of an additional stud torn from a Palliser shell, found amongst the wreckage within the turret. She was repaired at Malta. Thunderer was then regarded as an unlucky ship and was placed in reserve at Malta in 1881 and had her machinery overhauled. Her armament was augmented with a pair of torpedo launchers and a half-dozen 1-inch (25 mm) Nordenfelt guns on the hurricane deck. She was recommissioned in 1885 and remained with the Mediterranean Fleet until she was paid off at Chatham Dockyard. The future King George V served aboard Thunderer in 1885–86. The ship was assigned to the Portsmouth Reserve in January 1888 before beginning a major modernisation the following year. Her guns were replaced by four breech-loading 10-inch guns. To improve her defence against torpedo boats, her Nordenfelt guns were replaced by six quick-firing (QF) 6-pounder and eight QF 3-pounder Hotchkiss guns. Thunderers machinery was replaced by inverted triple-expansion steam engines and cylindrical boilers. Their increased output of increased her speed to and their more economical consumption of coal allowed the coal storage to be reduced to . The ship rejoined the Mediterranean Fleet in March 1891, but was forced to return home in September 1892 with persistent boiler problems and she was reduced to the Chatham reserve. Thunderer became the guard ship at Pembroke Dock in May 1895 and remained there until she returned to the Chatham reserve in December 1900. The ship was refitted there as an emergency ship in 1902, but was taken out of service five years later. Thunderer was sold for scrap for £19,500 on 13 September 1909. The Devastation'' class became more popular among the civilian population and in the Royal Navy as the ships got older. Rear-Admiral John Wilson, a former captain of the ship, stated in a meeting of the Royal United Services Institute discussing the most acceptable types of battleship in 1884, "I also agree with my friend Captain Colomb that we have no type of ship to my fancy equal to the or the good old Thunderer. Give me the Thunderer, the hull of the Thunderer; she had bad engines, she was not arranged as I would like inside, she was badly gunned as we all know, and she had not enough light gun or sufficient armaments; but she carried of coal, could steam at 10 knots from here to the Cape, and could fight any ship