sink. It will only have been about 4 or 6 mm thick to start with and your insurance will demand that it is 4mm ALL OVER for comprehensive cover. Check the stern where the rudder hits the transom, they frequently wear through.

 Has it already been overplated?

What engine? Need that information at least to assess how you can proceed.

Bilge pumps will not stop it sinking no matter how many.  Once the battery is flat, down it goes.

Without being nasty I would doubt that such a boat is worth spending the transport costs to Ireland.

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Maybe try it on eBay?

It may be a bargain. But likely a money sink.

Can I just ask, why did you buy this boat, most people would buy a glass fibre cruiser at the sort of money I am thinking about.

Have you asked in the boatyard?

Edited by LadyG
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I intend on getting a new battery as well. There are a few leasure batteries already but i think it's wise for me to get another battery or two. I don't know if it's a money sink but it was 9000 pounds and anything in Ireland of the same size and shape can be well over 30000. It's too late now anyway. I'll go over it will the hammer for sure. It's a BMC black taxi engine. 

I took out a loan to restore it for 20000. I assume I'm going to have to probably gut it anyway and i think I'd probably have to do that with anything i could afford here in Ireland as well so i figured it makes sense to go for the cheaper boat in the UK. It's 4-5 grand to ship it over but there's much more available in the UK for my price range. 

14 minutes ago, Alan de Enfield said:

 

Are you talking Eire, or, NI ?

 

You WILL find that you will have to pay VAT on your purchase price, and, on the price of the freight if it is going into Eire.

 

You MAY find that you will have to pay VAT on your purchase price, and, on the price of the freight if it is going into NI (depending on if NI is still viewed as being in the UK or the EU for boat importation)

 

Have you got a 'certificate of location' for the boats location at 11pm on 31st December 2020 ?

 

(Redacted) Examples of ours :

 

 

I know about that VAT. It's a kick int the teeth alright. The purchase invoice is going to be low and some paid in cash. It's going into the Republic of Ireland. 

 

 

 

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Screenshot (1568).png

 

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Just a word of warning - be VERY careful about the declaration of your purchase price and ensure you have a PROPER official Bill of Sale, otherwise you will be paying VAT & Duty on what the 'local value' the Customs place on the boat - you could end up paying VAT based on a £30,000 boat (if that is what you say is the local equivalent) as well as the VAT on the freight.

 

Even at £9000 purchase price + £5,000 shipping (I could get boats here from the USA for less than that) you'll be paying over Euro 3000 in VAT

UK VAT is bad enough at 20% but 23% in Eire must be very painful.

 

When I was loking at bringing boats into the EU you could bring it into any EU country and you only paid the VAT Rate at that 'point of importation' and it was then free to travel to anywhere within the EU. The 'best' country was Croatia with a 5% VAT rate (But, it has now gone up to 25%)

Edited by Alan de Enfield
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OK, assume you like the boat, you want to keep it, and even if you don't keep this one, you will end up with another one.

 

Travelling to and from the boat is going to be a big cost whilst it's still in England, you don't sound like you have a lot of knowledge to draw on and it is going to be difficult to build up contacts in the short term just to get it sorted out. In your situation, I would look at getting it to the right country asap. I would do as Tracy suggests and do your own hull survey with a hammer, not regarding that as definitive but because you will get an idea of what you are going to need to sort out so you can then start lining up the people you will need locally and also, equally importantly, because if it is paper thin and in need of serious welding then it is not worth 30k locally so you will have a much stronger case for the lower valuation to base the tax on. Bear in mind there are three general sorts of hull deterioration to be looking for - pitting, which is localised corrosion, where the surface has become rough due to areas dimpled inwards in an otherwise reasonable thickness piece of steel - these dimpled areas can be very thin, to the point of only being rust left; local wear, as Tracy has indicated, particularly on corners (I have a vague recollection that on Springers, in addition to the locations Tracy has mentioned there is also a vulnerability at the transition from sides to bottom because they don't have the normal slightly projecting baseplate, but I could be wrong on this), where it can wear right through; and general loss of section through a combination of wear and corrosion, where the steel sheet can still look smooth but is now a lot thinner than it should be. If you have the first two, these can be dealt with more easily (and cheaply).

 

I would assume that you are going to need work done, so I wouldn't start by lining up craning into the water in Ireland. I would start by lining up craning onto a site where first you can get a proper survey (and book a surveyor) and then the work can be done. If you are lucky, you don't need too much done and there is a boatyard in the right area which will take on the work. If you are really lucky they also have a crane. That way, you can get it craned off the lorry by them, surveyed, the work done and signed off by the surveyor and then they can crane it into the water. If you need rather more work done, this could become a bit long-term. I would then worry less about whether your welding repairs are done by someone who normally deals with boats. Canal boats are a really simple structure made of simple shapes so if you have a general fabricators around with the capacity to take it on, that might work out cheaper, so long as they do decent quality work (go from asking around on reputation, and visit them to see whether their welds look like neat, smooth lines of beauty or horrible snotty things make to look presentable only with a grinder). There are two general approaches to weld repairs on canal boat hulls. Most people use overplating because it is quicker, cheaper and less disruptive to the interior but the other option is to cut out and replace. If most of the work that needs doing is in the area of the damaged floor, I would rip that out first and get any work in that area done by letting in replacement material rather than overplating. If you are gutting the whole thing, you could consider this approach all over - one to discuss the pros and cons of with your chosen welder. While you are at it, I would also be exploring the options for having the whole thing blast cleaned and 2-pack epoxy painted inside and out (I might even explore the costs of having it metal sprayed while I was at it, although probably decide not to). This is all about ways to manage the longevity of an originally thin and now even thinner hull to minimise further deterioration.

 

For me, the hull is everything. Engines can be taken out, put in, rebuilt etc. An old BMC is probably going to be possible to persuade to run. I wouldn't bother dropping it in the canal to find that out - I would just try and turn it over first by hand, see whether it feels like you can engage forward and reverse, then see if by hooking a well charged starter battery up to it you can get it to spin over and start up. See what form of cooling it has - if it's skin tanks and there is still coolant in the engine and the tanks, then running it for a minute or so won't do anything any harm (obviously be ready to stop it rapidly if needed - use the key stop if there is one but if that fails, have something solid such as a block of wood ready to stick over the air intake - do not use cloth as it can get dragged in and do a lot of damage). If the engine smokes, don't be surprised; it may be tired and in need of a rebuild or it may just need to warm up properly - all that can be assessed later, as can the gearbox, and either reconditioned parts bought or the original overhauled.

 

You may find the above eats the majority of your budget. So long as you have a watertight shell, the majority of the rest of it is fairly straightforward DIY, so long as you ask the right questions, read the right information and use the right materials. Judicious use of Facebook Marketplace and Freecycle can yield a lot of what is needed, if you start early and plan for it. You can always start with something basic and upgrade later when further funds allow. You might find Danni and Joe's narrowboat restoration on Youtube useful viewing - I rather enjoyed it as it is definitely not rose-tinted, but shows what can be done with time and persistence. It wouldn't be my choice, but it's not my boat, and they ended up with what they wanted.

 

There are ways you could walk away now, and probably get your money back, but if that isn't actually going to get you any further forward as you would just need to find another boat which may not be any better anyway, and this is the way you want to go, I would say the trick is to not look at the relative cost but to look at the value and the affordability - if you can afford to get to a position that you want to be in then the value is what that end-point is worth to you, not anybody else.

 

Alec

Edited by agg221
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Thanks Alec for that information. I feel like you're right about the value being the end point. And its a good idea to work on it here in Ireland rather than putting it on water. I'm not terribly concerned about the engine as much as I am about the hull. But yes. It's probably wise to dry dock it here in Ireland first! 

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Springers are charming boats. At that price, if it satays afloat you've got a bargain. If not.....

Are you sure it's the black cab-style engine, i.e. a BMC 2.2? When Springer fitted a BMC it was usually the smaller 1500 model. A 38-footer with a 2.2 litre engine should go like peat off a shovel. One advantage, I'd guess, is that because so amny of these engines were produced, spare parts should be plentiful.

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36 minutes ago, Athy said:

Springers are charming boats. At that price, if it satays afloat you've got a bargain. If not.....

Are you sure it's the black cab-style engine, i.e. a BMC 2.2? When Springer fitted a BMC it was usually the smaller 1500 model. A 38-footer with a 2.2 litre engine should go like peat off a shovel. One advantage, I'd guess, is that because so amny of these engines were produced, spare parts should be plentiful.

  Not really a bargain if he has taken out a £20K loan to do it up, add on the purchase price £9K and all the work needed.
 You can get newer Springers all ready to go for under £30K on Apolloduck. would of been better off and combing finances and saving all the restoration head aches and problems.

See below.

 

https://narrowboats.apolloduck.co.uk/boat/springer-40-cruiser-stern-for-sale/712642

 

https://narrowboats.apolloduck.co.uk/boat/springer-44-cruiser-stern-for-sale/704983

 

 

 

Edited by PD1964
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6 minutes ago, PD1964 said:

  Not really a bargain if he has taken out a £20K loan to do it up, add on the purchase price £9K and all the work needed.
 You can get newer Springers all ready to go for under £30K on Apolloduck. See below.

https://narrowboats.apolloduck.co.uk/boat/springer-38-cruiser-stern-for-sale/709356

 

Yes, but then he would have needed a larger loan.

I do keep an eye on Springers for sale (gosh, haven't they gone up over the last few years?). I had one a few years ago and do find them appealing and characterful.

Edited by Athy
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My information is now out of date but we took our 50 ft NB to Ireland in 1998. It depends where you are going to keep in once it’s over there but Shannon harbour had the dry dock and welders. We used an Irish haulier from Bannager and the boat went unaccompanied ie the tractor unit and driver this side did not go with it just the trailer on the ferry and picked up by in Dublin by another driver. The company had trailers and a tractor unit based in Liverpool. With a 38 ft boat any 40 ft trailer will be ok although as the springer has a slight V bottom some extra Timbers may be needed.

I would doubt if there would be much tax to pay due to age and value.

 

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If the engine is keel cooled with a skin tank (rather than raw water cooled) then there's no reason you can't try starting the engine with the boat out the water. Just don't put it into gear unless you're sure there's nobody standing below within vicinity of the prop.

Edited by blackrose
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3 minutes ago, Athy said:

Yes, but then he would have needed a larger loan.

I do keep an eye on Springers for sale (gosh, haven't they gone up over the last few years?). I had one a few years ago and do find them appealing and characterful.

Why? He says he paid £9K for it and has taken a loan out to do it up for £20K, Would of been better off adding the loan to his £9K and having £29K and getting a ready to go boat. IMO.

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11 minutes ago, PD1964 said:

Why? He says he paid £9K for it and has taken a loan out to do it up for £20K, Would of been better off adding the loan to his £9K and having £29K and getting a ready to go boat. IMO.

Probably, but not always. It would still be the budget end of the market, it would still be old enough to have potential issues and there are still no guarantees that the work has all been done correctly. If you know what you are doing, know the right people, which brokers to avoid etc. then you can assure yourself that everything is genuinely good. If you don't, it's a bit like the risk of buying an old banger which has been stuffed full of body filler and given a shiny paint job and an MOT by post.

 

At least at £9k, you can assume it's bad and anything that isn't is a bonus, and you have a budget to fix it. If you spend £29k on a boat and get caught out then you haven't got anything left to fix it with, so you have to know it's right, and an inexperience buyer may not be able to tell the difference.

 

I am not suggesting that all new buyers should buy wrecks, just that in some circumstances it may not be an entirely irrational move.

 

Alec

Edited by agg221
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4 minutes ago, Dav and Pen said:

I would doubt if there would be much tax to pay due to age and value.

 

VAT is based on the price paid, or if there is no official bill of sale (it was a cash deal mate ......) then the customs will invent their own value for VAT

 

Now we are no longer in the EU he WILL be charged 23% VAT  (+ quite possibly Duty / Tariffs)

 

If you have the original bill of sale proving that the boat was buit in the UK there is an agreement with the EU that the import duty (not VAT) will be Zero, but, if you have no documentary evidence of the source of the boat, then duty is payable in adddition to the VAT.

 

The EU-UK Trade and Cooperation Agreement provides the basis for tariff free trade between the EU and the UK where the origin of the goods being imported or exported can be proven. This proof can be provided by using a statement of origin from the exporter or on the basis of the importer’s knowledge. This means a preferential 0% tariff rate will apply if goods entering the EU from the UK are proven to be of UK origin, and a request for this preferential treatment has been included on the relevant customs declaration. Similarly, a preferential 0% tariff rate will apply if goods being exported to the UK from the EU are proven to be of EU origin and again the claim for preferential treatment has been included on the relevant customs declaration.

Customs duties, if any, are payable together with VAT (and excise duty if applicable) at the point of importation into the EU unless you have been approved for a simplified customs procedure or have a deferred payment authorisation in place.

 

Irish Government website :

 

gov.ie - Trading with the UK (www.gov.ie)

 

(Whilst it is obviously not coming into Eire from the US the EU has added another 25% tariff for US manufactured boats)

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8 minutes ago, agg221 said:

Probably, but not always. It would still be the budget end of the market, it would still be old enough to have potential issues and there are still no guarantees that the work has all been done correctly. If you know what you are doing, know the right people, which brokers to avoid etc. then you can assure yourself that everything is genuinely good. If you don't, it's a bit like the risk of buying an old banger which has been stuffed full of body filler and given a shiny paint job and an MOT by post.

 

At least at £9k, you can assume it's bad and anything that isn't is a bonus, and you have a budget to fix it. If you spend £29k on a boat and get caught out then you haven't got anything left to fix it with, so you have to know it's right, and an inexperience buyer may not be able to tell the difference.

 

I am not suggesting that all new buyers should buy wrecks, just that in some circumstances it may not be an entirely irrational move.

 

Alec

I would rather of pooled my finances and got a far newer boat with little work, especially as the OP seams to have little experience with boats. So if he spends all his “do-up” budget of £20K(total investment £29K) the boat could only be worth £20-£25K. Makes little financial sense really.

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4 minutes ago, PD1964 said:

I would rather of pooled my finances and got a far newer boat with little work, especially as the OP seams to have little experience with boats. So if he spends all his “do-up” budget of £20K(total investment £29K) the boat could only be worth £20-£25K. Makes little financial sense really.

I get that, but if you don't know what you are doing and buy a lemon for £9k then the worst case is that you are £9k down and just return the loan. If you buy a lemon for £29k and end up needing £10-15k worth of replating then you haven't got the money and may find it really difficult to sell at all. You are likely to have lost a lot more than £9k and still have a loan to pay back.

 

Also, looking on the positive side, at the end of it you may have a boat that has cost you more than you could sell it for, but how many of us haven't spent more than we would get back to have something the way we want it? Maybe it's buying that more expensive flooring or that particular stove because you prefer the look of it. We had the hatches changed on Oates from flip over to slide. Financial return on that will be nothing so it's pure cost, but it does mean that my wife and children can actually open them! These costs all add up and I reckon if the OP ends up spending £29k to have a boat worth £25k this way, or buys a sorted boat and spends £4k making changes to their personal taste, they still end up at the same position for the investment in personal choice rather than financial value, but each to their own - it's our own money in the end so our own choices.

 

Alec

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10 minutes ago, Dobhair chú said:

I'm sure i could have gotten an okay boat for 30000 but it does look like it's not the worst like It's been said above, i could end up with lemon either way and i dont have a budget that high especially when you factor in the tax on a boat of high cost. 

Did you not fancy a GRP? Surely you could of got one over there?

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