Hi there, so today I'm going to be lifting up my flooring and sorting out
some of my ballast. There's different types of ballast underneath the floors
of normal narrowboats. There is either gravel, there are often sort of concrete
patio slabs, in my case it's engineering bricks. Anything heavy virtually, ballast
is in the bottom of a boat the lowest part, purely to counteract the balance of
a boat. So what I'll do today is lift at the flooring and sort out some of the
ballast, effectively, remove some of the bricks. I've got the multi-fuel
stove and the sort of hearth that it's sitting on, I've also got a washing
machine and all three of those, as well as effectively there'll be a settee
here, all of those are sitting on the port side of the boat. So currently what
I'm having to do is all my belongings, I'm having to put on the starboard side
to sort of balance it out, so I'll lift up the flooring and see what I've got
first of all. The flooring is Marine based ply and I can see from the bottom of it
that they've blacked it, now this is a really good thing because it prevents
the underside of the wood getting damp. Site supervise a Molly was happy with
the progress so far and therefore she decided it was time to have a quick nap!
Now I've done some maths and the washing machine, the multi-fuel stove, a typical
settee, the hearth that it's sitting on is around about sort of 282 kilos and
that's whats causing the boat to list. So there's 47 bricks per sort of bay and
each brick weighs around about 2.8 kilos, so I've effectively got to remove a
hundred bricks from this side for it to balance up. But I'm aware that there will
be some things on this side and of course the further you get into the
centreline of the boat, the less effect a missing brick will have, but I'm going to
would probably remove the half of both sides and that will see the boat to
stabilise. I've got another two flooring panels to do and I can sort of gauge it in the water, as I go.
The bilge is nice and dry!
You can see at regular intervals down the entire length of the boat there are these welded supports. Now they are
fixed to the hull and they're also fixed to the base plate. They are for raising
the floor level and fixing the wooden joist to them. However when I sorted out
the water up at the bow of the boat I lifted up a floor there and I could see
that there weren't any holes in these struts. So if there was a leak in any
part of the boat because there's no gaps in the actual floor, in this
strut, even though these are just being sort of welded in places along the floor
and I suppose water could get under there because this base plate has been
painted, I expect all of those are nice and full and there's no clear gap for
water to carry on down to the stern of the boat. So if there's a leak at all, the
water level would fill up this area. It would fill this much up to the, to the
top of the strut and then carry on probably up to the bottom of the floor
level before it then goes over into the next bit. With half of the bricks now
removed and the area cleaned up a bit, I can re-lay the floor and screw it down.
I'm not reusing previous screw holes as that could cause the floor panel to
loosen. I'm also using twice the amount of screws to re-lay each panel, to keep it
nice and tight and reduce the possibility of a squeaky floor in years
to come. So in a previous episode I discussed this lovely stuff. It's the
spray foam on the inside of Alice and this is the insulation. Now I talked
about how it bubbled and how there were bits missing and I wasn't really very
happy with it. I contacted Collingwood Boats and they
have contacted Narrowboats Ltd who were the broker that I purchased the boat
through. And they've both replied to me and they've apologised, the fact that there's
bits missing. They've said that if I wanted to, anywhere in the country, they would
send someone out and fix those and fill those gaps because that's under warranty.
And they've also apologised for the fact that they haven't told me that they do
provide a cutback service. They could provide that service as, at an additional
cost. Once I get started on these because I've got the multi-tool, it doesn't
really take that long, it's just a little bit daunting in the early stages. So just
be aware of that but I'm happy with their apology and what's done, is done.
I've now battened down both sides of the boat below the gunnel and I plan to
fix any heating or water pipework to the battens, to keep the pipes behind
the paneling and off the floor. I fitted the floor back down now and I wanted a
way of looking into the the bilge area of the boat, at all the different stages
knowing that the water won't carry on, to periodically check. Now I could just
drill a nice big hole and have a look but then that will leave a little dimple
in any carpet or flooring that I lay down. So instead, I've decided to use
something from a company called Super Rod and it's this bit of kit. It's
called a Cavity Master Kit. It's mainly used in industrial buildings, where it's
a quick job to get in drill a hole, pull some cables or some pipe work, tap the
hole off and move on and you can do that loads and loads of times throughout a
building. I have known Super Rod, I'm friends with the owner of Super Rod and
I have seen this kit and I know it works. So I've decided this is what I'm going
to get. I didn't get it from him I purchased it from Screwfix actually, in
Nottingham and I'll show you how I'm going to use it.
The kit is simply a wooden hole saw of around 100 millimetres and it uses a
drill and arbor to keep the saw centre. Normally you'd have a hole and a ring
and then the centre bit of wood that falls through. On this saw however, is a
downward blade system that cuts a secondary, shallower groove in the floor.
Included in the set of five steel plates but are 122 millimetres in width and two
millimetres thick. These simply sit in the groove and not only keep the floor
level but can also be walked on, without any carpet falling in the hole. I'll do
this at set spaces for every strutted area down the boat, so I can always take
a quick peek to see if the bilge is dry or not. Next week I sort the radiator
and shower pipe work out, and fix it in its final place. Plus I'll talk about the
paint I'm playing to use on Alice's exterior. Don't forget to click Subscribe
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until next time, see you later.