Tube Separation

[alexm]

Originally Posted by jwalker

If you look carefully at the video, it's pretty obvious that the front of the tube folded back and tore the cross piece at the bow over the rather sharp corner of the flange. After that the glue simply came apart.

Agreed. It looks like sheer force of water to me, rather than an impact with something solid.

Stills from BBC attached:

[tinker]

This is an avon, damage look familiar?

[jwalker]

No, different problem.

[Downhilldai]

Originally Posted by tinker

This is an avon, damage look familiar?

That's from scraping off the black paint

[codprawn]

Originally Posted by tinker

This is an avon, damage look familiar?

Remember the commercial spec Avons are very different beasts!!!

[tinker]

Had a chance to look at Nos's recently, and that looked like it could be sunk and raised again with no damage occurring.

[Nos4r2]

Originally Posted by tinker

Had a chance to look at Nos's recently, and that looked like it could be sunk and raised again with no damage occurring.

Errrmm... It has been Ask Neil Harvey.

[jace]

Hi All

We we’re also perturbed by the incident and of course wanted to find out the cause, we were very disappointed with the one sided media coverage, especially from Somerset Radio who, like a few of these posts have jumped to conclusions without knowing the full facts. Thanks to everyone else for balancing out the discussion.

Can I assure you and any Ribcraft owner, there’s not a design problem with our tube flange or in the way we attach the tubes. The majority of our hulls were designed by the same Navel Architect who designed the commercial hulls for the oldest brand of UK Rib when he retired, there’s no difference in the way we attach the tubes, the size and design of the tube flange to that of the original design. We manufacturer over 150 Ribs per year in the UK, do you not think that if we ever thought there were a design or manufacturing issue, we would be the first to address it?

The Statements which are completely false
1) “This was a glue or bonding failure” Incorrect, our initial findings are that the fabric has delaminated due to the extreme force exerted on the tubes.
2) “The boat is new, only just three years old” Incorrect, the boat is five years old and has had a very hard life, it’s a shame the BBC couldn’t have looked at its own website http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/bristol/2983482.stm

The causes for this failure are unique to this boat and we are working through the issues with Portsihead Lifeboat Trust. The extreme stresses on the tubes we think are exaggerated by the conditions and also by the boat being quite heavy due to her size limitations because of the boathouse, to add to this it has been repowered with twin 115’s Opti’s that are heavier and more powerful than the original Mariner 75 two strokes that we originally recommended and supplied from new.

As a gesture of goodwill, Ribcraft are going to fully repair the tubes at no cost to the Portishead trust, despite the boat being a five year old commercial boat.

I’m not going to reply to any further posts regarding this, I know the way things snowball on a forum, If you have any questions, please direct them to me jason@ribcraft.co.uk

Regards

Jason Purvey
Ribcraft Ltd

[ribraff]

This looks to me like a large wave has hit the bow of the boat either through stuffing or whatever else, as a result the tube has done it's best to seperate from the hull, i have seen and repaired a lot of ribs which have damage to the flange nose patch, it's easy to damage through loading on to the trailer or on a pontoon etc. It's a very important part of keeping the tube on the boat, if it is damaged this is what can happen.
I don't believe that this is a glue failure, once the bow patch and protection has gone the tube will try to seperate through the easiest means possible which will be along the join, fabric will delaminate ususally if pulled from the side and slowly.
On removing a tube for retubing you first apply heat to the bow patch and then find you can easily pull backwards on the understrips along the glue line.
I have very rarely come across the removal of a tube which has reulted in the fabric delaminating when pulling back the understrips.

[Bigmuz7]

Originally Posted by jace

Hi All

We we’re also perturbed by the incident and of course wanted to find out the cause, we were very disappointed with the one sided media coverage, especially from Somerset Radio who, like a few of these posts have jumped to conclusions without knowing the full facts. Thanks to everyone else for balancing out the discussion.
Can I assure you and any Ribcraft owner, there’s not a design problem with our tube flange or in the way we attach the tubes. The majority of our hulls were designed by the same Navel Architect who designed the commercial hulls for the oldest brand of UK Rib when he retired, there’s no difference in the way we attach the tubes, the size and design of the tube flange to that of the original design. We manufacturer over 150 Ribs per year in the UK, do you not think that if we ever thought there were a design or manufacturing issue, we would be the first to address it?
The Statements which are completely false
1) “This was a glue or bonding failure” Incorrect, our initial findings are that the fabric has delaminated due to the extreme force exerted on the tubes.
2) “The boat is new, only just three years old” Incorrect, the boat is five years old and has had a very hard life, it’s a shame the BBC couldn’t have looked at its own website http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/bristol/2983482.stm
The causes for this failure are unique to this boat and we are working through the issues with Portsihead Lifeboat Trust. The extreme stresses on the tubes we think are exaggerated by the conditions and also by the boat being quite heavy due to her size limitations because of the boathouse, to add to this it has been repowered with twin 115’s Opti’s that are heavier and more powerful than the original Mariner 75 two strokes that we originally recommended and supplied from new.
As a gesture of goodwill, Ribcraft are going to fully repair the tubes at no cost to the Portishead trust, despite the boat being a five year old commercial boat.
I’m not going to reply to any further posts regarding this, I know the way things snowball on a forum, If you have any questions, please direct them to me jason@ribcraft.co.uk

Regards

Jason Purvey
Ribcraft Ltd

Thanks for your post Jason .. I wish other manufacturers would come on here more often and be frank with us as the end users, as, in the end, we all want the same thing, to be on the water with decent gear

[Downhilldai]

Originally Posted by ribraff

... i have seen and repaired a lot of ribs .....On removing a tube for retubing ......

How much would it cost to re-toob this boat in Blue Hypalon?

[Nos4r2]

Originally Posted by Downhilldai

How much would it cost to re-toob this boat in Blue Hypalon?

It depends if he cuts his nose off to spite his face while making the pattern...

[BogMonster]

Originally Posted by wavelength

Given the number of humbers knocking about around the world, and the age of a lot of them, used and abused by various dive clubs and commercial operators, they do not seem to figure in the "tube ripping off from the bow due to stuffing into a wave" scenarios, or indeed any detubing situations. I've used them of all ages and all sizes, all over the world, including the Falklands and I have never had a prob with tubes coming unstuck from the front, back or indeed the middle .

Mine came unstuck from the inside, so none of the above


Nice to see Ribcraft responding on this thread, good on them also good to see their response to the boat owner's problem which is very positive.

[chewy]

Nice to see Jase posting what Ribcraft have to say.

It looks as though the max hp is 225hp for that boat.

I've been on Atlantic 21's and 75's when the bow has stuffed and the tube just folds back in and the boat stops pretty quickly. Still no damage though although our boats go away for refits evry few years.

Was on a Humber 5m Assault and that stuffed but all that happened was the bow went right under and filled the boat with water, no damage to the tubes.

It doesn't look as though the boat has hit an object as they is no damage to the hull.

[Chris]

Originally Posted by BogMonster

also good to see their response to the boat owner's problem which is very positive.

I wonder how responsive they would have been were it a private boat and not a highly publicised life boat

[jace]

Originally Posted by Chris

I wonder how responsive they would have been were it a private boat and not a highly publicised life boat

Cheers Chris, very negative of you! We get extremely few issues versus the number of boats we build. If you check back through my previous posts, I think your find we're pretty responsive.

In the past we have gone way beyond the warranty requirements to satisfy customers. As ever if anyone has any direct questions, e-mail me at jason@ribcraft.co.uk

[Downhilldai]

Originally Posted by Chris

I wonder how responsive they would have been ..

Originally Posted by jace

Cheers Chris, very negative of you! ..

I don't see Chris's curiosity as 'very negative'

[PeterM]

Chris comment does ( I feel) carry a degree of cynicism, that to be fair I dont think its 100% warranted . RIBs do fail & break, but this case has had a lot of unfair / one sided press coverage. For any manufacturer to be named on national news & not be given a chance to respond is not fair . At least on here Ribcraft have come forward & while it is easy to put things down to poor manufacture design etc I would hope we would all accept ( and have experianced ) that things do just fail sometimes with no-one at fault.

My own feeling is that ( as had been said RIBCRAFT do appear to go a long way beyond their reasonable obligations)

[simonnud]

[QUOTE=chewy;264741] Nice to see Jase posting what Ribcraft have to say.

It looks as though the max hp is 225hp for that boat.

I've been on Atlantic 21's and 75's when the bow has stuffed and the tube just folds back in and the boat stops pretty quickly. Still no damage though although our boats go away for refits evry few years.


is it possible that the boat is over powered ? if you go hard in to a back of a wave and keep the power on on an atlantic the engines are not powerful enough to do any serious damage twin 115 optis have got alot of torque and power in them. Could it be Helmsman error ?

Secoundly if the boat is keep in a shed damage should of appeared prior to the incident or maybe wearing ? persumibly the boat is cheaked after every use.

Is the MAIB investgating this if not should they be ?

[wavelength]

Fair do's to Jace- there are folk on here who moan that Hugo from Rib Int never replies to criticisms or recognises the forum but Jason has replied to the comments made on here. Very measured and professional response to critcisms on an open forum where not everyone is so open about who they actually are. Tubes shouldn't come off in normal use and if I had a leisure boat of any make and it detoobed from the bow, as some say has happened to them, esp if I had only had it a few years I would be well hacked off. But my experience of Ribcraft has been limited to a few clients with new boats that have been fine - and our local coastguard gp boat. Keeping in mind that it is a only a gp boat and not a rescue craft, it is now 13 years old, on its original tubes, been driven very hard in all sorts of conditions, driven by all and sundry, clouted into the jetty a couple of times that I have seen, and it is still going strong. Not my favourite boat but I doubt many would stand up to this treatment for so long.