How much!

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Travelling Westerly

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I was considering some options with regards to a little 3m RIB I have that has some worn tubes. Nothing terminal just yet but worth doing - or so I thought!

Got a quote for a 3m retube in Hyperlon from a RIB tube company in south Devon (well known) and to say I was speachless is very much understated! Now considering I can buy a brand new alu hulled and much better made RIB for £4k (in Hyperlon, 4 cells as opposed to 3), the quote came in at £3.7k excluding VAT :oops:. Thats more than a brand new boat! No wonder there are so many abandoned boats around with pricing structures like that.

Basically the next time it springs a leak, its going to landfill and Im buying a better brand new RIB for less money than a retube! What a shame....
 
Seems reasonable. It's a hell of a lot more work to clean, measure, cut, make, glue on a used boat than it is to make a new one to a pattern. You're also looking at skilled UK labour rather than cheap overseas labour. I'd imagine there's a bunch of disposal charges too given the amount of eco legislation about these days. All of this also assumes they can even get hold of the materials in the current climate.
 
I'm not going to agree or disagree on the value/cost side of it, but it is an awful lot of beer tokens, whatever way you look at it.

And you could probably get a RIB for half the price again that will last 75% of the time - this disposable world we are in now, shame...
 
lustyd said:
Seems reasonable. It's a hell of a lot more work to clean, measure, cut, make, glue on a used boat than it is to make a new one to a pattern. You're also looking at skilled UK labour rather than cheap overseas labour. I'd imagine there's a bunch of disposal charges too given the amount of eco legislation about these days. All of this also assumes they can even get hold of the materials in the current climate.
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Reasonable, come on! Its from a pattern so thats out the window for a starter. Clean up some sides on a 3m RIB! Hardly raising the titanic is it.
I guess they get away with charging prices like this if people like you think work like this is worth more than the cost of a new complete boat and by the way made in Italy, so not sure their labour charges are much cheaper than ours. :rolleyes:
 
lustyd said:
Seems reasonable. It's a hell of a lot more work to clean, measure, cut, make, glue on a used boat than it is to make a new one to a pattern. You're also looking at skilled UK labour rather than cheap overseas labour. I'd imagine there's a bunch of disposal charges too given the amount of eco legislation about these days. All of this also assumes they can even get hold of the materials in the current climate.
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Intrigued that the labour abroad is "cheap" while the labour in the UK is "skilled" to do basically the same thing.

Ink
 
Ink said:
Intrigued that the labour abroad is "cheap" while the labour in the UK is "skilled" to do basically the same thing.

Ink
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Anecdotally, and not related to the OP so apologies.

One of my other pastimes is cycling (another expensive, weather dependent hobby ? ).Despite the fact that the vast majority (90-95%) of carbon fibre bike components (including the very high end stuff ridden by the tour pro's) is made in Asia now, having production there is still referred to by the 'masses' as if it is a bad thing. I spoke with a rep from a major bike manufacturer (American brand) once who told me that there isn't the skill in the western world now to match the Asian producers - at any cost...

So I also share your intrigue ?

Patriotism is great, Nationalism not so much.
 
No surprises here. The makers of new boats will be using skilled but lower cost workers, making hundreds of examples of the same boat using machine cut pieces to produce the finished product. Pricing will reflect both the lower labour costs and the economy of scale.
The UK company offering a replacement tube will have to copy the tube dimensions from the original, devise patterns for the individual panels to make up the tube, cut the material and then glue it all together, finally fixing the new tube into on the old hull (which they’ve had to clean). Effectively, they’re making a custom RIB for you. That’s why the cost is so high in comparison to a new RIB especially taking into account the higher wages cost in UK.
Final point: the company probably didn’t want the job in the first place, hence the pricing!
 
duncan99210 said:
Final point: the company probably didn’t want the job in the first place, hence the pricing!
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They have the pattern apparently but no way is that reflected in the quote.
I think you've hit the nail on the head in that they dont want the job, more the much posher and bigger stuff (and I dont want them to do the job at that price point either).
 
Cornishwesterly said:
I was considering some options with regards to a little 3m RIB I have that has some worn tubes. Nothing terminal just yet but worth doing - or so I thought!

Got a quote for a 3m retube in Hyperlon from a RIB tube company in south Devon (well known) and to say I was speachless is very much understated! Now considering I can buy a brand new alu hulled and much better made RIB for £4k (in Hyperlon, 4 cells as opposed to 3), the quote came in at £3.7k excluding VAT :oops:. Thats more than a brand new boat! No wonder there are so many abandoned boats around with pricing structures like that.

Basically the next time it springs a leak, its going to landfill and Im buying a better brand new RIB for less money than a retube! What a shame....
Click to expand...
RibEye have never been cheap!
 
Ink said:
Intrigued that the labour abroad is "cheap" while the labour in the UK is "skilled" to do basically the same thing.
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People in other countries can be skilled too. The point was that the labour in the UK is coming from a pool of people who have trained and therefore not cheap. Labour in the places used for manufacture is less expensive for the same work. Since the existing RIB is in the UK it's not sensible to use the cheaper labour since it would be offset by the nightmare of shipping an old RIB out and back without the benefits of shipping at scale as the manufacturers do.
 
Cornishwesterly said:
Reasonable, come on! Its from a pattern so thats out the window for a starter. Clean up some sides on a 3m RIB! Hardly raising the titanic is it.
I guess they get away with charging prices like this if people like you think work like this is worth more than the cost of a new complete boat and by the way made in Italy, so not sure their labour charges are much cheaper than ours. :rolleyes:
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Put a number of hours on it. If you had to guarantee the work you'd want it squeaky clean for good adhesion so it's likely a couple of people will spend a couple of days on it just to clean it up and there's the first thousand gone. Measuring and cutting the pattern pieces properly is probably another day then another day or so gluing followed by testing. Add to this the cost of the space it takes up while being worked on and curing. The fabric is not cheap to buy in the UK so I think you're approaching the quote quite easily there.

For the record I wasn't being nationalist or anything of the sort, just pointing out that this skilled labour is cheaper elsewhere. I agree with Moodysailor that many skills are better elsewhere as local skills dwindled during the race to the bottom. Unfortunately if we want lower costs locally then it's chicken and egg and someone will have to start paying these rates to get scale into the system.
 
Cornishwesterly said:
Nor a top quality item from what I can see (tender size experience only though).
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We had a c.8m one. Needed new tubes after 6 years, which seemed very short as the boat was covered and dry when not in use.

The replacements from a different manufacturer were promised to be far far better , and they were!

Moral of story - Avoid any company which references “Superyacht” on its front page !
 
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