Riveted steel hull

Hi all
Martyn and Sam here! I have fallen upon this site, perhaps I should start with a short )) story first....
We bought a lovely little Seamaster 27 back in 96 and moved on board, job done , I am an engineer Sam's job is to look after me
In about 2005 we decided to move onto a bigger vessel, I was working in a boatyard, we had limited funds so we bought a restoration project..
What we have is a 1940 ish steel hull, originally galvanised and rivetted construction.. The bottom had been overplated at least 3 times! So I cut back , replated, rebuilt superstructure , fitted a couple of engines , fitted out moved on board had a pot noodle and a glass of red wine.... love the boat lived on for nearly ten years , motored around the East Coast and English Channel....
Happy Days (you can Google Elephant Daze and find us)
Does anyone have any idea what this vessel may have been???
I shall be adding photographs....
I hope someone can help, or! I hope we can have natter about old steel boats

 

Hello and welcome to the site

I've attached one of your pictures. The boat looks like a Pilot boat, or Harbourmasters launch, or Naval launch. What history if any do you have ? It looks like a Dutch build.

cheers

 

Hi Mike
We have virtually no history, we bought the boat as a shell, there were 2 little brass plates saying "grease sternglands daily" on board and the angle iron ribs were stamped Port Talbert Steel.
Everything from deck level up we fabricated ourselves to make the vessel a comfortable live aboard for 2.
There is evidence the hull had 4 lifting points (can still be seen on pictures although lifting point cut off)so I suspect this was intended to sit on a ship!
Thanks for the interest.

 

Could well have been a Royal Navy Pinnace although not the earlier 'Standard Royal Navy Pinnace' they were an older design.
I'd expect this is 40's but hard to nail down considering the boat may have been changed more than once.

Many similar sized similar looking naval launches of various designs were in use through the war as both covered and open boats.

 

Hi Mike
If I had to make a guess I would say the vessel was some kind of open boat.
Mid ships there was evidence of a water tight bulkhead, but I never found firm evidence of carrying tanks for either fresh water or fuel.
I assume the boat was always twin engined however I converted her from single rudder to twin, I agree with you on the date 1940s onwards, originally the hull was galvanised and plate thickness was about 3/16 at a guess, I cut back to as much original plate as possible and then welded fresh plate on in small plates welding everyplate to anything firm and original and overlapping the next plate slightly, there's lots of frames (18" spacing from memory)small bilge keels were present but I remade these, however the bilge keels I removed looked home made also. Think that's as much as I can think of for now.
Once again thanks for showing interest.