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Of course kids run on boat roofs, they always have done and hardly any fall off,you can tell because we'd hear about it if they did. And no one said an entire boatload of drunks locking is a goood idea, but it happens occasionally and very little harm gets done. Real boaters get used to the odd idiot and enjoy the vast majority without getting too wound up about it.

Yes. If you are not scared off by the boat, then good luck and we will help as much as we can with advice and suggestions. If you are intending to take the urine from day one, then those of us who get grief from CRT for being genuine continuous cruisers will be quite unfriendly! We have done over 400 miles and 400 locks so far this year. If you want to stay both sides of one bridge every fortnight then stuff you. If you genuinely want to boat then welcome to the community, and we will help you as much as we can.

Nah, it's fine. Just been round the Leicester ring, met loads of nice friendly people, most boaters waved cheerfully and even most fisherplonkers. No drunks, a few kids on roofs, so what? Might be a few more addled brains on the Llangollen next month, but it's all good fun. One's own attitude has a lot to do with it.

Successful boating in a post climate change world, part 2. Going to the shops:

May I ask why - why this specific boat? What is it about this boat that makes you what to pour so much time, energy, and finance into it? For some boats the bottom line at the end of the project is less important that personal accomplishments, however you can't spend what you don't have. An extreme fixer-upper is probably not the best idea for someone with absolutely no experience of boats but if there's a very good reason why you want to do this rather than spend a bit more on a boat that needs less or no work to get you out on the canals then the devil's in the details. Projects usually alway run over budget and time but the less experience you have the more likely this will happen and potentially by a bigger margin too, so if you're doing this to save money then the likely hood is you won't, you need to really breakdown and plan what this whole thing might entail, and what the boat might be worth at the end of it. For me there is rather a lot in your first post the screams too much work for too little return, add to that a lack of experience and no permanent place to work out of and this could all get rather overwhelming. There are a lot of questions to ask yourself here - Tools? Materials? Transport? Removal and disposal of rubbish? Who can help you? Who can you get in to do the stuff you can't? Can you trust them? And how much will they charge? What will you do when the weather is against you? How will you secure things and keep them safe when you're not there? How much time do you have realistically? What order would it be best to tackle each job in? How much will each individual job cost so you know how much you need before you commit to starting it? And these are just the questions at the tip of this particular iceberg. As a starter write a list of all the tools you think you'll need, them pop into the screw fix website, put them all in your basket and see what the total comes to, I guarantee you will need more tools than this so if this total scares the bajeesus out of you then you may have your answer. If that total doesn't scare the living daylights out of you then the likely hood is you've grossly underestimated what this project will take. If however you already have most of the tools needed then you might be good. The value of a fibreglass topped boat is always going to be quite a bit less that a full steel shell but the work to restore them would likely cost the same for each, which would make a fully steel boat the better bet. If you are only doing this because you can only afford to buy the boat but will then have to save to do some of the improvements then you may find the whole thing a bit soul destroying. I loves me a good project but when it comes to a narrowboat project my first one wouldn't be a fibreglass topped one, unless I desperately wanted and "Agenda 21" boat, which this boat isn't . Probably definitely - it's quite likely because of it's fibreglass superstructure, they are rarely held in high regard, but other factors may have contributed. What ever you choose to do good luck with it.

We have that on here but the technical bits on how each of you have done it are spread across threads and buried inside topics so I suspect the ideal solution would be for a mod to set up a new "closed" forum and invite specific individuals to post "how I did it" pieces. Maybe a sub-forum on "how I am getting on with it" and perhaps another "problems I found". That way the rest of us could not muddy the topic s with a load of questions but could post questions on (say) the maintenance forum. I would much rather trust a UK forum with contributions from people with a proven track record across technical subjects than something from the USA.

Go for it …. with your eyes open and your heart full of enthusiasm. You seem to know up front that it won't be easy or a walk in the park, but unless you've found the secret of eternal youth you're just getting older with each day. My old tub is 50 this year and has had all of the things you mention above done, and the maintenance is constant. Your biggest issues may well come from not having a home mooring (it sounds as if you're contemplating that) I too get tired of freeloaders pushing their luck when it comes to such things. Those towpath hopping over the same short stretch all year are a plague. I pay for everything I need and don't appreciate those that think the rules are a challenge to be tackled.

Well, don't be a stranger, by all means come back and talk over some of your ideas. There is also a huge amount of helpful info in the archives of the older posts, plus the search tool is pretty good. But you still have your survey of this boat to come, lets see what it says before we abandon all hope entirely.

Hi Rach. Bloody crazy, got the Heads water going again as i bust a JG T joint so water was not working, easy job but important. Fitted the TV that T got for us. Hull and rudder are painted but for one coat now that i can do as and when i can over the next week or so until the launch. Started on the interior cushions and about to go and do a bit more in a mo. New steering helm is fitted but for one disaster which has cocked things up. I did a job for a chap in Coventry last week and i gave him my helm as he wanted the original type as the cog had worn in his. Mine was original and the same as his so i swapped him for a new Ultraflex T67 he bought in error. Now all good to go but for the bloody adaptor is missing and i swear i have left it on his boat. I called him anyway and he will have a look when he goes to his boat. maybe this week though. In mean time i am looking for one but cant find one anywhere. So no steering now. Now i was adamant not to put back the launch again, due to the steering problem and wanting to get the cushions and curtains done. And the operation was cancelled again until the Wednesday and will be a dodgy launching 5 days after it will now be launched on the 28th June. Give me more time to recover. Not to happy but hey ho. Feels like something is stopping the launch for some reason. New steering bracket. Needs adjustment once the cable adaptor is found.

Get your own survey. A good surveyor will find enough faults to renegotiate the price and get at least the cost of the survey back.

Would love to hear more details from the o/p before putting my size eights in but on the face of it, I'd steer well clear. As everyone has said, it'll end up costing, so you might just as well save/borrow and get a ready to go boat that is mostly a known quantity, and then just maintain and enjoy it. That first flourish of enthusiasm as you start ripping off all the old carp will soon fade... depths of winter, pouring with rain, cold, damp, trying to fit kitchen cabinets, run pipes, wiring etc etc etc. If you get something that is up and together, you could look forward to arriving at the boat, lighting the stove and getting the kettle on - rather than donning your overalls, lugging a bunch of materials down a muddy towpath (in the rain) and breaking out the tools (if someone hasn't already broken them out for you that is!). Use the poor survey result as an excuse to try and get your deposit back - if not just cut your losses and walk away.

O' I don't know. A 4" Beef & Onion tends to be 4" Beef & Onion irrespective of you being a Plumber or an Electrician

Lost a few friends on boating accidents... It sounds like some of your friends may be the subjects of your first post.......

The choices for bleaching wood that I’m aware of are Oxalic Acid (Barkeepers Friend is widely available), a 50/50 mix of sodium hydroxide (caustic soda) and hydrogen peroxide, or a 50/50 mix of ordinary household (chlorine) bleach and oxalic acid. Liberon Wood Bleach as suggested above is, I believe, the second of those three and is very effective. There’s a a very good article about bleaching here: https://www.woodmagazine.com/materials-guide/finishes/get-the-color-out-with-wood-bleach

I've been boating for 46 years now, and in that time the canals, boats and people using them has changed a lot. As they say the only constant is change. However one aspect hasn't changed and that is the vast majority of people using canals then and now enjoying themselves immensely.

The mathematics, science, art and psychology of queuing systems is complex and often far from intuitive. Simple measures such as long term average flow, are rarely much help in making the best use of restricted resources. By definition, dealing with queuing only occurs when something is restricted. Another driver can also be economic - the sort of silly political objective of demanding 100% usage is always a quick route to disaster. I don't know what complexity CaRT use, but we do know that their water modelling is always being improved and is at present reasonably sophisticated. Again, economics comes into it as sometimes more complexity, which costs money, does not deliver comparable benefits. Simply knowing stuff does not necessarily mean you can do something about it. I cannot tell whether all of these restriction schemes have been properly tested against these models but, unless there is strong evidence to the contrary, I'd at least want to hear the argument before leaping to criticism. Remember, that one of the dominant factors is human behaviour and in the case of lock restrictions, vandalism and the inability (or wilfulness)of boaters to follow simple rules is often the main driver.

And it will be left, yet again, as a part fitted out project for the next dreamer to take on. There are dozens of them lying about in boatyards all over the country.

What exactly is the “boating way” and why should anyone need to have an interest in the history of the canals to be able to enjoy them? The purpose and usage of canals - and indeed the “way of life” - has changed throughout their history and it’s by no means the case that even those who made a living from them all had a great affinity for them. JP

................ you would have to be crazy. ............ sorry to pour cold water on your dream - I predict it will just become a nightmare, and you will come to resent the boat within a few months.

?????? https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=neox

Yes but yours was overpriced in the first place. Mine was already £10K underpriced!

I didn't know the Japanese built the Flying Standard!

In regards to why the survey was done, I have not asked that yet, it is just a survey on the hull not a pre purchase survey. I have asked if the identified work has been done, waiting to hear back on that. Thank you for all your replies, I think it definitely has made my mind up to get a full pre purchase survey done if I go ahead, I would feel more confident in what i'm buying. Thanks everyone

Originally thinking this was a fancy name for a chinese hat on a chimney, I was keeping out of it. Finally, and slowly, cottoning on to the fact you were talking about an item of clothing, I Googled the term. I am not a Yorkshireman, coming from the correct side of the Pennines but......................................HOW MUCH!!!!!!!! George

You would think so. Practically, I've had little success using that method. In my post above, I purposely didn't mention heat because the diy mechanic is less likely to have access to useful heat. If you run an engine, everything will come up to temperature at about the same rate, whereas what's needed is for the nut to expand much quicker in order to release its hold on the stud. A fine welding tip played onto the nut, bringing it quickly up to red, while the stud stays black would be ideal.

I agree with all the comments above, My friend James who I bought my batteries from is going into production of aluminium skiffs for the Thames, he is making outboards for them and supplying good second hand batteries. I only thought he would be better with direct drive through the keel, as its simpler, and allows a wheel if wanted. I am more than happy to help anyone with my electric drive and my solar/whispergen only domestic setup.

Eeeeeeeeeeejuts

Hi Pengie, welcome to the forum! You didn't mention the price or size of the boat in question. Everything has a price at which it would be worth it. Have you been looking for boats and found this one? Or did you see a too-good-to-be-true price and start dreaming? There are a number of things you mentioned there that would be an absolute dealbreaker for me. The hull sounds like it is in very poor condition. A survey from 2 years ago cannot be relied on and I'd strongly recommend getting one for a boat in this state. If it has needed overplating in some areas it's quite possible that other areas have also since deteriorated. A boat sitting for sale for 2 years won't have been maintained properly. And fibreglass top, yuck. "No insulation" sounds dubious, not sure how that's possible if the interior is livable. If you really don't have insulation this boat is going to be unbearable in both the cold of winter and the heat of summer. Insulating it is going to involve redoing the interior entirely. This is a very major hassle and expense. Yes, I think that you will need to spend a great deal of money on this boat to complete the project, and moreover, you're going to need to do a lot of work. This is going to be particularly difficult given the fact that you want to continuous cruise and you aren't going to have a home base for deliveries and working on her. Finally on continuous cruising, as @TheBiscuits said your plan to do the bare minimum every two weeks MIGHT be within the letter of the rules but is not considered within the spirit of it. The letter of the rules is actually not fully explained - it's more than just cruising every two weeks. I am told there are a myriad other factors that CaRT will look into when deciding whether to renew your license, such as the distance traveled, the pattern (did you move the minimum distance for three months and then go on a long cruise? This is not "continuous" enough), the number of times you overstayed (because of poor weather etc), if you had any complaints against you. If you move your boat a mile every two weeks for a year, I am pretty sure that they will have something to say about it. And yes, to answer your question, your movement every two weeks is monitored strictly. But the spirit of the community is more important than the literal rules. Keep in mind that the canals are rather crowded in places. Continuous cruisers are using visitors moorings because they are visiting places. If your boat is in a mooring, that means that someone else can't moor there who is genuinely visiting the spot. It is seen as uncool to try to get away with the minimum amount of cruising possible. I'm not trying to put you off or telling you not to do it, I'm just letting you know because you might not be aware that you could encounter a good deal of vitriol from the boating community if you carry out this plan. We're liveaboard CCers and we've certainly been on the receiving end of this vitriol, owing to our we-also-work-a-9-to-5-job cruising pattern (we certainly haven't done 400 miles and 400 locks this year... yet!). What you're proposing is substantially less cruising than what we are doing. You should just be aware that your plan is going to be seen by other boaters as selfish. Consider renting a home mooring somewhere affordable for when you aren't genuinely cruising.

I've been hunting for those for ages now, no clue where I'd left them. I'll pick them up next time. Thanks again.

Came across a set of interesting commercially produced slides recently describing the repairs to Blisworth Tunnel in 1983. Have uploaded them to: http://www.fulbourne.org.uk/index.php/miscellaneous/blisworth-tunel-reconstruction-1980-s Tim