Humber Ocean Pro 5.5M Restoration

[Balthazar]

This RIB was in a quite poor shape when I bough her and all tubes where losing the pressure very quickly, in a couple of days everything was almost flat.

I have replaced the inner Leafield A7 valves with new ones but leaks continued. I did a soap water test and found out that the air was escaping from under some of the wear patches that were probaly incorrectly fitted at the time of repair. Some of them were easy to pull off, plrobably glued with basic contact glue. I found 2 patches that were glued with black silicone

(click to see video)


I stripped all the whear patches using the heat gun and MEK solvent. It took me about 2 days full time just to remove all the patches, quick repars and clean the glue. I tried to clean teh glue with acetone and MEK but the glue being more than 20 years old there was no other way than a mechanical mean of removal. I bought online 3 brushes for hypalon cleaning and using my power drill cleaned everything (one brush only needed finally).

[Balthazar]

In some places there were patches over patches over patches, looks like the previous owner was chasing the leaks but still using the basic contact glue so nothing really held well.

[Balthazar]

[Balthazar]

In total I used about 3.5 litres of Bostik 2402 two part glue, standard procedure, sanding down with 60 grit, cleaning with MEK, primer coat (30 min) followed by final coat (3-5 min).

To patch everything back took me about 3 more days full time, could not do faster as some places needed to be deflated and loosely reinflated, rolled down etc.

[Balthazar]

I started by opening the previous holes a bit wider and fitting the inner patches. Took me twice to get them right.

Then I have cut 100mm wide bands and glued them overlaping every seam. Then all the new whear patches were cut in sizes that can overlap these bands and have 30mm space between them





[url=https://flic.kr/p/2mfsEcq]

[Balthazar]

Final result is not bad at all, it is not the sexiest RIB on Thames but the tubes hold the 2.5PSI pretty well for about 7-10 days before the next pump up. I guess the valves still leaking despite the new membranes kits, I will replace them in the winted by C7 Leafield.















The trial of the Arctic Grey as colour for whear patches was not very succesful for Thames, cause of all the mud in the water there are lots of dirty marks and droplets just accumulating after each trip. I think when the time will come for re-tubing I will go for Neptune Grey with Military Grey whear patches.

[Balthazar]

Forgot to upload the umages of the original state of the boat









[url=https://www.flickr.com/gp/193600048@N05/VhT16G]