Skipper's Cabin
The destruction in the skipper's cabin continues apace. Although not a priority for us as we will be doing the cargo hold first it will be necessary to strip it all back in order to shot blast the inside of the cabin. Additionally there are areas of the steel floor which have completely given way and I suspect (without a crystal ball or any form of 'rust diviner') that the entire floor will need to be removed and steel welded over. I believe this is from the curved sides of the rear of the barge being a condenser for warm air and the associated condensation slipping down to the steel subfloor and then rusting away. This is one of the problems with the old fashioned way of insulating with rockwool and wire to hold the insulation away from the steel.
As I ripped out the rear of the cabin I found some 'insulation' which was just scrunched up newspaper. As can be seen from the date, it's been some considerable time since it was renovated. Hence why the floor has rusted through...
I have made good progress with the cabin, but I have so much reclaimed wood which was put in there for safekeeping that it's now getting in the way. Plus I hate having to rip out the rockwool insulation as the dust it kicks up gives me a really bad rash on my arms which itches like hell and takes a good 2-3 hours to subside after a shower. The dust, stifling heat and limited through flow of air makes it an unpleasant work environment to say the least.
On a slightly different note, a local film producer contacted me to discuss making a film about Zeelandia. yesterday evening we spent a couple of hours on board and this was the end result...
Pretty cool right? We are hoping to get some more filming done when I start doing some fun stuff like welding the floor and he has (possibly foolishly) agreed to come on the barge to Sharpness and document the trip and some of the work whilst she is in dry dock. As a shameless plug in thanks for the rather amazing video, check out his website which has some other really cool stuff on it.
He is available for corporate work, fun and creative stuff and bar mitzvah's...
Brownian motion-type musings on barge renovation, life and other bits of flotsam.
