Geoff Taylor

Hi, Viton type must be used as bio content in fuel will damage nitrile .

I too used high temp silicone and grouted with fire cement, whatever the old grout was turned to dust and the reason for using high temp silicone was that my tiles are almost all black and do get very hot. So far so good!.

I too can recommend Braunston Marina , we have had experience of buying and selling through them and in both instances received exceptional service. It is very important to also have an experienced surveyor, for both of our dealings we used Craig Allan (he has built narrowboats) and his superb knowledge of his job saved us quite a few thousands in purchasing power.

Hi, it may be a case of trial and error, try placing a steel plate over the hob part which will transmit the heat ( the thickness being the trial and error bit ). Most eco fans have a safety overheat device which is a strip of steel in the base that lifts the base away from the surface should it be too hot, it works ok on our fan model which is sat on an Aarow ecoburn 5. Out of curiosity when I am next at our boat I will check the temp at which our fan lifts as I have a laser temp gun (its great for locating hot spots or cold /icy areas ) gun is not expensive, plenty on ebay.

Hi, as long as the heating system and engine antifreeze strengths are ok the main concern is the fresh water system, we lag the pump and calorifier and do not fill the water tank any more than 3/4 full. We like to leave our boat ready to go all year round. It may be totally not needed but i leave the sink, wash basin and shower taps on and remove the shower head and blow hard which clears the taps of water thus leaving a good bit of room should it freeze, I did this when a few years ago we had a minus 14 or so and never suffered anything burst. Must add that we had no heating running at all at those temps, the water tank did have a small block of ice in it and there was a little icing in the pipes that ten minutes after lighting the stove cleared (the calorifier is under the fixed double and water pump under the galley sink).

The new plugs are definately not the right ones, they may have been packaged wrongly or a mistake on the part number by the cross reference, taper seat must be replaced with the same type and the measurement from taper to tip be exactly the same. The photo of the old plug shows that it is making contact on the taper seat, the new plug is designed to sit on a copper washer. It is possible that Shanks at some time changed the design of glow plug from flat seat to taper. There will be a part number on the original glow plug which can be checked online with other manufacturers sites. I would personally use a top brand name as so many inferior copies are on the market nowadays. Hope this helps.

Our German shepherd never had any experience of a narrowboat until she was 6 yrs old and took to it like a duck to water, she was not clumsy but we always put her in a life jacket just in case to ease lifting out of the cut safely should it ever happen (it did happen once). She always knew when we were going cruising when the jacket was fitted and never resisted it being worn. We wish you all the best and am sure your dog will be ok.

No way would the valve guide cure the problems with this engine, what you have probably done is inadvertently solved it by replacing the head gasket that was possibly starting to blow, I have seen engines running quite well with all of the guides knackered and the only tell tale sign is being that of blue smoke and using oil.

Hi, I do not know if it may help, our H&L was built in 1978 with reg no 60197, at a very wild guess at yours it could be late 1980s.

Broken mounts etc may make a noise etc but will not cause overheating, a big end problem would show itself pretty quick by a drop in oil pressure and rise in water temp and total engine failure would soon follow. Maybe a faulty thermostat on the cooling side assuming knocks are mountings and oil pressure ok , it was not mentioned if the engine is raw cooled or skin tank so a problem could be there. The head gasket can be checked with a chemical test kit and the knocks could be lurking in the injection system caused by a faulty fuel injector (a "crack" test will eliminate this). The art of diagnosis is the order in which it is done, I tend to check the easiest first and do not jump to conclusions and keep calm !!.

The LWs are perfectly happy to run on 15W40 grade lubes as are most diesels of that age despite being non turbo (naturally aspirated), 15W40 was primarily used in turbo diesels up until modern engines were advanced in design and had to use semi and full synthetics. I have used that oil in all my old petrol engined cars (mainly Fords) with no problems and know for a fact that the Castrol rally team used it in their Cosworth BDA engined Ford Escorts in the 70s/80s. The British climate perfectly suits the all year round use of 15W40 grade lube according to all the manufacturers temp charts and for most makes of diesel engine.

Hi, Just a guess, if you are running with a paper air filter it is possible that the excess oil from the breather has blocked it and the alternative is to create more suction by the engine getting its air from the crankcase therefore causing the excessive oil consumption. If that is not the case then I am afraid that something a lot more serious is wrong especially having to have modified the pistons to take different rings etc. Were the bores checked for ovality after the honing?, was the wear lip at the top of the bores removed or the top rings stepped to miss them, otherwise the top rings will break up very quickly, (I have witnessed this on quite a few occasions with both petrol and diesel engines) were the rings fitted the right way up?, is the ring circumference exactly right for the bore?, the engineer who machined the pistons would not know this if he did not personally try the ring fit in the bore, many questions I know but thats engine building. Hope some of this info helps you but my fear is that you will have to endure another stripdown in order to find your problem.

The best way to clean up the affected parts are to remove the battery terminals and pour boiling water to dissolve the bits that need it, dry thoroughly and coat in the correct stuff if you have got it, Vaseline and even stern gland grease will suffice. The idea of waterproofing the terminals is to stop damp tracking between pos and neg as a slight current causes this problem, a loose battery post letting acid up it is also a reason for furring up.

A rub with Tcut or its equivalent and a wax polish should do the job, it works on our cream paintwork perfectly.

Hi, rust spots can vary greatly upon the quality of the steel used in boats, slight flaws in the rolling of the steel causes pockets of slag or air bubbles hence premature pitting. Higher quality steel is inspected and certified against these flaws and given a certification code, Chinese steel used in boat building has been known to fail a hull survey inside 9 years old !. For instance, our 38 year old 5mm hull on our Hancock & Lane has recently passed a hull survey with flying colours and is blacked with standard bitumen every 4 years. She has never had a galvanic isolator fitted until I treated her to one last year.

I know a groundsman that around dusk waved (not pointed) a green laser at them and they would leave for a few days, apparently the green mimics the eye reflections of one of their predators in the wild. It certainly was an impressive site watching them all take off !.

Hi Tim, The deaths may be tiny and if they can be reduced even more then something will have been accomplished, smokers choose to risk the warnings that their health may suffer and die as an individual but ignorance of poisoning by CO can wipe out a whole family.

I know that it is sheer common sense to fit fire and CO alarms but is there any reason why these devices could not be made compulsory as part of the BSS inspection?, if it saved just one life then surely a device that does not cost a Kings ransom has done its job.

I am a bit old fashioned and would not use Prestone and stick to copying the colour of what is in there and before doing anything dip the mix with an antifreeze tester as it may be so strong you could get away with only a water top up.

The Eber is ok on any type of anti freeze, but as Matty correctly states, do not mix blue and pink. The green is ok to mix with blue as both are ethylene glycol (the pink is not). Some of the green brands have a tracer chemical in them that makes it change colour if a head gasket fails and blows exhaust gases into it.

Hi, If you are local to an agricultural engineers, plant hire company, hydraulic hose company or even a haulage repair shop you should be able to obtain the correct o rings for your injectors, they will be a standard size and cost well under a fiver.

We use 3 where we are as it seems to be the only one that works here and it works everywhere we have been besides.

Hi, always get a full survey done regardless of the seller having any recent documentation, the seller should be able to supply proof that they own the vessel and supply a current BSS certificate. There is no logbook system for narrowboats or any way as I know for checking that they are on finance except for the honesty of the seller. Buying from official sales outlets are much safer if a newbie to the canal world. Hope this helps a bit in your search, good luck.

Hi, found this site, an interesting read about Red/Blue antifreeze. here - Opie Oils https://www.opieoils.co.uk/pdfs/tech-articles/coolant-antifreeze.

We have an early Aarrow Ecoburn 5 with separate ash/vent door, a superb stove, very controllable and all steel construction apart from feet, main door, ash door and blanking plate for flue option, the later models look as though they use a full door now.