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Alway Swilby

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Everything posted by Alway Swilby

  1. Yes, I nearly stuck an "almost" in there but then decided against it.
  2. We shared the Rochdale locks up out of Manchester from Ducie Street Junction with a liveaboard single hander. After many many hours of sruggling with low pounds, reluctant paddles, reluctant gates, removing carpets from propellers etc. the chap said to me "When do we get to the Bridgewater?". Turns out he'd come down the Ashton flight and expected to go down to the Bridgewater via the Rochdale Nine. He took a wrong turn at Ducie Street because he had an old Nicholsons that didn't show the restored Rochadale over the Pennines. By this time we were nearly at the Rose of Lancaster. The next morning he elected to carry on with us over the Pennines and back south via the Calder Hebble, Aire & Calder, River Trent etc.
  3. Is your calorifier also heated by the engine when it is running? If so it seems a shame to loose that free hot water.
  4. We are using Nebo at the moment but it doesn't count locks. Apart from that it is good. https://nebo.global/ I run it on an old Android phone kept on the stern. When you shut it down at the end of the day it sends you an email with details of that days journey. You don't want to run it on your real phone in your pocket because then it logs you walking around locks, going to the shops etc. You can also see where other Nebo boats are (if they allow their location to be public). A Canalplan app sounds interesting.
  5. There are maps available that show mooring time restrictions. But they are not produced by CRT and you have to buy them. They show lots of other info too such as water points, elsans, pump outs, rubbish bins and recycling bins, toilets, showers, where you can buy diesel and gas and other useful info. https://www.waterwayroutes.co.uk/. I must declare an interest here in that I help to keep them updated.
  6. Apperley Bridge Marina, the other side of Rodley, sell diesel.
  7. I thought the facilities at Sheffield were originally provided by BW/CRT for the use of all boaters including visitors hence the CRT key on the doors. I've no idea but maybe some arrangement in the lease to CV Marine says that the facilities should be available to visiting boaters and some financial transaction takes place. It would be a shame if visiting boaters couldn't use the elsan. The general misuse and availability of CRT keys is a different issue. Maybe CRT should change the locks (all of them?? Howmuch would that cost?) and keep a tighter control on the issue of new keys.
  8. CRT told me that they are trying to claim off the vehicle's insurance company. I don't know whether they suceeded.
  9. Shame that circumstances dictate that next Tuesday is impossible for us. I've asked them if there might be further bridge swings that we could manage to get to.
  10. Maybe the Fire & Rescue people get involved too if they've nothing better to do.
  11. Yes. York City Council come along with a truck with a pump on the back and they use river water to sluice it all down. The silt will get carried along by the current and end up in the Humber and the North Sea. I did once read a statistic about how many tons of silt are carried along in the Humber but I've no idea now of the figure.
  12. Rather than say "Oh, that gate is 25 years old we'd better replace it" perhaps they inspect the gate and then decide whether or not to replace it depending on its condition. It might be good for another 10 years. Seems sensible to me.
  13. Mauds Swing Bridge on the Stainforth & Keadby Canal has been closed since a road vehicle strike on 23rd November. We want to go that way so I rang CRT this afternoon to see if there is an update on progress. They reckon it could be months rather than weeks. So we may have to go from Keadby to Goole via Trent Falls instead.
  14. Dunno. I never thought of cold water. If I ever live my life again I shall try it out. But hot water worked ok for me for 30 years, I don't think it was a risk.
  15. When I lived in a house and worked I used hot water (from the kitchen hot water tap) on my car's windscreen every time it was frosty. Never cracked a windscreen in over 30 years.
  16. Four of the eight have installed cassette toilets much as they hate them. Three of the eight now fully compost back at their houses and use it on the garden. The remaining one sold the boat so they don't do anything. As you say there is no way of us knowing how much still ends up in the bins but I would love to find out. My speculation is different to yours and I think there will be a lot less poo now than when the practice of binning was officially allowed.
  17. Ok, I'll rephrase it. Of all the boaters I know that have a separating toilet none of them bag and bin any more. It only a small sample of about eight boats but they've all given up bagging and binning.
  18. It is now more than a year since the ban on uncomposted poo being put into CRT bins has come into effect. I wonder how much poo still actually gets dumped in the CRT bins. I know we don't do it any more and I know of some boaters that have either changed to cassette or like us have changed the way they do things. I don't know of any boaters that still bag and bin. Obviously this is a small sample but I would speculate that there is "not much" poo finding its way into the bins nowadays. No doubt there are people on here that would speculate that there is "loads".
  19. No it's not. Where have we admitted this? I have NEVER dumped urine in the cut. I nearly always use an elsan but there are rare occasions when I have "taken the piss" to a remote site in the countryside far away from any watercourse and dumped it there. I wonder if you are male have ever had a wee behind a hedge when out walking in the countryside? I bet there's not one man on this forum that hasn't done that?
  20. All it is is a "View from the front of my boat" video. No commentry or editing and all filmed from a static camera at the bow. Looks like there isn't any attempt to "Vlog".
  21. If the OP is still around I would advise that this forum is not a good place to ask about "composting" toilets. The forum in general is very anti the idea as comes across in lots of the coments on this thread. For better advice from people that actually use composting toilets on boats rather than people that have no intention of trying the idea you should have a look at the facebook group mentioned by Ditchcrawler https://www.facebook.com/groups/1525582381058089 . It certainly is possible to do it especially if you can get "Hot Composting" going. The time required to compost is much reduced.
  22. Thanks for all you've done over the years Stuart. Your site has been very useful. We are going to try Nebo for a while but it doesn't count locks 😞. We were trying to be the last boat moving on your site but we got pipped at the post by someone else!
  23. Maybe I should have said the engine running but not driving the propeller. PS (derailing my own thread here!) Our alternator puts out 65 amps (at 24v) at idle when first started. Increasing the revs doesn't increase the amps.
  24. Do people change their drive plates as a matter of course even if it is still working? I.E preventative maintenance. If so what interval would you suggest is good. Our Beta 43 with PRM 150 gearbox has now done getting on for 5000 hours of which approx 4500 have been for cruising with the other 500 idling to charge the batteries. Should I be looking to change it or should I just carry on regardless?
  25. I don't know if it's boring or not because I never look at it so I can't vote.
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