Last Sunday KMBC held an open day focused on lifeboats
There was a great turnout and numerous other clubs joined the event.
Here are a few pictures that I took with my phone, I will post more as soon as I have downloaded and sorted those on my camera.
I'm not sure if I posted a little run at Spencer's pool of my 44 lifeboat . Our lifeboats had to have a closed cabin, and therefore ours were not like the American open cockpit style due to our inclement weather or maybe we were smarter than the Americans and kept our crews warm year-round.😀
As of a few recent Spencers events someone said clockwise pattern. Near the end of the event last weekend a few gents wanted to run faster-electrics so everybody pulled their warships out.
HMS Exploit is an Archer-class (or P2000) patrol vessel of the British Royal Navy, built in Woolston by Vosper Thornycroft and commissioned in 1988.[1][2] She is assigned to the Royal Navy Coastal Forces Squadron, carrying out a range of activities both in the U.K. and overseas.
The ship's company consists of a permanent staff of the commanding officer, two senior rates and two junior rates, but can take up to twelve students with training officers usually embarked when conducting navigational training. Whilst at sea, students are able to put into practice navigation and seamanship skills they have learnt in the classroom during weekly training nights. These include chart planning, acting as Officer of the Watch, using the ship's radar and carrying out seamanship evolutions from anchoring to securing alongside. Instruction is given in engineering, firefighting, damage control and ship handling. The ship is based in HMNB Portsmouth.
Operational history
Royal Naval Auxiliary Service
XSV Exploit was originally ordered for the now defunct Royal Naval Auxiliary Service (RNXS) and had a distinctive black hull like other RNXS vessels.
On 19 March 1994, a serious machinery space fire occurred on Exploit approximately 30 miles off Lundy island as she was being transferred to Portsmouth from Greenock as part of the managed run down of the service by RNXS crew. The Padstow lifeboat and the RAF SAR Helicopter from Chivenor, were scrambled, and a tanker on route to Milford Haven was diverted to help, but were not needed. The fire was later attributed to a major mechanical failure of the starboard main engine, resulting in a large hole in the sump casing. The fire spread quickly to the air ducts, igniting various rubber coolant pipes causing thick acrid smoke.[3]
Royal Navy
In June 2017, Exploit, in company with HM Ships Smiter, Ranger and Archer, deployed to the Baltic to take part in the NATO BALTOPS exercise, the first time that Royal Navy P2000s have been involved in such an exercise.[4]
In the early 2020s, Exploit, along with other Archer-class vessels, was given a more operational role as part of the reconstituted Coastal Forces Squadron. In early 2024, Exploit and three of her sister ships deployed to northern Norway as part of the NATO exercise "Steadfast Defender".[5]
The Tamar lifeboat was the first to be fitted with an integrated electronic Systems and Information Management System (SIMS), allowing the crew to operate the all-weather lifeboat from the safety of their shock-absorbing seats.
When crashing through the waves, the Tamar’s pioneering seat design absorbs most of the energy on impact, reducing the strain on crew members’ backs.
The Tamar is designed to be launched from a slipway – her mast and aerials can be lowered to fit inside a boathouse – and she can also lie afloat.
Tamar class lifeboats have gradually replaced some of our Tyne class lifeboats that have reached the end of their operational lives as part of our plans for a faster and more efficient 25-knot all-weather lifeboat fleet.
Following a tradition of naming our modern lifeboats after rivers, the Tamar is named after the Tamar River, which is 50 miles long and forms a natural boundary between Devon and Cornwall.
New Brighton Steam Lifeboat Video at Southport MBC 09 March 2025
The lifeboat’s hull was of best quality steel, the plates being triple rivetted together with 72,000 rivets – torpedo boats of the period were double rivetted – without a single continuous seam, in order to counter the stresses smashing into waves, whereas other steel hulls were single rivetted. It was not self-righting beyond 110°, the mast being 20° below the horizontal, but featured modified end boxes designed similarly to self-righting vessels, and contained fifteen water tight compartments, bilge pumps and steam ejectors. 15.24m long with overall beam of 4.36m and 1.07m deep, including a flush deck with inset accommodation for up to 40 persons, it was powered by twin horizontal direct acting compound steam engines complete with one boiler and at full speed, a 1,000-rpm fan created forced draught, and it had twin funnels. Recognition must be given to the fortitude of the engine room crew including stokers of these steam lifeboats when being tossed around in storms but the forced draught would have provided ample ventilation. A fuller account may be read here.
This lifeboat was transferred in 1892 to New Brighton temporarily then was based at Holyhead – there, in 1901, while on passage, a boiler room explosion killed two firemen. It was retired from service in 1928.
Dave and I agreed that today was not going to be a lifeboat day so my Aero Naut Classic and Dave’s Fairey Huntsman and cabin cruiser had a trip out. My DF65 also got its keel wet but I didn’t get pictures of that.
I was with friends at Hoylake boating lake yesterday and one of them has a Fairey Huntsman kit to build without instructions. Does Dave have the build instructions for his by any chance, such that he could share the information with us? So his kit can be built without too much guess work.
Colin
Here we have the current and 2 previous Dungeness lifeboats, my Rother & Mersey and a pals Shanon. The other model with the Rother is a Medina prototype. All models are 1/12th scale, photos are at Little Radford MBC.
My recently refurbished 1/12th Scale Brede Lifeboat
Modelled on RNLB 33 - 07 Inner Wheel towards the later end of her service when the enclosed radar had been replaced by the Furuno rotating array. I know its to fast for scale speed but I was enjoying its first outing post refurbishment!