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I never hear anyone complaining about the noise of my vintage engine i never hear anyone complaining I never hear pardon friday

There is no need to feel guilty. Running engines to heat water and charge batteries is normal, and sometimes we don't want to move. Worse things happen. Our engines will sound much better than my banjo practice, traffic and train noise. Rog

Had a transit van on bridge 32 of the L+L last year. Driver ignored red lights and kept coming. He stopped on the bridge with both barriers down hurling abuse at me. I spotted a police car in the queue behind him so I called the PC over. White van man was later prosecuted for failing to conform to a red traffic signal. Yeah !!!!

Yesterday I cruised for over two hours in pouring rain which topped the batteries up. I passed dozens of solar boats moored up, in the dry, running their engines cos solar provided zilch. The rule seems to be 'I hate running engines ... unless it's mine'. As I said, there's no need to feel guilty, it's what boaters do to have hot water and electric. Boaters will understand Rog

They dont work

Of course they have gone down in price. All fantastic bits of kit fall in price when in great demand!! ?

Oh no. Don't go with my advice. Nobody ever does. If it all goes horribly wrong, blame dr bob, otherwise it was my idea.

I'm not too sure how many you can get on a squirrel, would think that when the squirrel's legs start to get bandy, you've gone too far. You should get a vet's doc's advice. Think we'll go for Rusty's suggestion... thanks again Rusty! I might get this one for Christmas too

https://www.fluesystems.com/shop/baby-equaliser-stove-fan.html @Dr Bob said they are brilliant, he's a doctor. I listened to the doctors advise. It goes round, and i paid more than 22 quid, but not yet convinced it works. The supplier is also good.

Thought I’d give an update now it’s been over 6 months since I fitted the 4x new US2200 batteries. Just to say, the batteries are performing very well. As time has passed, they have actually got better. We’ve replaced the 240v fridge with a 12v Inlander and added another 100w solar (total now 400w) and beefed up the solar controller to battery cables. All I can say is that the previous woes of the 4x Halfords 115ahr are over. Over the summer, I’ve not needed to run the engine unless I need hot water when moored up for a few days. Even with the Mikuni running (it’s getting cooler now), inverter on and everything charging (phones,iPad etc), I’ve never seen the battery voltage drop below 12.25 volts under load. Even with a whole evenings TV (240v), the batteries never read below 12.4 in the morning. Any, suffice to say, they done the job for our boat. Hope this helps anyone thinking about fitting US2200 batteries. Yes, I know T105’s are very popular too but I chose US2200 as like to be a bit differently.

You know we had that business of teapots on top of boats as some sort of code a couple years back? Maybe we could agree something similar to mean “I’m a grumpy sod so don’t moor near me, run your engine in my hearing or work my locks for me”. Suggestions for what it should be? Maybe a guzunder, decorated or not as preferred, to mean p*ss off!

There's only one manifold gasket, it spans all five ports

Happened to me on the L&L s few years ago. Lady driver in 4-track drove past the warning lights as the barriers dropped. Stuck between the barriers I just carried on swinging the bridge, much to the amusement of the other drivers. Didn't get eye contact for so,me reason?

Swerving off at a tangent Dr Bob, I often see your "LiFePo4" written as "LiFeP04", i.e. with a zero instead of a letter O. Being a chemist I imagine you are writing it correctly. Even my indolent google and perusal of the periodic table has failed failed to answer this question for me. And while I'm on, and you being a chemist, I have this prescription from my doctor, are you open today?

This all depends on wether you are a hobby boater or not. Hobby boaters make use of all such stuff in their home much the same as liveaboards who are in their boat home. We never ever run our engine outside permitted hours but need leccy like people in houses and don't live like Fred and Wilma Flintsone. Perhaps we liveaboards should have a banner proclaiming us as such so hobby boaters are forewarned? Ahh so that's why you keep knackering your batteries then Mike ?

The old Housing benefit system was a local system with local knowledge and local responsibility. There was access through your councillor. The new system has none of these features and is bound to fail, or at least fail its claimants.

Oxfordshire Narrowboats are particularly well situated between locks, about a mile one way and a mile and a quarter the other way. Whoever does the first show out north, goes to the lock to do lock demos for all the northbound boats and whoever does the first show out south does the same for boats in that direction. They rest of the show outs are given steering tuition to the first bridge and then sent on their merry way to the lock, the guy doing the show out then walks back to base to do another show out. all customers are sent by email a copy of our hand book and a link to the CRT boating video. On check in they are asked if they have read and understood the hand book and sign in to say that they have, or asked to read it then sign. they are then shown through how every thing on the boat works, given a demos on how to tie up etc and boat handling tuition whilst underway. whilst 70-80% of customers do what is told to them the rest seem to think they know better. Many boats come back to Heyford for their last night, as they are due back at 8:30-9:00am; when I walk the dog of an evening it is quite unbelievable how many of them are using bow, stern and centre lines to moor up; with ropes at 90% to the boat instead of the 45% they were instructed to do and with ropes tied to the mooring pins instead of going around the pin and tying to the boat, again as instructed. Often this is done next to Armco railing with the nappy pins left in the lockers. So whilst some may say certain hire boat companies don't do enough training you also need to realise that some people don't or won't listen and a vast proportion of people are so terminally thick that is a miracle we ever managed to climb out of the Stone Age

A fun trip earlier this week. Main point of wider interest is that there is now a lot of tideway tunnel construction activity on the river, and more tug traffic. Important to read the notices to mariners and watch out for obstructions. Nasty one below Vauxhall bridge where the duck boats used to launch. https://nbsg.wordpress.com/2018/08/22/teddington-to-limehouse/

Blimey, at that price I would buy three. I think they are made of aluminium though, not steel. The duck is unanimous in saying this particular fan works. He was part of the Ultimate test of ecofans, reported in a thread earlier in the year. Ours worked famously again yesterday but unfortunately it didnt go round today. I think the fire went out. eta....Go on Rusty, put the link up!

We came down the flight a few days ago during the early rush at 0900 - I thanked the volockie for opening both locks to clear the queue. Two CRT guys then gave him some grief for not consulting them first - he gave a spirited rebuttal along the lines that they were not there at the time?

I'd like to offer a word of support for the much maligned volockies at Hillmorton who have managed to temper the idiotic 'one lock of each pair is closed to save water' edict from CRT with some commonsense. Namely they've taken it upon themselves to open all the locks when queues build up. (The other morning there were 12 boats waiting at the top when the locks opened and only one coming the other way.) If they weren't there, you'd just have to wait – no jobsworth from CRT would be coming out to unlock them. And just as a footnote, there was a volockie on duty all day Sunday in the pouring rain – and there were plenty glad of the help.

Yep its because ..... wait for it... they dont work. Our bulkhead is 9 feet from the fire. Our bed is against the bulkhead. It was cold. we bought an eco fan. It turned at speed. No change. Looked at wind pattern with smoke. It stops 4 feet from stove. All fan does is turn heat into bearing noise. The floodgates are open. Eco fan myths abound. Time to book flights back to australia.

Blimey, just seen the price down from £74.40 to £22.32 - like you said a steel!

Very happy with mine, Leoch not ultra expensive. Two years in they still appear to have full capacity the LA's they replaced died under 3 years and were definately sad at this age. There are two types of AGM one charges at 14.4 and t'other ar 14.8 volts this voltage must not be exceeded or you will damage them. I do have Solar(tracer mppt) and this has had to be tweaked to avoid any equalisation charge, I have also had to change the victron voltages and again stop it equalising, the alternator fortunately was already 14.4 max so that was OK. The SOC voltages are also different with 100% being 12.9-13.0 volts which is actually a benefit, but 50% is also higher at 12.3 volts. As to value for money ask in 18 months time and if they are still good, they will be getting cheaper than the LA's I had before.

We have a four blade fan that came free with our hobbit stove, I think the more blades the better.

LiFePO4 Put sub and /sub in square brackets before and after the 4. So {sub}4{/sub} except with square brackets. It’s far more effective to use your tongue.

well dogless i am sure we can get away with to banjos ,,image over 200 of them .thats where mr is heading for this weekend ,i wonder how many engines would you need to run to drown out that lot ..lol.

I've always called them "midday" and "midnight", seems to prevent confusion ☺"

Not a chemist, though my father was. Lithium Iron Phosphate - LiFePO(subscript)4 is how it should be written. But I haven't worked out how to get the subscript

Had to give u a greenie for this post. Old knacker so called trad engines also do my head in and I always wonder how the hell people put up with them. Someone came the other direction from us on the Oxford summit pound today and we heard them coming for about 600 yards. The blokes missus was stood on the pointy end whilst he stood at the back with the splitter ruining his lungs and ear drums! We are moored int middle of nowhere now with only enough Armco for our boat so no one will moor anywhere near us tonight ?

I suppose I'm a hobby boater as my liveaboard days were twenty years back. Hot water and fridge run silently on gas, 9" TV doesn't eat much battery and new LED lights even less. Hobby boaters shouldn't need to run their engines anyway, they should be out cruising about charging their batteries, not sitting under a tree for ages running their washing machines. I only really object to engines running when they poison me with fumes. Musicians tend to get irritated by outside noise, especially stuff with an irregular beat - old trad engines nearly drive me insane. So I find it disturbing, but I've got the choice of staying and putting up with it or, luckily, I've got an engine and can bugger off. I'm not denying anyone the right to run the damn things within the usual hours, it's my own reaction that's the annoying thing. Gareth was probably hearing the noise from Creamfields Festival at Daresbury - apparently it was annoying everyone in Northwich too.

oh dogless your that other banjo player,two now .please no more ..

Just remembered Victron do something similar..... how ever it’s input is 7amps from car/solar or 3amps from mains, so not a great improvement. https://www.victronenergy.com/batteries/peak-power-pack just re-read you can fast charge via a battery charger on one of the inputs to 40amp. So it may be what your looking for?

Bizzard started it by talking about pins and effergies ?

Knocked this up with an old ladder and two fancy lockable hinges.

I get people knocking on the boat complaining that I turned the Kelvin OFF. "Hey mate, I was enjoying listening to your engine, why you turn it OFF?!"

A brief scan through VNC shows only three threads on the subject currently running. I reckon it peaked at about 100,000.

Running engines is a regrettable part of boating life for those who are not hurtling around the system everyday. Solar is not reliable enough in this country .Modern engines are not that noisy and is a steady constant noise .The worst is the Generator which ramps up and down as load changes these tend to be sat out in the open .The so called trad engine is far noisier but who will complain about that noise.

Not in my case. I leave the microwave in the boot of the car (only use it when we're in the marina) and cooking is gas. We also opted not to use the 24" TV and DVD player last night to save a few AHs. The batteries were only needed to power a coup!e of LED lights, the water pump and, most importantly, the 12v fridge. Don't want my sausages from https://thepigplace.co.uk going off!

Just out of curiosity, when you heard the other engines being run, why didn't you run yours at the same time? If everybody did the same you'd achieve your ideal result.

Just imagine how dreadful it must be for the poor fishermen on the canal bankside who've found a nice, quiet and peaceful spot to while away the hours and every so often a noisy canalboat comes past to destroy the peace, you think you have a problem? If we've going to complain about each other, wait until the bankside residents start complaining about your smoking chimney's. I have to say I'm passively indifferent to other people running their engines, if it were to annoy me, my boat can be moved

Used to be one of my favourite spots, much as Tixall was. I don't bother any more as the noise drives me mad. Never understood why anyone would want to moor up somewhere for the peace and quiet and then spend most of the day listening to their engine, very often pumping fumes into someone else's living space.

Ah, I see - I always sail early from those because there always seems to be folk running their engines...

Do you score points for the length of the queue (double for 4x4's)? We do at the lift bride at Wrenbury ! I am the champion at the moment with 4 cars,1 white van ,a bus AND the bin lorry ! Also at the same bridge I had a cyclist try to run the lights ....he came to a rather undignified halt ?

Through the side of the hull, silly.

Don't you just love it when a car driver sitting at the barrier asks the bridge operator "Are you going to be long?". The correct answer is "About 48 feet" [or whatever applies to your particular boat].

I usually stop for tea until the other boat has gone away, But if I do happen to share, I assess their ability and if I don't find them competent I stop for tea until they have gone away. I'm the captain obviously, and I have my captains cloth cap. There's no excuse for rudeness. If you were behind me in a flight I'd immediately wave you past, obviously. 'Tis the courteous thing to do innit. IF you were catching me up, that is