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People don't have to play golf or tennis, but the recent changes mean that they are quite at liberty to do so. Since you and others seem so intent upon 'commonsense' how about some commonsense Government decisions rather than being led by the wittering classes of the Daily Wail and Sun. When the lockdown is lifted there will be an increase in infections and deaths, I think pretty much everyone is accepting of that. When Spain started to come out of lockdown, their daily infection rate was circa 500-700 (under 1000) and now after about 10 days they are back up to 3000+ so, unless you still believe in the English exceptionalism, we can pretty much expect the same, except we are currently starting from a far higher figure, so after 10 days or so, instead of going up to where the Spanish are at 3000 (still less that where we are now) we could easily rise to 16,000 - 17,000 infections a day if we get the same percentage rise. Do I trust the 'commonsense' Government to then say,"Oh we need to re-impose a lock-down", frankly, no I don't as it would be acknowledgement of lifting the lockdown too soon so we will rattle on with increasing infection/death rates until they have no choice and we will be back to where we started from. Two more weeks lockdown and then monitor what is happening elsewhere and follow the sensible lead would be the commonsense approach, but as you say we don't do commonsense.

As one of the few (maybe only) people here who has done significant boating during the lockdown, can I second this? You're not just sitting, fat and happy, in the middle of the canal, and surface transmission at locks is the least of your worries. Much more of the problem is when you're standing on the back of the boat in the bottom of a lock and someone's ugly mug appears above you whilst they gawp at this new sight: there are a LOT of people taking their Boris exercise on towpaths who have never been near a canal before lockdown and have not seen boats moving. Two metres safe distance is two metres HORIZONTALLY, if someone is standing above you, you're much more vulnerable. To be safe, expect to have to shout at people to get them to clear lock areas before you use the lock, and expect to get very strange looks when you shout at people standing on bridges as you approach to ask them to move off the bridge whilst you pass under. Now that everyone has been let out again, somewhere like Foxton will be hell to boat through; it'll be heaving, as will Buckby top lock; the pub may be closed but people will be using the tables on the lockside. Add similar places in you locale to taste. Also expect the towpaths to be busier than you're used to: there will be a lot more people walking past your boat, and a lot more people cycling. Judging by the prevalence of groups of young males travelling fast on bikes during the lockdown period, gay, poly, marriage is a lot more common than I thought. MP.

I'm amazed at this thread, it's not that hard to understand, boating for pleasure ain't yet permitted, just wait and continue to do your bit to keep the population as safe as you can. Anecdotally the number of boats, that appear to be non-liveaboards, that are moving has at least doubled since the weekend. Including a absolutely massive wide beam which moored up next to me for exactly a week before heading back off in the direction it came. We all like our hobbies, but for now we should make small sacrifices with them rather than looking for loop holes in the new rules

You can only chose from what's on offer, and that wasn't.

We shouldn't forget that the main purpose of the lockdown, as 'sold' to the public was to prevent the NHS being overwhelmed. It wasn't introduced to stop all deaths from the virus. To do so would be impossible. To get close to 'no deaths' would require limitations on freedoms that would be unacceptable in our culture. If by chance these limitations were accepted, and widely adhered to by the vast majority of the population, the economy would be left in a state as unpalatable to the British people as would have been the limitations to 'achieve' this. So I'm afraid the path is still to prevent the NHS being overwhelmed until such a time as some kind of 'herd immunity' is established and/ or a successful vaccine is developed.

In a nutshell Dan, thats how most people with, as the PM put it " Common sense " see it. Rocket science it isnt.

I think you will find we have left the E.U. Granted we are in a transition until the end of the year, but we then finish that period. Negotiations are continuing to finalise a trade agreement.

Edwardian are superb, not cheap but the best never is 👍

There was no spark between them then!

When I first encounter locks, I shall be washing my hands after each and every lock. Wearing gloves is pointless IMO. It just means you may have virus on your gloves instead of your hands. If you then touch your face, the outcome is the same. Your hands are easier to wash too. Disposable gloves may have some value IF you discard them after every lock but that's probably more bother than washing your hands.

How can common sense be applied safely to what has oft been very wooly information. Even Ministers have had problems interpreting it correctly at times. Easy to say you got that wrong, where is your common sense. Typical get-out clause in my books.

if every thing this girl says is true .and yes there are two sides ,but lets just say its all true what she is saying ,,the bods on here would still look for an angle to twist and turn every thing she said ,look at most if not all the threads on here ,it happens every time ..there are some well meaning threads and even those get the snide remarks ,they all start off well ,but then they slowly go down hill over time .a thread can start of by some one needing a bmc engine ..10 comments in or so. the thread turns to some thing compleately different /.whats her health got to do with this ...any one got any eggs for sale ...oh i might end up being offered a box of spanners ...stay safe all

I agree. It was jolly useful to see their plans over the next few weeks. Of course, we all know those plans may have to change. Let's all hope the R0 stays below 1.

For permanent liveaboards, the question is, can they go on longer cruises, or only to the water/elsan and back? I do think that's a legally grey area but for the sake of being reasonable, they should all be minimising their cruising. Where forum members have had good reason to cruise to a new area, fair enough. I would be cruising mainly for my own enjoyment, so that's not fair enough (even though some boaters are clearly doing this). I will wait until overnight stays at second homes are allowed and then I may head off for my cruising season.

It's both. The key thing is that we can't stay overnight away from our primary home. I'm in an odd position: My boat is my primary home. However, since lockdown started I've been living in someone else's house with them. So right now, this house would reasonably be classed as my home. I could, if I wanted to be bloody minded about it, go to my boat today, declare myself home, and set off cruising. That's clearly not what the government or CRT intend though, so common sense kicks in...

I'd call that a graph, and I think a graph does need labelled axes and a title and possibly a key to mean much. Otherwise it's just a pretty line that means nothing.

Cold fusion is certainly the way forward and I have been working on this too, I used to work at Southampton University in the building next to the chemistry department where it was invented, and I did find a few bits and pieces in the skip, but still can't work out exactly how to put them back together. ..............Dave

My thanks to yourselves for getting this going, and to all who have participated. There have been departures, certainly by myself, from the specification of nice things today but the general wish is to be interesting, I am sure. This field pattern at Montady, beside the Canal du Midi hopefully complies, although it is, I believe eight centuries old!.

As they do where we moor, the boat next door to us is liveaboard, we are hobby boaters.

I'm not too clear as to what work is so urgent. Blacking? a few months not That critical. Depleted anodes? You can always hang a few overboard bonded to the hull with a bit of wire or chain. Galvanic isolator, no big deal if not on shorepower or in a marina. Others may shoot me down but I think you're overthinking the issues.

My daughter is a teacher. She is DESPERATE to get back to work in order to help her children. She would happily work through the traditional summer break in order to try and help the kids make up for lost time. She is not alone.

Quite so. If was able (I live in Wales so can't) I would be tempted to go to the Marina and check the boat out but at the moment even if I could I would not be going out boating until a few more weeks yet.

And a vaccine may *never* arrive. The common cold is a coronavirus and no vaccine has ever been found for it.

That's how I understand it. The virus is here now and only herd immunity will stop it. We can't hide until a vaccine arrives so have to control the rate of infection at manageable levels to achieve the same result, or to minimise the human suffering pending the achievement of herd immunity by vaccination.

The only thing I'd add to that is that if you are going to come down with the virus, living alone on a boat is not a good place to do it. Even if you're not seriously ill, you may not be well enough to provide yourself with power, water, food and sewage disposal, and certainly it's not easy to do those things without risking infecting others. As liveaboards ourselves, we've tried to think through what we do if one or both become ill, and the answers tend to involve the one who isn't ill getting the boat to within very easy reach of services before they succumb too. That's not a very satisfactory answer, and it's obviously even worse if you're solo. If you can be as sure as possible that you're not already exposed when you go to the boat, that will help. MP.

It does depend. On many American alternators the connections are external with the exception of the brush connections. On an A127 it's that yellow lead from the field diodes. Bosch alternators would need careful surgery to the alternator. With a nine diode machine the easiest way is to slap a -ve onto D+. This is an American motorola unit and opening the red lead would do the job. Japanese stuff is just way too varied and may need internal surgery or may be done externally depending. Give me a picture of the machine in question and I will advise if I can.

That line rather demonstrates that you to haven't the foggiest idea of what the government want, so much for your claiming that it was all very clear. If the Government wanted us to 'stop at home where possible' I would have little or no argument but they did away with the 'Stay at Home' advice, or didn't you notice? My belief, with infections still running at getting on for 4000 per day (3,877) and deaths at over 200 per day, is that we are winding down the lockdown about 2 weeks early (bearing in mind we were 2 weeks late going into it) and the message from Government, rather than your interpretation of it, is that we need to 'get out there'. You can take limitless exercise so how do three rounds of golf and a tennis session match your idea of 'stop at home'? After that, should I wish to do so I can drive from Birmingham to the North York Moors and go for a walk, how does that fit in with your idea 'stop at home'. The lack of logic of the current proposals was highlighted by the primary school teacher who asked the PM the question of why she was expected to now teach a class full of children (whose infective state she would have no idea of) but was not permitted to go and visit her mother who has been isolated for the past 6 weeks so it should be reasonably safe to suggest she isn't infected. Joined up thinking? probably not. The final issue for me is that, despite the rhetoric, do I trust the Government to re-impose a lockdown should the infection rates start to skyrocket again? Since we were 2 weeks late imposing the the first one, it would be expected that we will be 2 weeks late re-imposing another one since to do so might suggest that they were premature in lifting the first one. I would expect an increase in infections whenever the lockdown gets lifted, but if you look at figures from other countries, Spain were down to 700 infections a day before winding down the lockdown, they are now back to 3000, if we start our wind-down at 4000 and show the same sort of increase, we are going to be back up to 17,000 infections a day.

I'm extremely pleased that I can now use my shared NB Isis in the middle of June and other owners will be pleased. However its has to be a nonsense to say we cant sleep on our own boat, that is surely unenforceable. I would be doing multiple day trips its a consequence of listening to much to the anti seaside second home ranters some of them racist. However I would like to know about best practise of lock usage with or without gloves bearing in mind the comments about Covid 19 spread?

There's going to be a stampede. Best to continue to treat everyone and everything as a biological disaster area - methinks.

"Many would choose to stay away." Really? If you take this forum as a sample of boaters I would say that people are champing at the bit to get back aboard. I am certain that if boating were suddenly allowed it would be like a bank holiday weekend out there. Who accepts that the risk of transmission from outside surfaces is quite low? Surfaces that have been touched on a handrail for instance are going to be touched again immediately after. It's not enough to look for ways to make it possible however much we may wish it to be so, it's about making a rational common sense judgement of whether it's SAFE. You have to make that judgement on the basis of hundreds of people, and let's be honest, a lot of people are not taking the virus seriously or taking any precautions at all, not on the basis of one boat's crew using an otherwise deserted waterway.

Ivan, apologies but a rather long reply to your question “can I use a 30A Sterling BtoB”. I think the quick answer for your particular situation is “maybe not” but likely “yes” for others. I am very tempted for my new set up and it looks like DRE is happy with his. I think Nick's response is the key (30A is too low). Now, the long story (which answers some previous questions on alternator temp). First lets go back over what I am using and my experience over the last 12 months. I am using a 150A AtoB on a 2002 Beta 43 with a 90A domestic alternator. On the 'US gel' setting, it nicely backs off current to the Li's at 80% SoC (around 13.9V) so not overcharging. On this setting it also restricts the current to the Li's at around 45A for the first hour then reducing to around 35A after that. I assume this is something to do with alternator temperature restricting the output of the alternator but it could be the AtoB. For summer cruising this is fine. I can forget about the charging and not overcharge or heat the alternator too much. I have measured alternator temps and it gets to around 95°C in the centre of the top of the alternator and around 65°C on the back plate where the diodes are. The typical temp of the top of the engine is around 75°C so that will also drive alternator temp. My engine bay is not well ventilated (I cant see an air intake!). I have tried to 'up' the AtoB setting to the UK gel but it means the current to the Li's goes up to 55A and the alternator temp rises too fast and gets over 100°C pdq. So for me 45A is the max I will do (50% of rated output). So all fine for summer. However, in the winter it is a different matter. With solar not working well and using 120Ahrs per 24 hours, I need to get as much power back in the Li's. We dont cruise much in the winter so most charging is done while tied up. We therefore run the engine for an hour in the morning and an hour in the evening to warm the water up and charge. Having used 120Ahrs overnight, there is no way I will overcharge the bank so I CAN change the AtoB setting to UK gel and charge at 55A without fear of overcharging as I will never be near full. With the bilge blower on, I can do an hour without the alternator overheating. I can therefore get 110Ahrs back in per day. If I was in the lower setting, I would take 3 hours of engine running as the current is only 35-45A. This all depends on your adversity to risk and what temp you are going to allow your alternator to get up to. I have decided 95°C on the top is appropriate given that MP and T&B have both blown their 'cheaper' A127 type alternators.....mine is £250 to replace. Also though note that while solar is great in the summer, what happens when we get a spell of 30°C weather? I park under trees so the boat is not too hot. Not very good for solar. With my AtoB, I now have a choice of controlling the Amps I put in. Now, in your case, I worry that the 30A BtoB is going to be a bit limiting. I am guessing your alternator is a 90A one (you did say you have seen 50A out of it!). If you fit a 30A then that is 30A in. At 85% efficiency you are looking at only 25A out. That maybe fine with solar but in the winter you could be still looking at 4 hours engine running – and in the summer under trees. I think that is too low and you are loosing out on another 20A that the alternator could give you (you are wasting almost half the power available). If you are looking for a 'plug and play' box then you really need to be able to maximise power in the winter but not worry in the summer. I notice DRE is saying you can reduce power by 50% on his BtoB. One solution could then be to fit 2 *30A in parallel and de-rate one of them to get 40A ish or with both at max -50A in winter. Cost though is now going up. Another alternative is to buy an AtoB like I have but that is £350. The advantage here is that if you have 2 alternators (do you?) then the Amps can be got from both. I think your need to have a solution for winter is not to rely on the BtoB which will only give you 25A charge. Remember in winter you will not overcharge so maybe just operate without the B2B (but buy one for the summer) ...ie when tied up, bypass it, and just rely on disconnecting the charge on high alternator temp. Best solution is talk to Nick nicely and see if you can Beta test his alternator controller but that means dismantling your alternator.😁

Arrghhh... earworm...

I know they have. Many dozens too. The specific case I'm aware of involves boaters whom I have a pretty low opinion of generally.

The guidelines don't object to people travelling short distances, or longer, to get to the boats. It's what is then permissible, once there. Once cruising is allowed, the ball game changes. All boats, apart for liveaboards' essential needs for services, are for visiting only.

Well my boat is staying firmly tied to the bank because for me it's not a grey area, if you normally travel to the boat and spend extended time on it ,it becomes a second home

Try telling that to all the parents trying to homeschool a small number of children, makes the real world dig seem a bit lame.

Does "OP" mean original poster?

just a small point but you would need to check if the canal is wide enough to turn

My alternator is only "small", and seems to put out about 35A when it starts charging the LA bank, but the Amps then tend to half every hour, as the bank is charged up. So it doesn't run at any particular "higher" level of Amps for any length of time. It isn't connected in any way to my lithium bank, and I don't think I foresee this happening in the foreseeable future. If it were connected to the Lithiums via a 30A B2B unit, it would run at 30A constantly. I have no idea whether that would make it too hot, or not. I would think hot. You would think that a constant 30A from a 70A rated alternator ought to be fine, providing it's spinning fast enough. On my boat, experience to date suggests that my solars, (500w), will keep up with power use, (100Ah +/-), most days from April to September and, if I have to run the genny every now and then, it's no big deal. Even in winter, with no solar input, they last about 5-7 days of full time living aboard, so running the genny for 7 hours, every 5 or 7 days is no big deal - in fact, it's a luxury compared to keeping the LAs fully charged at least every second day. I probably differ from many here as I don't do much cruising, so alternator charging would not form a major source of charging, unless something changes in my boating style. Given that I don't go far, or often, I am able to keep the genny and petrol in a shed thing on the mooring. Pretty sure Sterlings B2Bs have a custom setting. My Pro Charge Ultra Charger does. In fact I think the BattleBorn Batteries link above, (somewhere), explains how to set up the custom setting for their batteries.

Sorry if I offended. My intention was to back up/ reinforce your view

Incompetent, yes. Girlie, no. I thought I put you on ignore but given that I read your comment I obviously didn't. Your balls are big but your brains are small. I can resort to on line insults but have never before found it necessary.

Most marinas have quite a low percentage of live aboards and most of them can be very helpful to a new boater

KiwiBill's Long Ramble Home - Topic 1 - Europe, North Africa & Near East - 1937 to Present Day Right! We're off! The way things appear to work, the Memory Trigger Pack has to be a physical tactile object which, when presented to the Machine, gives access to other mementos or artefacts, photos and memories from a quite extensive region. Not of much use to my biographer but I am not doing this for him. You are warned: there will be very little cross-referencing. Let's go! The Memory Trigger Pack (MTP) to start with is a selection of gold and silver coinage from UK and Austria. My mother chased her Kiwi ex-boyfriend to London in 1937 but he negligently married an Oxford lass and Mum had to console herself with a debonair, guitar-playing Austrian refugee doctor. My Aunt Helen arrived in 1938 to rescue her elder sister from the wily foreigner but was also swept of her feet and cooperated with the young lovers. Helen spent the Battle of Britain on the south coast in the WAAF manning one of the earliest radar stations.(ref 'Eyes of theFew') She ended up living, acting and teaching in Italy after spells in Ethiopia and Libya. Shortly before she died in Italy, in genteel poverty, she appeared as one of the old English ladies in 'Tea With Mussolini'. Looking exactly like my grandmother (her mother). Immediately after Dunkirk my Austrian father-to-be was interned as foreigner and sent to Australia.(ref 'Dunera Scandal') Mum was evacuated from London during the Blitz but ended up being bombed anyway in Glasgow where my elder brother was born. They eventually got to Australia and I was born there. My younger brother was born in Auckland and we all lived in Australia until 1949. Dad was sent to what is now Papua New Guinea for a year and we lived there as a family until moving to Auckland at the end of 1949. Bill and Jenny (first wife) left NZ by plane in 1968 and took six months to get to London because they discovered that hitchhiking around the Mediterranean was great fun. From Athens to Istanbul Bulgaria, Rumania, Hungary, Western Europe, North Africa, Egypt, Lebanon, Syria, Turkey again then back to Athens to pick our left-luggage and the plane to London. This is where the cross-links start mounting up. Visiting Aunt Helen in Libya just pre Ghadaffi, loving a sea-side city in Algeria where we ended up living and working four years later, making friends in Egypt who came to visit us in England, making contact with Austrian relations. My Austrian relations all spent the war in Vienna under Hitler. In the mid 1950s my father arranged to bring Rudolf, a Brewery Engineer, to New Zealand with his wife and two adult children. The Scene: Conference Room, Dominion Breweries, Auckland. NZ's biggest brewer supplying a vast population of two million. Chairman: Next item, appointment of Chief Engineer. How do you pronounce this bloody foreigner's name; Sheezel, Shissel? Probably a bloody Nazi. Bugger it! What does his CV say? Secretary: Twelve years Chief Engineer of Vienna Brewery. Monthly production 500,000 hectolitres. Chairman: Hectolitres! What the F*** is a hectolitre? (sound of sliderule slithering) Secretary: Umm. Well he was responsible for producing as much beer in a month as all the breweries in NZ produce in a year. (pause, silence) Chairman: Seems to be a good sort of bloke. I think we can use him. Uncle Rudolf had a successful career with DB then moved on to upgrade two other NZ breweries. The house I live in now was his on one of the sites he was developing and my father had just bought 60 acres out of Auckland. Cut in two and put on very large trailers it was transported 200km and stitched back together. Rudolf and Aunt Fini (Josehpine - famed for yeast baking and being the only woman in NZ who polished her husband's shoes) retired to rural Austria but came back to NZ to be with children and grandchildren. We visited them in Austria during their retirement. They had rescued, from deepest Austria, our only great-grandmother who been to us in Algeria. Do you start to see the possible complications in this telling? Rudolf and Fini died in NZ while we were London-based. So this stirring of memories is, in part, a wake for them. Everything is linked but the only place where it is all clear is in my head. Elsewhere is data on computers, photos, documents and souvenirs. And my elder daughter lives on a narrowboat in Hockley Port. Will she want the 30kg of beautiful petrified wood she helped collect at the age of four in the Algerian Sahara? I will return to the Austrian gold 2000 Schilling coin later. It has a both a Vienna and a Tashkent connection. KiwiBill

I guess you have never run a business?

Don’t bother with a mag. CanalWorld Discussion Forum is all you need. The advice is free, non-judgemental, unbiased and accurate beyond reproach! Oh, hang on a minute... ...yeh, on second thoughts Waterways World is probably a better bet!