The culmination of more than two years work was marked by Princess Alexandra when she laid the final plank in HMS Warrior’s upper deck replacement project.

The princess is patron of the Victorian ironclad warship, which has been a museum piece in Portsmouth Harbour for more than 15 years, and joined local schoolchildren and renovators for the last act of laying new planks.

“It’s been a pretty big task,” said Philip Barfield, of the Maritime Workshop. “The old pine deck was in a hell of a state, but it’s now been replaced with teak – probably the best wood.”

Project manager Ron Broome, who joined the Royal Navy as a Ganges boy and retired in 1994 as a lieutenant commander, said the team faced a battle with the weather.

“You can’t lay wood when it’s wet. We soon realised that what was needed was something more substantial. So we hit on the idea of using polytunnels – similar to the ones used in market gardens.”

The next task for Maritime Workshop foreman Trevor Ford and his team, who have also worked on Victory and Cutty Sark, will be to re-build Warrior’s flag lockers and fit new galley windows.

This month – the “quietest period for the ship” according to Mr Broome – Warrior will be docked for three weeks for work to her hull. Her new decking should last for up to 75 years.

Earlier in the day, Princess Alexandra visited Type 23 frigate HMS Kent, of which she is sponsor.

The princess, who launched the ship on the Clyde in 1988, met the 174-strong crew, was given a brief tour of the vessel, and learnt about Kent’s recent anti-terrorism deployment in the Gulf.