Self-service Life Raft

I service my own inflatable life jackets which is acceptable to our marine safety authority. I built my own boat which is acceptable but they will not accept any life raft that is services by anyone other then the original manufacturer.

Makes no sense
 
ghostlymoron said:
If it doesn't work mid ocean, your insurance will be the least of your worries. I don't recall noticing an exclusion in my policy anyway.
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These days, people (and relatives) are far quicker to sue when things go wrong. Only insurance issue I can think of is if someone dies because the skipper/owner has not taken due care with safety gear. Defective self-serviced raft could be more of a problem than no raft under UK rules, which don't require one anyway on small leisure vessels.
 
Graham376 said:
These days, people (and relatives) are far quicker to sue when things go wrong. Only insurance issue I can think of is if someone dies because the skipper/owner has not taken due care with safety gear. Defective self-serviced raft could be more of a problem than no raft under UK rules, which don't require one anyway on small leisure vessels.
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Interesting view on, liability.

Maybe before departure you could get a disclaimer signed acknowledging that the raft, should one be needed, whether it works or not, is solely for the captain, and all passengers or crew irrevocably agree to "drown like gentlemen" (whether or not they identify as that gender or any gender or no gender)

obviously give them a tot out of your brandy bottle, as you with bottle in hand, scramble over the side into your self-serviced raft....

 
Kelpie said:
Which is crazy. I'd much rather have a questionable life raft than no life raft at all.
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So would I and I'm not against anyone self-servicing but, there "may" be knock on effects in worst case scenario. You only have to look at investigations into fatal accidents to see how nit-picking they are The life raft failing through not being serviced by competent person could possibly be seen as a breach in duty of care, which we all have to each other.
 
As my initial questions have been answered I'm not bothered about the thread drift. But it seems to me that there are various degrees of risk appetite and perceptions of risk, confidence and skill. I packed my own parachute for many years; getting some slippery material that wants to fly into a tiny bag, in a way that it comes back out in the correct way has given me some confidence in packing a liferaft; given also that I service my own life jacket. There the responsibility lies with me; with that I'm going to make sure I do it right as I won't be able to blame anyone else when I'm drifting into hypothermia.

So, you can see that I have a fairly high degree of risk appetite and a fair degree of confidence. Furthermore, I have been an intensive care nurse so I am au fait with bits of high tech machinery with life dependent responsibility. That, I believe, gives me the competence to check out and re-assemble a balloon with a gas cannister ?

Those of you who know me will also know that I have solo-sailed the Atlantic. To some this seems as madness, or so my work mates said. But these same people often lives in multi-storey houses. There were 787 deaths from falls on UK stairs in 2015 (https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/datasets/the21stcenturymortalityfilesdeathsdataset ) Should we assign stair use to accredited persons? Lifts for the rest of us?

I'm being slightly flippant here but the point remains: out perception of danger, and the way we deal with it, is personal. I f I could remember the details I'd refer to two Ch4 programmes from 20 od years ago: one was about risk and the other was about some BASE jumpers. But I can't :)

Thanks for all the ideas and experiences.

PS I have sometime wondered when I would need a liferaft on a Rival 32. The chances of my brick sh1thouse being so damaged (without killing me) that it required leaving seem to me to be less than...
 
So:
after four hours the solidly inflated life raft looks like a soggy paddling pool. Methinks it is time for a new one. It is twenty years old, the strobe light is U/S and the cylinder only has one year of service life left before re-charge. I now have two further questions:

- new ones all seem to be much of a muchness; has anyone got any recommendations for a four-person cannister?

- are there any recyclable parts - the gas cylinder for example? Or would anyone want to buy an old, saggy LR? :)

Thanks
 
mattonthesea said:
So:
after four hours the solidly inflated life raft looks like a soggy paddling pool. Methinks it is time for a new one. It is twenty years old, the strobe light is U/S and the cylinder only has one year of service life left before re-charge. I now have two further questions:

- new ones all seem to be much of a muchness; has anyone got any recommendations for a four-person cannister?

- are there any recyclable parts - the gas cylinder for example? Or would anyone want to buy an old, saggy LR? :)
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20 years is a good life for a liferaft. There's nothing which can realistically be recycled. As for a new one, will you go for an ISO9650 raft? Ocean Safety is the brand I chose when I last bought.
 
I have got the Seago basic one, comes in at £750ish. When I did the self service was impressed with the build quality which was basically what the chandler said to me in that it was as good as the 'premium' ones. It's 16yo now so will look to replace soon myself and will go for the same.

Repack the old one and set it off by the boat to play with and try it out before dumping in the skip.
 
mattonthesea said:
So:
after four hours the solidly inflated life raft looks like a soggy paddling pool. Methinks it is time for a new one. It is twenty years old, the strobe light is U/S and the cylinder only has one year of service life left before re-charge. I now have two further questions:

- new ones all seem to be much of a muchness; has anyone got any recommendations for a four-person cannister?

- are there any recyclable parts - the gas cylinder for example? Or would anyone want to buy an old, saggy LR? :)

Thanks
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Have you any idea why it failed to stay inflated, was there a defect that would have caused it to deflate soon after it was made, or last serviced or did it simply leak through the joints/fabric due to old age...?
 
The valves leaked but not too badly and not when capped. Other than that there is no obvious leak - probably old age.

We tend to do day sails interspersed with 3-4 day crossings nowadays (well outside CV19 - more wish list these days). Biscay, North Sea, hopefully Gulf of Finland next year or two.
 
mattonthesea said:
The valves leaked but not too badly and not when capped. Other than that there is no obvious leak - probably old age.

We tend to do day sails interspersed with 3-4 day crossings nowadays (well outside CV19 - more wish list these days). Biscay, North Sea, hopefully Gulf of Finland next year or two.
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If the valves did not leak when capped probably bad rubbers in the valves but the caps should have been on for the initial inflation with only the over pressure valved liable to fail!

AFIK the internal top up valves, unless capped, would not take the initial pressure which is built up in the initial stages when the raft is exploding it's way out of the packaging...
 
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