Leaderboard

Would it help if I drove to you tomorrow A.M. FOC and tried to help? I will need to know if you have a jump lead or a pair of them aboard. Ring 01189874285 today if you want to accept.

I posted this thread a couple of weeks ago as I was surprised how high my CO monitor had gone. It seems like I am safe as the levels were below the 'unsafe' level. The following week after finding this out, I looked at the CO monitor regularly and even with my normal cleaning routine (door open no longer than a few mins) the level was going up to 50-80. I was a bit concerned about this as any CO is bad for you as it binds to your red blood cells! OK, end of story then? No. Over the past month, I have noticed our stove has been struggling a bit to get up to the really hot temperatures I expect and when loading it with coal or wood, it was taking longer than I remember to get back up to hot. I was blaming this on damp coal as the last 10 bags we got had been stored outside and the dust on the outside of the pieces was not dusty but damp. Also when burning wood, there had been some smoke coming out of the vents on the stove when the wood was first put on. I finally figured out that the flue probably needed a clean. I did it yesterday and was amazed that the top of the flue where it exits the boat was totally blocked with 'crap'. There was probably a very small hole for the flue gas to get up the chimney. Cleaned it out, hacked out the solid deposit and put a rope and chain down the flue and cleaned the top plate in the stove. All back to normal now. Fire working great. Nice and hot. 'Damp' coal burning well.........and ZERO CO showing up on the monitor!!!!!! That last bit is worrying. The slow decay in performance of the stove over a few months had not really registered there was something going wrong until it was very wrong and almost blocked.....and it wasnt just the burning performance. The restriction in the flue meant that CO was getting into the cabin when the door was open. I had never seen the CO monitor showing any CO in our last two winters on board. For the last few months, everytime we have opened the stove door, there has been significant CO getting into the boat. OK, the 50ppm level is only dangerous if at that level for 8 hours (time dependence) but 50ppm for a short period twice a day, 7 days a week is still not good for you. Our stove is on all the time apart from maybe 20 days when we have been off the boat since we lit it for the winter.....and in that time the flue got blocked. Morale of that story is keep your chimney clean! It's not only poor stove performance you get with a blocked flue. It's also a low dosage of CO.

Thanks all for all the great replies. The pictures were taken at the same time. I have been out and bought a multimeter, heavy duty jump leads and a YAUSA 900cca battery. There is a possibility we ran out of diesel the night without power, but there was a good 5-6 inches in the tank when I dipped it. Just called Tony Brooks and took him up on his very generous offer and he will no doubt shed some light on things tomorrow. Thanks again everyone

Cruising in the dark has a mystical feeling. This was early this morning, no-one around, nothing else moving as I set off at 06.00. Wendy (full of cold) was sleeping, so I left early to catch up lost ground. Please do post your photos, mine was just snapped on my iPhone as didn’t have my good camera aboard.

I LURVE cruising at night. Here is one of my best pics....

Sorted, thanks everyone, fuse blown near the battery bank.

A word of warning!! If you let the kids think you like grandkids they dont stop making them!! At present we are up to nine and there is still a danger of more possibly from the youngest sprog at least. Very expensive at chrimbo!!

Which makes it pretty much useless if you are singlehanded on a 40’ boat in a deep lock. Learn not to drop it in the water.

Mummy and daddy to be of our grandchild. ❤️❤️❤️

Yes. If you have £15k to spend on something as useless as gold then it should be taken off you and given to the homeless, obviously.

Of course it has relevance. Maybe I of to translate into newspeak, pacifically it's a corruption of its original meaning, "to sniff". ? This nonsense makes me go nucular.

Cobalt poisoning?? On a boat?? N

There’s more nice people on here than not nice people. I have been confronted many a time by others. It’s a computer based discussion forum. Like a telly, I have a choice. It’s a big, massive enormous shame that people, man, bloke, lady, woman or lass and others feel the need to leave. I like the variety of people. One such poster, a lass, used what could and was, termed as childish and annoying words in her posts. A couple of posters mentioned this and we lost a completely sensible contributor. Her posts were constructive and at time humorous. Even ‘friends’ can get up your nose at times. Hey ho! Hope the OP stays regardless of strong opinions being expressed.

That’s what I thought. The flow at that point at lunchtime today was around 3mph. That’s based on a highly technical measuring system. I used an average speed app on my phone while walking next to a floating piece of wood!!