Drum progress

[Tom Bowser]

On board the Drum we are currently getting things ready for a hollywood low budget movie to be filmed next month called The USS Seaviper (villani-rockhill.com). We have been raising money for the past year and after the movie is completed we are going to start restoring the outside by cutting out the rusted metal and welding in new steel and sand blasting and painting. We are furtunate that the boat was permantly put on land six years ago, that is always the major expense.
The we I am talking about is Lesley Waters, the lady that works for the Park and myself. We have been getting major funding support from the USSVI and visitor donations and material donations from a local steel company and Sherwin-Williams paint. It is going to be a slow process as we can't close the boat to visitors and will have to work around them, but we are planning on getting it all sand blasted and painted this year to stabalize it so we can start making repairs.
I will have updates on progress from time to time.
Tom

[Mark Sarsfield]

Tom,

  Have you come up with a cost estimate for your exterior overhaul?.  The Batfish park estimates around $60K for scraping, painting, new deck, etc.  We have the same advantage of being land-locked.  Saves a lot of money on towing and dry dock fees.

[Tom Bowser]

Mark
The steel we need is being donated by Oneal Steel a some what local steel company. Sherwin-Williams is going to donate up to $5,000 at their cost in paint and they are trying to get the sand donated also. The labor will be myshelf as a volunteer and Lesley , the lady that works on the Drum. We will rent a large compressor and blaster for about $550 a month anf I am figuring two months to sand blast and paint exterior and inside all fuel/ballast tanks. We can not shut the boat down to visitors so the sand blasting will be done from sunrise until about 1000 when the visitors start coming to the boat, then we will paint what we have blasted and I will go inside a fuel tank and blast in there. I don't know about where you are but down here we have found scrapping doesn't get deep enough so we are going to sand blast every thing and we have tried all the rust inhibitors and none of them work.
Tom

[Lance Dean]

I've always thought it was a shame that a company like LINE-X wouldn't get into a project like this.  I had the rear bumper of my truck (all steel from a junkyard) professionally sandblasted and immediately coated in LINE-X, and ain't nothing taking that stuff off.

A good sandblasting is worth it's weight in gold, but being near the Gulf like the Drum is, that paint is gonna have to be slapped on QUICK!

[Mark Sarsfield]

The Batfish is near the Arkansas river in eastern Oklahoma.  So, we don't have the salt spray issue to contend with, but we do get a lot of rain. 

I like the sand blasting idea.  $550/month to rent the machine sounds pretty reasonable.  We have a large sand bar on our part of the river.  Maybe we could get the Army Corps of Engineers to dredge it and give it to us.

How do you gain access to the fuel tanks?

[Tom Bowser]

There are access covers along the tank tops under the deck. I am going to cut access holes near the bottoms of the tank to help with ventilation and to shovel the sand out through. You will need to sample the air for flammable fumes and wear an air feed respirator. Most of out tanks have so many holes intem the air is almost fresh.
Tom

[Tom Bowser]

New update.
The movie has been pushed back to the end of Aprill because they don't have their camera yet, it's a new super digital so they will need a learning time also. As soon as we get some warm dry weather we are going to start restoring the stern, look out for flying rust.
Tom Bowser

[Lance Dean]

Things ought to be getting really busy down there really soon. 

[Tom Bowser]

Today we hauled the mark 27 we are restoring back on deck to do some more welding and to test the 220v power we just finished installing. Also we have fun playing with our 27's, we are getting pretty good at bringing them in and out of the boat.

The 220 and 110 circuits we ran are working good, all lightning bolts where they belonged, cominmg out of the welder at the right pace. looks like next week we will start on the stern.
Tom Bowser

[Tom Bowser]

New update
The Mark 27 is complete except for painting.
One of the movie crew is here helping to get ready for the movie and we can now lower and raise #1 scope 5' and we got it to rotate again. Now I can go up and clean the lense. Finally got to se the Batleship the proper way, thru the scope. Tested the dep depth gate to 30'.

Our Navy inspection is the 19th of this month so we will get ready for that shortly. I am hoping to get a litle bit done on the hull before they get here.
Thats about all for now.
Tom Bowser

[Mark Sarsfield]

Tom,

  How much work did it take to restore the hydraulic system?  Did you bring both IMO pumps back on line or just one of them?  Are you pumping low pressure air to the air/oil "flask"?

[Tom Bowser]

Sorry you got all excited, I should have explained to start with. the movie people made a can to hang a f' hydraulic ram in the well and push up on the bottom of the scope, works real good but we can only lower it to the point that the bottom of the scope is even with the top of the well. It does get the lens down to within reach of a short handled brush so we clean it though.
Tom Bowser

[Mark Sarsfield]

the movie people made a can to hang a f' hydraulic ram in the well

Say again?

[Tom Bowser]

Sorry about that, as you can tell I don't proof read very well. That is supposed to be a 5 foot long hydraulic ram or cylinder with a 3 1/4 cylinder and about a 2 inch rod capacity 2000# hydraylic pressure. works great and the more we operate the scope the freer it gets.
Tom

[Mark Sarsfield]

How did you get it into the periscope well to begin with?  Scope probably needs a little grease on the exisitng hydraulic rods/cylinders in the upper housing in the conning tower.