Steel boat as a long-term liveaboard (in a warm(er) climate).

[Tranona]

Sail magazine had an article last year by Tom Cunliffe, a very experienced cruiser, called" Dream Boat or Derelict", which described the many pitfalls of plastic boats, rotten deck cores( which my plastic boat friends have all been struggling with) chain plates bolted to rotten bulkheads (ditto) bulkheads coming away from hulls( ditto), water coming in after a collision with a rock ( which many steel boats have no consequences whatever from), thru hull problems (a non issue on steel boats with welded in stainless pipe nipples for thru hulls), the list goes on.

While these problems may occur with a small number of boats and Tom is right to warn people looking to buy older well used GRP boats, they are the exception and the vast majority of boats in numbers that outweigh the total number of steel yachts built do not suffer from such problems.

On the other hand the majority of steel boats historically suffer from corrosion, many to the point of ending up worthless.

You can huff and puff all you like but I am afraid the facts are against you.

If only you could open your eyes and your mind to what is really going on. But of course you have a history of not doing that so really a waste of your time and ours.

 

[Brent Swain]

I cant imagine not hearing-and taking action to repair-a broken exhaust pipe before it caused a fire.

If it was leaking against a two by four timber long enough to set it alight, how come an experienced guy like you, with all your skills and sea miles, opinions on just about any subject, was deficient in this department.

I suppose that I am attuned to engine noises and mechanical defects. If an exhaust pipe broke while I was doing 150 MPH on the Isle of Man TT circuit and dragged on the track, it would soon chuck me off.

I heard a training boat leaving Falmouths Premier Marina, a Bavaria 34. It did not sound right, so I took a look. No water leaving the exhaust outlet. I called the Skipper and Instructor who turned the seacock on. He had given the job of checking the engine, drive belt, oil, seacock to a trainee. The trainee had turned the seacock off, not checked that it was on.

So, I can tell if another boats exhaust sounds wrong, but you could not tell YOUR own boats exhaust was defective.

All my faith in you has gone, like smoke on a breeze........................................................

Yes ,a mechanic in a yard would hear the difference, but bucking into a 25 knot headwind ,not so much.

 

[john_morris_uk]

I had a fire on board last year, while underway. An exhaust pipe broke, and burned thru a 2x4, and burned a couple sq feet of foam. I sealed the boat airtight, and the fire went out quickly. Trying to fight a fire with the hatches open, at sea, is suicidal. My brother , a lifetime fireman, said he has seen fires in department stores, with plenty of combustibles around, go out quickly, as soon as it ran out of oxygen. Even a big department store didn't have enough oxygen to support the fire for very long ( as long as the windows don't break).
I said on to the next anchorage , no problem ! Better than ending up in a rubber ducky at sea, as some suggested I should have done. (" Wisdom" they call that!)
A friend had an oil stove overflow on a steel boat, and burn a couple of sq feet of foam and plywood, before running out of oxygen and going out, despite there being many gallons of stove oil spilled and unburned. The fire didn't even last long enough to burn thru the wooden hatches and plastic vents , right next to it.

Sorry Brent, but you’ve just lost what remnants of credibility you had. Any half decent boat has lots of ventilation. If it’s an ocean going boat it will have dorades. If they’re designed properly you have the ability to close them in extremis (as in preparing for a storm.) it’s either a matter of turning a screw to shut the flap/valve or unscrewing the dorado head and screwing in blanking plates. It’s not something you do in a hurry. Whilst i agree that it’s possible to disrupt the fire triangle by stopping off the oxygen/air supply, are you really suggesting that an ocean going yacht can be closed down in seconds to stop a fire spreading? That as the fire burns, all the sea cocks are suddenly magically shut and no hose is going to rupture in the heat and start sinking the boat? That you seriously suggest that the best plan is to have no life raft but to evacuate to the deck and hope the fire burns itself out?

Fires on steel ships with all their firefighting equipment available threatens the ship and many ships on fire have to be abandoned and eventually sink.

Your advise/opinion is incredible to the point of being dangerous and I very much hope nobody takes you seriously.

 

[Brent Swain]

Friends, who had their steel boats catch fire from welding, had them gutted. No damage to mast, sail, ri, etc and only minor damage to the engine, quickly repaired when they tried to fight the fire with hatches open. The only had to repaint and rebuild the interior. At sea, they could have still sailed anywhere. A plastic boat would have burned to the waterline and sank, a complete loss.
(Leaving them in a rubber ducky , a much better situation , according to some here?)
Jack, on his circumnavigation on one of my 36 footers, Island Breeze, had a welding fire on board in Frisco bay. It burned furiously ,until it came to the foam which had been painted with cheap latex. There, the fire stopped. It was not any special fire retardant latex ,only cheap stuff.
Thus, it is probably a good idea to paint any spray foam with cheap latex, plenty, as it is often free in recycling depots.
If you are doing any welding aboard, it is also a good idea to be ready to quickly seal the boat airtight, if things get out of control.

 

[Brent Swain]

Sorry Brent, but you’ve just lost what remnants of credibility you had. Any half decent boat has lots of ventilation. If it’s an ocean going boat it will have dorades. If they’re designed properly you have the ability to close them in extremis (as in preparing for a storm.) Whilst it’s possible to disrupt the fire triangle by stopping off the oxygen/air supply, are you really suggesting that an ocean going yacht can be closed down in seconds to stop a fire spreading? That all the sea cocks are shut and no hose is going to rupture in the heat and start sinking the boat? That you seriously suggest that the best plan is to have no life raft but to evacuate to the deck and hope the fire burns itself out?
(Quote)

Sure beats your suggestion that you should jump in a rubber ducky in mid ocean and simply watch her burn. Where does that leave your credibility?
The fires I mentioned starving their way out , for lack of oxygen, didn't burn long enough to affect any thru hulls.
Had their owners been at sea, and in a rubber ducky, as you suggest they should have been ,and imply "that way they would have been much better off", instead of in a sound vessel with a small , slightly charred portion of the interior, doesn't do much for your credibility .
Abandoning a steel boat with the overwhelming odds of being saved with minimal damage , for a rubber ducky in mid ocean, makes the rubber ducky a big liability, more likely to cost lives than save them, as does advice to abandon the boat for the rubber ducky.
Big ships are hard to seal, small cruising boats, easy to seal airtight.

For fire safety, wisdom is choosing steel in the first place.

 

[rotrax]

Yes ,a mechanic in a yard would hear the difference, but bucking into a 25 knot headwind ,not so much.

The donk would be at high power-just the time to hear an exhaust leak.

I wonder if it was a steel exhaust that failed............................................

 

[Robin]

:sleeping::sleeping:

And still BS ( Apt initials) raves on. Apparently sailing anarchy is a safe haven these days, I think I might jump ship for a while.:disgust:

 

[Kelpie]

And he still doesn't answer my question...

Which was, since it is now several pages back: if steel is cheaper, stronger, lower maintenance, more versatile, longer lived, and does not produce heavier/slower boats, why aren't Bavarias etc made of steel?

(Yes other posters had some valid replies to this but I wanted they weren't true believers and I wanted to see what the man himself would say).

 

[rotrax]

And he still doesn't answer my question...

Which was, since it is now several pages back: if steel is cheaper, stronger, lower maintenance, more versatile, longer lived, and does not produce heavier/slower boats, why aren't Bavarias etc made of steel?

(Yes other posters had some valid replies to this but I wanted they weren't true believers and I wanted to see what the man himself would say).

Like many other questions he has been asked, he will not reply because he has no answer.

Steel is a great material for building boats for some applications, especially DIY where the skills required are not high.

Its drawbacks are corrosion if the applied protective coatings are breached.

I have a great deal of experience with steel narrowboat hulls and superstructures-even riveted iron hulls with 3 inch elm bottoms, the traditional way to make a narrowboat hull once wood was superceded. Some are over 150 years old.

Fresh water in a muddy canal is nowhere near as aggresive as seawater and salt laden atmosphere.

Steel, even corten steel will corrode and rust, even with BS's 2 hours maintainence each year.

If, in fact you believe that claim...........................................

 

[solent clown]

Steel is my field. I have a plastic boat.

 

[lpdsn]

Even a big department store didn't have enough oxygen to support the fire for very long ...

Must've sold out.

 

[john_morris_uk]

Sure beats your suggestion that you should jump in a rubber ducky in mid ocean and simply watch her burn. Where does that leave your credibility?
The fires I mentioned starving their way out , for lack of oxygen, didn't burn long enough to affect any thru hulls.
Had their owners been at sea, and in a rubber ducky, as you suggest they should have been ,and imply "that way they would have been much better off", instead of in a sound vessel with a small , slightly charred portion of the interior, doesn't do much for your credibility .
Abandoning a steel boat with the overwhelming odds of being saved with minimal damage , for a rubber ducky in mid ocean, makes the rubber ducky a big liability, more likely to cost lives than save them, as does advice to abandon the boat for the rubber ducky.
Big ships are hard to seal, small cruising boats, easy to seal airtight.

For fire safety, wisdom is choosing steel in the first place.

Show me where I've suggested that you immediately abandon your boat and take to the liferaft.

Any seaman worth their salt knows that you step UP into the liferaft as a last resort as the ship/boat sinks underneath you.

Or in the case of a steel boat as it becomes too hot to stand on the steel with the fire roaring away inside. Any decent seaman knows that a properly built boat is well ventilated and although its POSSIBLE to seal much of the ventilation off, its also time consuming and slow. I've got several dorades and water resistant ventilators on my boat and the screw on caps to seal them off are stored below. Bit tricky to seal off the ventilation when you've just been beaten back by the flames, smoke and heat if you can't access below decks and you certainly daren't risk opening a hatch and introducing a large volume of air and inducing a fireball flash back.

Better to have the option of a liferaft as a final resort that listen to extremely dangerous advice from someone who is making it clearer and clearer that he is a liability at sea. I don't mean to be unkind, but some of your suggestions and guidance are risible and dangerous.

Tell us about any firefighting courses you've done....

I also strongly suspect that the yacht that burned out its interior in San Franscico was ashore. Or are you going to claim that every seacock was shut?

 

[lpdsn]

Or in the case of a steel boat as it becomes too hot to stand on the steel with the fire roaring away inside.

Sure, do you not just put on the asbestos flip flops and dance about on deck until it cools down again?

The Brent stood on the burning deck...

 

[john_morris_uk]

Counting his firecrackers

 

[Kelpie]

Ah what you fail to realise is that anybody who puts to sea in a boat not fitted with the Brent Swain Industries patented hermetically sealed companionway hatch system is a raging fool.

 

[Robin]

Counting, he's crackers

There, corrected it for you John.

Had two experiences of fires. First when a canvas tarp caught fire from a dry (steel) exhaust in a wooden boat locker. second similar on a grp mobo being used as a committee (startline) boat for a YC race. First example resolved by dumping tarp overboard and a bucket of water. Second resolved by the crew taking to liferaft until help arrived with more extinguishers.

 

[lpdsn]

Counting his firecrackers

A spark flew up his trouser leg

And I wonder if a moderator can think up a suitable next line.

 

[solent clown]

Does the forum owner have any responsibility for potentially dangerous advice given about fire fighting by just shutting the door and hoping for the best. I would hate for someone to take Mr Swain's advice and end up on fire in the drink/dead because it did not work.

 

[lpdsn]

Does the forum owner have any responsibility for potentially dangerous advice given about fire fighting by just shutting the door and hoping for the best. I would hate for someone to take Mr Swain's advice and end up on fire in the drink/dead because it did not work.

Where in the broad spectrum of quality of advice on this, or any, forum would you draw the line?

I think of it like a conversation with someone in a pub. Whatever they say the responsibility is still on me to form my own opinion. I would never dream of blaming the landlord.

 

[solent clown]

Where in the broad spectrum of quality of advice on this, or any, forum would you draw the line?

I think of it like a conversation with someone in a pub. Whatever they say the responsibility is still on me to form my own opinion. I would never dream of blaming the landlord.

Fair point. Apologies, I am not really proficient at this internet forum thing. I tend to try to talk online as I do in real life, and when I am incorrect or ignorant I am happy to be corrected or educated. Learning from others mistakes is a good way not to make so many one's self. It seems that all too often people online are more concerned with not conceding a point than getting to the nub of problem. That is a shame, as it is neither educational or pleasant to wade through the mire of comments that muddy the waters of the original question. Mr Swain doubtless has a font of knowledge but it is negated by a defensiveness of his that seems to be colouring his perception.