Amy&Ian

We have a domestic gas oven on our boat (widebeam, so have a bit more space and all the reviews for boat ones were rubbish unless you pay £££££££). Its a Beko, can't remember the model number off the top of my head. Our's is pretty good but I have learnt not to trust the gas numbers as a guage for temp. I bought an oven thermometre from Lakelands for around a fiver, and that helps a lot. Also I try and turn around the food at least once, as it does tend to get quite hot at the back. Ours is a double oven with the top unit also a grill. It's the top one that is slightly more uneven than the bottom. Still learning but it seems to do the job, have handled a few cakes well, lasagnas etc. Haven't tried a roast yet.

Hey guys! Sorry to dissapear from the the thread there, had a super crazy period at work. Many thanks for the tips on the quadrants, I will definitely look them up. Will post a pic when finished! Cheers, Amy

Hey there. A while back I posted this querie - http://www.canalworld.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=53792&hl= And took the good advice to use Kedian. And very pleased we are with the results! They did a super job fabricating a new hatch from the old one, making much bigger windows. More light and less rain drips, yay! If anyone is looking for steel work for their boat I would totally recommend these guys, super professional, gret quality work, on time and within our budget. http://www.kedianengineering.co.uk/ So we have it back on our boat, letting all that lovely light into the bedroom.. and that's about as far as we have gotten with it (the kithen has been taking our immeadiate attention!). We have a plan to line it with somekind of thin insulation and plywood, and have some insulated glass panels on order to fit into the lift up window bits.. however we don't quite know what to use to secure the windows open or locked shut. Any recommendations? Have you done something similar and have some good tips or suggestions for undertaking this project? Cheers! Amy & Ian

Loads of young people on boats down round London way. A lot of this is because many young people are completely priced out of the housing market here, both for renting or buying. My partner and I (early-to-mid-thirties) live on a little barge in Hackney for this reason. It is hands on, huge learning curve but we both love it and we love our boaty neighbors. A wonderful mix of industrious, problem solving individuals, including many people in their 20's, young couples (including an increasing number of families).

Just to add our experiences for the benefit of anyone building their fire surrounds for the first time. Don't just rely on a piece of fireboard to do the trick! We have recently replaced the stove on our barge. The old stove had a reflective metal backing, over a sheet of fireboard, then the fireboard over a piece of ply. The ply had a massive, singed black scorch mark where the heat from the stove had passed through the fireboard! It was a real eye opener for us, our new stove is surrounded by double sheets of fireboard with an airgap, the exposed board will be tiled very shortly. It does feel a little like safety over-kill but I'd rather that than risk losing our boat or our lives to a fire.

Waterworks - Yes we will be willing to spend a hundred quid (maybe even a bit more!) on it, our quotes for a new wooden dog box were around the £1000 mark. We don't want to spend a grand that's for sure! We'd like to keep the metal oval lift-up hatches but cut larger holes into them, so we don't think we'll need to cut any more of the base away. Does that make sense? AlanW - I'll look him up, cheers.

Hi Lucy! Not sure if you'll read this, I've just been trawling the forums for welding advice and saw this, and went oh I know this person! I'm Amy, friends with Dan, my partner and I are up on the wall on EendrachtII. I saw Dan recently and he told me about the horrible experience you had. So good you didn't fall in or lose hold of your boat, the water was going SO FAST that day! Anyways, hope you are getting it fixed, all is ok and you are keeping warm and dry! Amy x

Hello wise & experienced people. Our old barge refit is slowly coming along (got the wood stove on yesterday, finally, warmth, woohoo!), now onto the fixing of leaky cold roofing bits and could really do with some advice. We would like to keep our old steel dogbox or hatch as it is one of the few remaining quirky elements of our lovely old lady barge (and we've been quoted INSANE££££££ amounts for an equivalent wood replacement), however it needs some help. There are holes, the corners are quite thin and I think parts of it are held together by layers of paint, so we'd like to get the weaker bits and holes repaired and also to cut larger apertures in the oval lift up hatches, inserting glass and making lovely lift up windows. We are trying to figure out if we need to get the whole thing sandblasted or stripped somehow back to the bare steel, then take it to some welding person. It seems that both things aren't often done in the same place. We are based in Hackney on the River Lea, the hatch is removable and we can put it in the back of a car. I have been contacting some welder type people I have found via google but as yet have had no decent replies. Was wondering if any of you had any advice or recommendations for either workshops, welders in this region. Do you even think we need to sandblast it? It's just going to be painted again. Many thanks for your input. Amy

Hi guys. This is fascinating stuff and has really inspired me! I am seriously considering solar thermal for my barge (well just about to move in). We have a slightly different challenge. Our water is currently heated by a combi boiler/water heater. So we don't have an existing tank. More over the Manufacturer of the water heater says the device is cheap and cheerful and so could be damaged if it is fed hot water rather than cold water. This means that a system such as: solar capture > solar storage (tank) > water heater> shower won't work. Seeing as we'll need the water heater for some parts of the year to compliment the solar I have thought of a different approach. I hook my shower with three feeds - cold, hot (from heater) and solar. So rather than having two temperature adjustment taps on the shower I would have three. Hopefully for much of the year I wouldn't need to use the hot tap (heater) just relying on the solar and cold taps - but in winter I could turn the hot water tap on to top up the temperature. So it would look like this capture > storage tank > shower It's sounds really simple to me and means just one one extra pipe hooked up to the shower with a tap. It also means I could place the tank on the barge roof just above the shower (I'd have to insulate it) - so saving internal space and plumbing. Has anyone ever done this before? Can anyone spot a hole in my plan? I'd really appreciate people's thoughts. Cheers. Ian

WotEver - Thankyou! No I have never heard of a thermocooker, it does look interesting and we are always keen to find ways to reduce our energy consumption. Can't believ you can make cakes with it, have you tried that? What kind of stuff do you cook with it? (cute puppy pic by the way!) Bat & Frog - Thanks, you are right, the clock doesn't need to run all the time, if at all.. and we can also ignite with one of those clicker things. All the modern ovens I have been looking at have such superfluous digital doodads. Might have to go vintage! Tha Bagdad Boatman (waits) - Yes it's wide, and Cannon seem to come up quite a bit as recommended cooker.. will definitely look into those more. How does your Cannon oven fare with roasts and baking? Does it do the job? Securing - good tip thanks. Round knobs versus shaped, also good tip, hadn't thought of that. I have been google searching for battery op igniters, if I find one I'll let you know. David Mack - Cheers, they look so beautiful but we will probably stick with gas. I love the look of Aga's but struggle with the combined heating and cooking. Having the two together in winter is great, but having to have the heating on in summer to keep cooking.. our little boat will be a sweat box!

Hi there, first time posting! We are in the process of turning a lovely old barge into our home. It's our first boat and it's all very exciting. I have been reading the different threads about ovens and hobs, and I understand that I need to find one with the safety shut off device. Do any of you knowledgeable people out there have any recommendations for good ovens and stoves? I love cooking and baking and would be gutted to end up with an oven that burns up one end and weakly defrosts the other. We will also have limited electricity (no shore power, we will be running off batteries/generator/solar panels), there is an inverter but we don't want the oven to be running unnecessary fans, digital timer displays etc. I'd love to hear any experiences, suggestions, ones to avoid, whatever. Cheers! Amy