Underwater hull cleaning equipment developed in 1977 by Peter Henry and John Murphy in Western Australia. 

Both Peter and John are commercial diving specialists, and developed the underwater boat hull cleaning equipment over a period of one year. This Floating Hydraulic Underwater Hull Cleaning (FHUC) machine was the first and only one of its kind ever developed, with a material development cost close to $5000 AUS, it was so successful that a further three commercial diving FHUC hull cleaning machines were then built, to cater for demand.

Back in 1977 at the time of development of the FHUC hull cleaning machine, Fremantle Western Australia allowed tuna fishing boats to come into port for maintenance and repairs, which frequently resulted in the hull of these tuna boats requiring extensive scrubbing, a time consuming job, which the FHUC machine reduced by over two hours.

Boat hull cleaning machine being lowered

Boat hull cleaning machine

As shown above during lowering the divers air hose can be easily seen on the left (yellow) coming from the onboard air compressor, and the main cleaning brush hydraulic hose can be seen to the right of the water cooled hydraulic unit.

Transported and moved easily using its own specifically designed trailer, the FHUC hull cleaning machine would self lower and raise itself by powering the hoist directly available from the FHUC machine itself, in this way the diver always maintained complete control of the FHUC.

The design of the FHUC allowed a single diver to completely operate the machine. The motor used onboard was a 10 horse power Briggs and Stratton, fitted with built in electric starter, this motor provided all the power needed to drive the hydraulic line for the brush head, which was fully controlled by the diver.

The FHUC machine units remained in full service for over four years, mainly in the Fremantle port area, before Government policy changed and tuna vessels were not allowed to come to port in Fremantle.

After Government policy changed and tuna vessels were not allowed to come to port in Fremantle, the FHUC machines were then purchased by commercial companies in the Philippines, where they were sent and remain in use even today.

Picture to the right shows Peter Henry (right) and John Murphy (left) preparing a FHUC machine for use, ready to be lowered and used on the tuna boat behind them.

The image below shows divers testing the initial FHUC machine. A small onboard air compressor provided a backup for the land based hookah air unit.
 

Image to the right shows the complete FHUC machine unit and land air compressor stored ready for next time it is required.

The FHUC machine stored.