Empire Foam Solutions has had the pleasure to provide one-stop flotation foam solutions for clients across the United States. This includes our marine grade foam that is coast guard approved.
Check out some of our success in recent projects, helping our customers with their boat, dock, and barge foam.
In 2017, the Derecktor Shipyards of Mamaroneck, NY had a local private home customer with a dock that was failing. It was a rather large, heavily built, steel dock. They called us to fill the “barge” sections with our 2.2 CG Approved Flotation Foam, thereby providing the customer with a long-term solution. They could have patched the leaks they could locate, but tiny, relentless leaks are tough to find. In addition, this dock did not have a lot of reserve buoyancy. Since even one leak will eventually prove problematic, the major expense of disconnecting from the shore mounts, transporting to the shipyard, locating and repairing the leak, will likely be repeated many times. To implement the solution, fabricators cut access holes for us and we installed our 2.2 CG Approved Flotation Foam and filled the sections – top to bottom, end to end. They then patched the holes, painted the barge and relaunched in very short order. This provided a permanent solution.
Carver Companies contacted us in 2017 to help them upgrade the long-term safety of two brand new buoys they were building at the Port Of Coeymans. These buoys are being used to moor transport barges queuing up for trips up and down the Hudson River to points as far north as Albany. The buoys take a lot of stress due to the currents, winds and size of the transport barges. In the past, buoys had leaked and sunk, necessitating a very expensive recovery project. By filling the new buoys with our Aloha Flotation Foam, Carver Companies would be able to deploy the buoys and never have to worry about losing one (along with the massive mooring chain) to the murky depths of the Hudson River. To implement the solution, Carver Companies delivered two of their buoys to our factory. We then filled them with flotation foam. The buoys were then transported back to Carver where they welded up the access port, painted them and deployed them in the Hudson River down near New York City.
The NY State Canal Corp The Canal Corporation runs the New York State Canal System, which includes the Erie, Champlain, Oswego and Cayuga-Seneca canals. Spanning 524 miles, the waterway links the Hudson River with the Great Lakes, the Finger Lakes and Lake Champlain. In 2012 the Canal Corp decided to address the un-maintainable condition of 6 of their work barges. In spite of the Canal Corp having their own dry-docks the barges were so riddled with pin-hole leaks that they couldn’t keep ahead of them. Constant pumping had become the rule for this group of barges and having them in a constant state of imminent sinking was deemed no longer acceptable. They knew that foam filling was a very viable option as they had 2 barges built in the 50s that had been foam filled in the early 80s and these two barges were still in service in 2012. All the other barges of that vintage had been scrapped due to excessive leaking. We won the bid and filled them with our Aloha Flotation Foam, solving all the headaches and expense of constant pumping and leak patching.
In 2019, EMS contacted us with a challenge they had with a “landing barge” they own and operate. The barge holds a coal hopper, attached to a conveyer belt system that terminates at another hopper up on the riverbank. The riverbank hopper is used to load dump trucks, on a non-stop basis – with coal that is used to fire the power plant at one of Alcoa’s major aluminum manufacturing facilities Newburgh, KY.. The barge was leaking and when the metal gets thin it is possible to suffer a rupture. The other issue was transporting it to a shipyard for repair or replacement. As you can see in the video and attached pictures, it would have been an expensive operation to disconnect, remove the hopper and conveyor system, transport it to a drydock, repair/reskin and then re-install. In two weeks, we were able to install over 3’ of our 2+ lb/cu.ft. flotation foam, without moving any of the equipment or the barge itself. Now the “landing barge” is ready for many years of worry-free service.
“Empire Foam Solutions and their installers were professional and very knowledgeable, clearly experts in the creative installation of their innovative flotation foam for the maritime industry. They provided us with a complete solution to replacing our barge that saved us significant costs over replacement/conventional repair of our conveyor termination barge.” —Bob Aldrich of Evansville Marine Service, Inc.
In 2018, Rene Cross, owner of the Cypress Cove Marina in Venice, LA called desiring to save his beautiful houseboat from having to have an entire new bottom. The cost of installing a new bottom when compared to installing our flotation foam to one foot about the waterline was significant. The houseboat was pulled out of the water and the compartments flushed and cleaned in preparation for the foam installation. Our installers filled the bottom to approximately 1’ over the normal waterline. As a result, the houseboat is at a permanent berth in the marina and will be a trouble-free home for the foreseeable future.
