Retaining fee paid. Advice needed, please

[JohnnieFlowers]

https://youtu.be/SegtsmNOMcY?si=SgxSYNI9-VNvWdo9

If I haven’t copied the link correctly, it’s on the channel of Rue & Jane @Armada; the video is titled “Dionysus another failed 2pack”

 

Hi again.

Having put a retainer on BN Dionysus last week, we have just stumbled across this YouTube video.

We would be really grateful if any of you would spend the time to watch it and give us the benefit of your advice.

Suddenly, it doesn’t seem quite as perfect any more.

To our inexperienced eyes, the blacking looks to have been done as well as possible (although we don’t know what the bottom is like). The state of the engine bay was a bit of a shock - it looks spotless now after a lick of paint…!

Should we be worried, or are we overthinking things?

All advice gratefully received.

 Thanks.

[Graham Davis]

Video no available.

 

[Rob-M]

I think this is the YouTube link, 

 

 

[JohnnieFlowers]

Yes, that’s the one.

 I have no idea how you did that, but thanks Rob.

 

[nicknorman]

If it were mine I would have had it shot blasted rather than all that messing around with a grinder and then painting on top of a dodgy substrate. 2-pac applied to a decent substrate is great. If applied onto an unstable substrate it is pointless.

[Peanut]

A wide beam like that was taken out here last year. Two packed from new, and the paint came off in ribbons when cleaned off with the pressure washer. There are some poor workmen out there, the paint was put over mill scale. The rust removes the mill scale, and patches have been cleaned and treated, but I don't think the owner is in a position to have it media blasted.

I suppose, it is now is similar to any other boat with conventional blacking, so long as there is no claim of being two packed. The baseplate of the wide beam had not been coated at all.

Edited April 6 by Peanut
correction

[LadyG]

To my inexperienced eye it looks ok but the bow thruster tube does not seem to have been blacked, or the base. We  cant tell from this photo what is going on.now.

Only a survey will tell you what to worry about, imho.

Boats do deteriorate.  No rust visible..

Edited April 7 by LadyG

[blackrose]

10 hours ago, nicknorman said:

If it were mine I would have had it shot blasted rather than all that messing around with a grinder and then painting on top of a dodgy substrate. 2-pac applied to a decent substrate is great. If applied onto an unstable substrate it is pointless.

 

 

The guy actually admitted at the start of the video it would all end up falling off so what's the point of putting blacking over it? Later he said the remaining badly applied epoxy would stay on.

 

The hull looks in good condition so if the idea is just to keep blacking it with bitumen every few years it's fine, but I would aim to get it out again within 2 years.

 

Like Nick I would have had it properly blasted and epoxied.

Edited April 7 by blackrose

[Gybe Ho]

11 hours ago, JohnnieFlowers said:

 

All advice gratefully received.

 

 

The majority of boats for sale are not epoxy 2-packed and given the video evidence you should just disregard any claim to prior epoxy coating in your valuation. You are buying a recently blacked narrowboat with a minor headache re. the likelihood the regular 1-pot blacking will fail earlier than expected due to the continued detachment of the remaining original epoxy.

 

I feel that video expose of the hull gives you an advantage as a buyer, few surveyors conduct such a thorough inspection of hull side plating. The key findings of the blacking prepwork were the bent prop blade on a cheap poorly specified propellor, noticeable corrosion around the drainage outlet, minor surface corrosion under the failed epoxy and a disappointing amount of internal engine bay corrosion on the horizontal swim baseplate. Ask your surveyor if the swim baseplate is 6mm or 10mm, most are 6mm.

 

As mentioned earlier in this thread, a gritblast and epoxy 2-pack will sort the hull out in the longterm by removing any remnants of the failed epoxy layer however that comes with a £3500 to £6000 price tag depending on whether the whole baseplate is treated at the same time.

 

Providing you and your surveyor are satisfied the engine bay corrosion has been arrested before it became structurally significant then plan for conventional 1-pot re-blacking sometime next year then save your pennies for a full blast & epoxy 3 years from now.

[Tonka]

Can't be bothered to watch the video but it is shot by a firm who epoxy boats in the fresh air. Have been passed and there is no shed or polly tunnel which other boat yards use

[Bee]

There's another point here that is rarely addressed. The British steel canal boat building industry has always used great slabs of steel of hefty thickness and  until recently just sprayed on a thin coat of bitumastic on the sides and nothing at all on the bottom. This is woeful practice and older steel boats have suffered because of it but it is cheap. The proper steel to use for boatbuilding is shotblasted and primed steel, that's the stuff that comes ready painted in what looks like red oxide and it gives the boat a proper start in life, the mill scale is removed and paint adheres to it. I have little faith in the design or building practices in the narrowboat industry, there are some builders who really know what they are doing but an awful lot just see a narrow boat as a long straight tank with pointy bits at the ends and dead easy to turn out. This sets a standard and is then copied over and again by the next builder and so on. It should not be the case that an owner of a new boat has to get it shotblasted and properly painted before launching the thing.

[MrBean]

14 hours ago, JohnnieFlowers said:

The state of the engine bay was a bit of a shock - it looks spotless now after a lick of paint…!

I haven't watched the entire video in detail, but if you are concerned by the state of the engine bay shown from 6:46 then don't be, it is not the same boat.

It is a cruiser stern and the wrong gearbox from that shown in the recent sales pictures. My suspicion is that it relates to a job previously covered in their blogs, and providing some sort of update on it?

It is a very disappointing paint job from what many people seem to think is a good boat builder. I agree with others above, unless it has since been blasted and epoxied - assume the hull is going to either need regular blacking or a thorough blast and paint at some point.

I feel for you, a disheartening find compared to what you had hoped you were buying. In the long run it will not make much difference if the hull continues to be cared for, but it is an expense in the shorter term that you may not have been expecting. Hope it all turns out well for you.

[ditchcrawler]

12 hours ago, Peanut said:

A wide beam like that was taken out here last year. Two packed from new, and the paint came off in ribbons when cleaned off with the pressure washer. There are some poor workmen out there, the paint was put over mill scale. The rust removes the mill scale, and patches have been cleaned and treated, but I don't think the owner is in a position to have it media blasted.

I suppose, it is now is similar to any other boat with conventional blacking, so long as there is no claim of being two packed. The baseplate of the wide beam had not been coated at all.

Documented  here My day in Court with Collingwood Boat Builders – Retirement with No Problem

2 hours ago, Tonka said:

Can't be bothered to watch the video but it is shot by a firm who epoxy boats in the fresh air. Have been passed and there is no shed or polly tunnel which other boat yards use

I didn't realise they did epoxy. No problem doing outside, we did it in the middle of the North Sea

[Gybe Ho]

1 hour ago, ditchcrawler said:

 

I didn't realise they did epoxy

 

 

 

They don't but they have some videos documenting epoxy failures.

 

1 hour ago, ditchcrawler said:

No problem doing outside, we did it in the middle of the North Sea

 

 

P&S Marine Watford near London do grit blasting and painting during the warmer 6 months of the year. Favoured by DIYers because they let customers apply additional coats of epoxy after the initial blast and prime. It does not look like Armada Warf can raise boats up to a decent working height for a baseplate blast and coating.

[b00ke23]

As someone else already said the engine bay in that video is a different boat....you can see it is a cruiser stern and has a PRM mechanical gearbox whereas Dionysus has a PRM hydraulic gearbox and a semi trad stern. 

 

While not ideal, the job the yard did will be ok for a year or two. You have 2 options.....get it out every 2 years for pressure washing/grinding and blacking, thus any patches where the 2 pack falls off won't be left for a very long period of time to corrode. Or in about a year get it booked into a yard who can actually shotblast it back to bare steel and reapply the 2 pack. Obviously this will cost considerably more than just re-blacking but should mean the boat won't need to come out of the water for perhaps 7 years. Luckily, the hull doesn't seems to have suffered much corrosion with the 2 pack falling off but definitely have a survey. This certainly wouldn't put me off the boat. 

 

AFAIK Rugby boats won't refund a deposit unless works exceeding 10% of the value of the boat are discovered in survey so pulling out is problematic. If the surveyor mentions the failed 2 pack you can of course go back and negotiate a discount.  

[JohnnieFlowers]

Huge thanks to everyone who has taken the time to watch the video and comment.

On first watching, we skipped the bit about the engine because we assumed it was a different boat. Then we watched the whole thing again and weren’t sure. And consequently had a huge worry…! But, thankfully, and thanks to you guys, we now have much more confidence in our original assumption. 
Re the blacking, we feel that Armada did the best they could with the brief they’d been given from the seller.

Michael Clarke is coming out next Wednesday to do a full survey, so we’ll see what he finds.

He is obviously going to scratch patches of blacking off where he takes his readings, and then RB will drop the boat back in the water with little areas of bare steel……

…..what advice (sorry for asking again for even more advice) can anyone offer about the best course of action. 

[Gybe Ho]

9 minutes ago, JohnnieFlowers said:

 

Michael Clarke is coming out next Wednesday to do a full survey, so we’ll see what he finds.

He is obviously going to scratch patches of blacking off where he takes his readings, and then RB will drop the boat back in the water with little areas of bare steel……

…..what advice (sorry for asking again for even more advice) can anyone offer about the best course of action. 

 

 

When I watched my boat being surveyed last year the paint was not scratched back to bare steel, only the accumulated weed was removed. The surveyor's depth ultra sound gadget, that sees through the paint layer, was used to establish the true original rolled plate thickness where the hull was corrosion free then pitting depths were measured mechanically with a sophisticated type of tyre tread depth probe.

 

Your hull side plate looks to be in a good condition judging by that video, I doubt any pitting over 1mm will be found. Let's start a sweep stake now, my prediction is a max pitting depth of 0.5mm near the waterline. The baseplate will be another story.

 

Ask your surveyor to comment in the feel of the rudder movement. A surprising number of boats have suffered impacts to the rudder that induce a slight rudder stock bend and/or have crappy cheap cup bearings supporting the lower end of the rudder stock.

[David Mack]

4 hours ago, b00ke23 said:

Obviously this will cost considerably more than just re-blacking but should mean the boat won't need to come out of the water for perhaps 7 years.

There's a 2 pack epoxied boat been docked at Aylesbury Circus Field Basin today - first time out of the water in nine years apparently. After pressure washing the hull looks pretty good. Only rust visible on a cursory inspection was below the sink/wash basin outlets down to water level. Those areas will need taking back to bare metal and patch priming, but the rest will be fine with a wire brushing and a couple more coats of epoxy.

[Peanut]

9 hours ago, ditchcrawler said:

Documented  here My day in Court with Collingwood Boat Builders – Retirement with No Problem

I didn't realise they did epoxy. No problem doing outside, we did it in the middle of the North Sea

That of course was a different boat, but the same builder.

[b00ke23]

4 hours ago, JohnnieFlowers said:

He is obviously going to scratch patches of blacking off where he takes his readings, and then RB will drop the boat back in the water with little areas of bare steel……

…..what advice (sorry for asking again for even more advice) can anyone offer about the best course of action. 

 

When I had my last boat surveyed like this, the yard just painted over the scraped patches with blacking and put the boat back in the water about an hour later (far from ideal from blacking drying point of view). When the boat came out for blacking 3 years later the patches were not significantly corroded, so I wouldn't worry about it.  

[blackrose]

11 hours ago, JohnnieFlowers said:

Michael Clarke is coming out next Wednesday to do a full survey, so we’ll see what he finds.

He is obviously going to scratch patches of blacking off where he takes his readings, and then RB will drop the boat back in the water with little areas of bare steel……

 

 

Why are they doing it the wrong way around? Paint first, survey after? 

 

Don't put the boat back in the water with lots of little areas of bare steel. At least paint over them first and give them a chance to dry. If you only have a few hours and bitumen won't dry in time buy a small can of International Primocon or Jotun Vineyguard and put on a couple of coats over those patches. They're both basically the same, single part, quick drying (silver/grey colour) underwater primers, compatible going over or under bitumen and they'll at least stop those patches rusting for a year or two.

 

https://marinestore.co.uk/international-primocon-antifoul-primer-ypa984-primocon-j160224.html

Edited April 8 by blackrose

[matty40s]

14 hours ago, JohnnieFlowers said:

 

He is obviously going to scratch patches of blacking off where he takes his readings, and then RB will drop the boat back in the water with little areas of bare steel……

…..what advice (sorry for asking again for even more advice) can anyone offer about the best course of action. 

I seem to remember that Michael doesnt need to go back to metal with his kit, he may scrape away weed, but I think Dionysus will not have much of this given the time since last blacking.

(If he does go back to steel, come over and speak to that friendly chap from the workshop who said hello when you had just bought the boat...)😉

[cuthound]

On 06/04/2026 at 21:57, nicknorman said:

If it were mine I would have had it shot blasted rather than all that messing around with a grinder and then painting on top of a dodgy substrate. 2-pac applied to a decent substrate is great. If applied onto an unstable substrate it is pointless.

 

Yes, this is what I had to do. 

 

The original 2 pack was great and after 12 years I had another couple of coats applied. 

 

Two years later this began to come off because the original 2 is pack hadn't been abraded enough to for a consistently good key for the new 2 pack. It is all but impossible to remove the new coating completely  without grit blasting.

 

So in the end the only way I is was able to black the boat without risk of it failing early again was to get it grit blasted and start all over again.

Edited April 8 by cuthound
Clarification

[Tonka]

11 hours ago, matty40s said:

I seem to remember that Michael doesnt need to go back to metal with his kit, he may scrape away weed, but I think Dionysus will not have much of this given the time since last blacking.

(If he does go back to steel, come over and speak to that friendly chap from the workshop who said hello when you had just bought the boat...)😉

Who is the friendly chap then. Anyone we know

[JohnnieFlowers]

Huge thanks, once again, to everyone who has taken an interest and offered advice.

The general consensus is that grit blasting to bare steel and new 2-pack is the best solution, although the latest blacking will be ok for a year or so. We have taken note and will make plans accordingly.

23 hours ago, matty40s said:

I seem to remember that Michael doesnt need to go back to metal with his kit, he may scrape away weed, but I think Dionysus will not have much of this given the time since last blacking.

(If he does go back to steel, come over and speak to that friendly chap from the workshop who said hello when you had just bought the boat...)😉

Thanks Matty40s.

We will definitely come over and say hello again next Wednesday.