stewart&jenny

Hi John, Very sorry to hear of your loss. Ben will live on for quite a while in your heart. 2 years ago, give or take a day or two, I cried my eyes out when we had to put Max, our Border Collie Cross, to sleep. I still miss him. Within a week I could no longer stand the quiet so off we went and found Zebedee, another collie cross, and then a year ago, we added Mopsey, another collie ........ I think that is enough All our dogs come from rescue centres. I love em to bits. Max only lasted till he was 10, and though I wish it had been longer, his time though shorter than hoped for, was filled with happiness. So I keep the memory and we plod on with our latest 2 additions in the knowledge they giving us as much enjoyment as we are giving to them. Being a confessed Border Collie addict, I am happy to share my addiction .... my sister has spaniels, and she just bought another only to find it really does have a personality disorder! Having said that, it more to do with taking the dog away from its mother far too early and nothing to do with the breed. Whatever dog you choose to get, it will receive love and attention, and you will receive the same. I wish you well in your quest to fill the space left behind. You'll never forget Ben, so don't delay, go off and take a look round your local rescue centre, you won't regret the visit, no doubt Ben will guide you ..... Best Wishes, Stewart

I recently bought some batteries from www.alpha-batteries.co.uk/ phoned them up and they helpful and open to negotiation....

The Beta Marine guy said that the supply take off to the calorifier is before the thermostat. Thinking about it, the diameter of the supply pipe limits the amount of heat that can be delivered so the supply pipe acts as a limiting source anyway At the moment, I have no connection to the radiators except via the secondary coil to the calorifier, a sort of reverse feed if the CH pump on and the gas not lit. One of the things that I have puzzled over is how to keep the rads warm when the multifuel stove is lit in Winter. I have a radiator right at the front and sited to be adjacent to the S/S water tank. The idea being to prevent the tank from freezing and also to keep the front cabin warm. But the CH stat is in the lounge, therefore, at normal settings it doesn't come on. Am now wondering that maybe I have the stat in the wrong place! If I extend the stat to the front cabin and have a thermostatic radiator valve on the lounge radiator, the secondary slightly off topic problem is solved ..... ... thanks ALL

Alan, You inspired me to phone up technical support at Beta Marine! They say that the Beta 38 engines are designed for the hot water take off to be before the thermostat, so that it only opens upon design, and the supply is self limiting so that heat transfer cannot damage the engine. I'm glad I phoned and now I shall go and tinker

Sigh .... now why didn't I think of that! I went and bought an additional calorifier 700x300 for £150. I now have to work out the cost of converting 1" tappings to suitable hose unions .... still, I am quite looking forward to the challenge.

I thought the same thing till a mechanic at the local watering hole suggested I could cool the engine down suffiently to warp a piston! .... I am not used to pistons warping so I thought I'd come on here and ask The bathing frequency would depend on time of year and how close to water point

The photographs just show the original siting. The pipework is insulated and thermostat heats up the calorifier just fine. I have since plumbed in a corner bath and now there is insuficient hot water.

I am running a Beta 38 cooled by a skin tank and supplying heat to a calorifier. See pictures: http://www.cig.canon-europe.com/p?p=GRzDMizRD2T The amount of heat is insufficient to fill a bath. On our last boat, with similar engine but larger cylinder, there was sufficient hot water capacity. So I am thinking of installing a 2nd 43 litre calorifier. I havent yet worked out the installation but I am competent to do it. What concerns me is just how much heat can I take out of the engine? Is there any guidance? The point is, can I actually do harm by removing too much heat? Thanks, Stewart

We have a Victron fed by a bank of 6 110ah batteries. We have a Victron battery monitor hooked into the installation. For 3 years I used the available energy to power up my tools while doing a fit out. I basically bled the batteries way down below 50% on quite a few occasions. In October we went off for a months cruising and basically the batteries were knackered so that as soon as you switched on the microwave, the battery monitor registered a voltage below 12v and the inverter would switch off. The solution was to turn the engine on so that the driven voltage went back up. We have now replaced the battery bank and all seems to be working ok. I might add that we researched and finally bought 5 - 120ah 60% deep cycle 300 recycle batteries for £75each (from Alphi Battery Suppliers) ..... I believe that the advances in battery design are such that the 5 batteries are now at least equal to the original 6 batteries. Am quite looking forward to testing them out .....

Jenny in times BC (Before Co-habiting) had this cockatiel that she asked me to look after while she and children went off on holiday. They returned a fortnight later. To get him back home we took "Sherpa" for an afternoon drive (AD) , in my Transit van.It being a nice sunny day, the cage is strapped to back of driver's seat to stop it from falling over. Me driving with the window down and we stop at this T-junction (in the middle of Epsom, Surrey ... just by the college for the anally retentive ). Just as we turn into the road this teenage girl happens to be walking up to the junction. Without further ado, Sherpa decides to let out this perfect wolf whistle! I'm sure he couldn't see her, so I guess it just something to do with the sounds indicative of my 2 daughters staying for a while during his 'holiday'. Anyway, the look I received from the passing girl who thought I was the culprit was nothing to the ear bending I was receiving from my passenger seat!

dontpanic, you've asked what I've been puzzling over, will a river journey upset my equilibrium ... .. I'm not an adventerous sort so I tend to stick my head under the covers as soon as brain starts to make enquiring noises, and I go off and do something else! We are in Stoke area, on Macclesfield Canal, and intending to go all over the UK - Jenny will be in charge of the maps and destinations, and she also likes to do the tillering so no doubt the decision making will be left to me, and I will be the one who decides if such and such a place is a suitable stop over. Maybe I'll take steelaway's advice and moor up tied to a tree! There will be 5 of us on board, a cockateil, two border collies, and us two - 4 of us will have life jackets, so we can swim to the bank if necessary. I'm also thinking of taking my 16' double extension ladder - LOL - if the dogs that desparate they can walk the ladder! Have got some serious reading up to do before we venture upon the rivers and posts like yours are emminently worthy of pursuing especially when they include nice photos

I found so much gas leaking from the standard 13Kg propane cylinders that I went off to: http://www.bes.co.uk/ and bought 2 new leads with rubber washers. Now I can happily tighten up the leads hand tight and be reasonably content they not leaking. One more point. Previously I would have left the cylinder unconnected until needed. The last pair of cylinders just bought, I connected up both. The second cylinder, as soon as I unscrewed the black insert, it nearly gave me frostbite because the cylinder had been turned on !!!! I cannot believe this had been done on purpose but it does make you think! Certainly, an awful lot of gas would have escaped by the time I came to connect up, and no I wouldn't be able to smell it because I have lost my sense of smell

Start of ........ That is interesting. We were given a 47Kg flogas bottle (full) by a neighbour just in time for the cold spell! It's now empty and I was pondering the possibility of carrying a full bottle strapped to the front end ready for use as a stand-by next winter ......... upon discussion with Jenny, it appears the space has been / will be taken up by a container full of spuds Am now looking at what the RBOA offers End of

thanks for that info. I'm with O2 mobile wise, I wonder if this can be cobbled together re other 'hotspots'? I shall pass this on to serious boyfriend of daughters who is an expert in these sort of things .... let him do the hard work

I sort of held back from replying to this, but upon reading out the comments to wife, we both commented, "But I/You never remember the blasted combinations!!!!" I did put a combination padlock on the lid to the gas hatch, sadly I forgot the number. I had remembered to write it on one of the vertical timbers to the right of an adjacent window but time had passed and the timbers were now snugly covered over with oak plywood!

Fascinating thread .... kept me awake! Nice deviations, lot's of waffle. Now then ........ What I would like to know is this. While continuous cruising is allowed in the travelling season, what happens when we have "stoppages"? Would I be forced to pay some sort of stop-over fee? I happen to feel a slight amount of sympathy for Mr Davis (such a long thread, have I remembered the name correctly?). Albeit, I have nothing to go on but I would imagine he feels a bit miffed! Circumstances prevail, sometimes life has a way of hitting back below the belt. We are going off on our first serious attempt at CC - hopefully going sufficiently fast around the system to prevent any suggestion of standing still! I did have it in mind not to go for a 'Winter Mooring' as it seems so blasted expensive for what you get but now I reckon I'll save the pennies and .... hang on a minute, aren't we in the middle of a "Global Warming"? No Winter! No stoppages! rofl

I have 5- 120aH batteries and they are connected up via : http://www.es-store.co.uk/ac-changeover-systems-and-dc-link-box/dclinkpcbmeg5S.html It may not be what you want but when it comes to making decent connections I rate it highly. Saves on the brain thinking and it does come with lots of nice protection (be aware, it quite a big box)....

Thanks for the replies I appreciate the comment re the shrinking back of the neoprene seal .... luckilly I have sufficient additional seal to take advantage of the advice (when I enter the next stage ) As for the weedhatch seal, I was wondering if I could use the mastic one gets with sink tops - it seems to me that the mastic used to seal a stainless steel sink is the same stuff! Anyway, I'm going to enquire at the local chandlers and the local plumbers, they bein approx 100yds apart ..... see which works out cheapest When they broke in, it was in pursuit of alcohol. I think the alarm belting away must have detracted them from the other items. The doors and side hatch were/are all locked and the only means of entry/exit was via the smashed window. They didn't feel the need to turn on any lights so they missed the freebies - cheque book and money on table; brand new flat screen TV + dvd player + freesat; not to mention loads of dvds (maybe our selection of no interest ) .... we had just returned the day before from a month away and being complacent, I had left things in place - things have changed a bit. I have now installed a mesh to cover the inside of the windows, this to act as a deterrent. They can of course get in but there aint no alcohol ............ One ironic aside. Shortly after this, I shut the steel door on the cruiser deck, shut home the padlock and blinked! I had left the keys inside the boat. A spare set at home, but I needed to get back in. Hmmmmm, it seemed the only way in was to climb in through the smashed window ..... I guess it ok to smile

I have a 3 year old boat and last October some defective specimens levered the front cabin window, broke the glass and ruined the frame. 3 times they came into the cabin, and each time the alarm went off and I received a text message (which I read when I woke up - 3 messages ending at 3am!) .... sometimes you just know it for real. As I walked down the path I could see the curtain flapping outside the boat. 4 other boats got some attention, but mine was the most painful. I am insured but I have a £300 excess so not a route to explore. I phoned up and obtained the window supplier's details. 3 years down the line and I am informed that the process of anodising is no longer done due to excessive CFC production hence sadly a matching window cannot be found. I end up buying a replacement window from the original boat builder. It's only agreeable attributes are it's the same size and it's brass anodised, after that things diverge. It has a black neoprene strip that covers surface fixing screws, oh, and it has a slider ...... none of the original windows matches - never mind, it was only fifty quid I boarded up the window till I had time to work on it. I have spent absolutely ages puzzling over how to remove the existing window frame when it is fixed by screws from the inside necessitating removal of plywood panelling and oak trim. Enough procrastinating ... today I went for it! (and it was remarkably easy lol) I drilled through the internal panelling with a 10mm drill to expose the screws. I removed the screws and went outside and carefully levered the window out of the steel opening. I scraped off the remains of the mastic seal and cleaned up ready for insertion of the new window. Ideally, I would like to paint the area first but the weather awful, the timing not right, and I'm just pleased to remove the broken frame and get something in that is watertight! I was advised that I needed some "weedhatch rubber" to seal the new window to the steel hull. I didn't have any, and it was past closing time. I was going to use a flexible silicon seal, but was against using that on the grounds that I wouldn't be able to paint over it, and I thought it might corrode the metal, and additionally I wanted to take the window off later in warmer weather ...... so, I went off to my local Focus and bought a roll of rubber draft proofer sufficient for 2 doors! It p-shaped seal with peel off adhesive backing. This allowed me to stick it to the perimeter of the window opening AND to the perimeter of the window frame. I had some ancient stainless self tappers in my collection, just perfect for the job - slotted, not cross-head - I drilled 16 holes, screwed the frame in place (making sure I didn't warp it in the process) and finally I covered the screws with the neoprene cover. Later, come warm weather and inclination, I shall remove window and paint surrounding area, affix weedhatch rubber .......... etc I tidied up, stepped back and tried to feel pleased. All in all, £60 for materials, 4 hours work and at last secure! I just have to replace/rectify the damaged internal panelling, and I try not to see the horrendous scratch marks made in the paintwork during the process of breaking and entering. To think they did this just to grab a bottle of wine and a can of beer!