Team Britannia

Not sure which episode it will be, but keep your eyes peeled for "Britain by Boat," a new travel series on Channel 5 on Fridays at 8 pm. Hosted by TV icons Michael Buerk and John Sergeant, one episode sees Alan Priddy giving them a guided tour of Excalibur in her shed at ABC Marine Alloy Boats on Hayling Island, and then they visit the yard next door, where Sir Alec Rose's legendary yacht Lively Lady was being restored. It was filmed during the summer, before Excalibur's big turn round :-)

This is one of the 16 bilge pumps which will be mounted beneath Excalibur's huge fuel tanks. Supplied to us by Whale, they have a combined pumping volume of 130,000 litres per hour! Standing next to it is one of the mounting brackets which we've custom made - ease of removing the pumps for cleaning is paramount.

This was a couple of months ago, but great to finally see the clip.

The admiral is in Turin today, visiting the good folk at FPT Industrial. What's that all about? We'll let you know... :-)

Our Rowing Marine crew member Lee Spencer paid us a visit today, amid his preparations for next month's attempt at rowing solo across the Atlantic from Gibraltar to Venezuela. His impression of Excalibur? "It's massive!"

It's fair to say last week was rather busy. Lots of commercial visitors. Lots of secret work carried out on the boat, lots of planning for this week and LOTS of filming for a video being presented at the Fort Lauderdale Boat Show this week by a group of very good friends of ours. Alistair and myself are having crash courses in various languages to help out.

It's not every toilet that can boast a 1,200hp extractor fan, but that's pretty much what we have with Excalibur's outside loo, just to the rear of the wheelhouse on the starboard side. A similar airbox on the port side encloses the entrance and steps down into the engine room. The fuel fillers and breathers will also be located here, so unpleasant whiffs will be sucked into the engines. Meanwhile, inside, the wheelhouse has been tidied ready for fitting out :-)

Team Britannia and Goodheart Voyage Ltd have appointed Renee Shuyan Lu as Director of South East Asia Marketing and Sales Division. Apart from her many business interests, Renee is Vice Chairman and General Secretary of the Portsmouth Chinese Association.
We have been working with Renee for some years, and with the growing interest in Team Britannia coming out of Asia, she will be a valuable asset to the project.
Welcome aboard Renee :-)

Wow!!

It might look as though it's awaiting a delicious pizza topping, but this is in fact a sample of a paint finish we're testing for use in Excalibur's storage areas. We'll leave it for a week and then give it a high pressure blasting. If it survives that, we can start painting :-)

Team Britannia update in the September issue of the Institution of Diesel and Gas Turbine Engineers magazine Power Engineer.

You might be thinking that it's three weeks since Excalibur was extracted from her shed at the Aluminium Boatbuilding Company (Alloy Boats), rotated through 180 degrees and put back in again, and not much news since then. That's not to say we haven't been busy. As you can see from the photos, the fairing behind the wheelhouse on the port side is now in place, giving us more advertising space than a London bus! Needless to say, if anyone is interested in getting their logo on ...a floating billboard which will be seen quite literally all over the world, then do get in touch.
The admiral has also been crunching the numbers on the wheelhouse windows, which are going to be pretty substantial. The windscreen panes will be 19 mm (that's 3/4 inch in old money!) toughened glass, with 12 mm (just under 1/2 inch) for the panes along the sides. This goes well beyond Lloyds of London specifications, and is twice the requirement in American build rules. The total weight of glass is 453 kilos!
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Excalibur tucked up in her shed at Alloy Boats :-)

The Clean Green Boating Machines
It’s no longer enough for record-breaking afloat to be the realm of the petrolhead, says Clive Tully. Powerboats pushing the boundaries in speed should also step up to the environmental mark.
http://www.teambritannia.co.uk/the-clean- green-boating-mach…

https://www.portsmouth.co.uk/…/ocean-ra ce-record-bid-leaps-…

She's going to be such a stunner when she's finished :-)