canals are us?

It's exciting stuff. Over 5 years ago I was in the same situation on buying my first boat for 25k. A 1998 Liverpool 50ft trad. I work so Marina Based and have no regrets and adapted the boat as I wanted. Walk through bathroom and bigger kitchen with separate 12 volt fridge and freezer, cooker, dishwasher and added solar and a victron inverter charger. I had my boat surveyed by Steve Hands and it was a very good result. He doesn't do BSS though. I plan to get out soon and go cruising! At first I thought it was sinking as hearing drips, then realised it was raining. James

You do have to bear in mind it's in a very harsh environment what with sulphuric acid with burning logs and coal together, soot, tar coating, condensation formed while heating up on the boilers surface etc. Mine is just a steel back boiler not stainless and is 4 years old. It's wasn't expensive at £140 from woodwarm. It's a pain having to drain the heating system and refill but the only thing to really go wrong rather than heaters coking up etc. Some factory integral fitted boiler stoves used to fail around 5 years like the old arrow stratford due to above issues, undersized boiler for heat load, no rust inhibitor etc and no pipe stat to prevent cold water being circulated back round the system when fire started and fire dying down. I like woodwarm stoves as all of their boilers from 8-70,000btu are bolt in and are separate to the stove so that when it leaks you don't have to throw away the stove. Clearview do too. James

I have a woodwarm fireview with 8,000btu domestic hot water boiler heating 2 rads or the calorifier on gravity circulation on my 50 foot trad narrowboat. Never gets the rads really, really hot like a webasto, but heats the bathroom and bedroom to a good temperature in winter and stops my bedroom windows freezing up. My stove is at the bow doors and replaced an oil stove without boiler and is a gravity system with 28mm and 22mm copper. I can also turn off the 2 gravity rads off on the lever valves and switch a pump on to heat the calorifier under the bed, pipes run from one side of the boat to the other under the floor to the calorifier under the bed hence needing a pump. It takes the back boiler at least 2-3 hours to get the water hot for a shower, so don't ever use it. I'm Marina based and so for hot water use a 1.1kw immersion heater on a timer. 2 years ago I installed a used Webasto and linked it into my existing heating system and added 2 more rads in the salon and galley, to heat this space when stove isn't lit. This works really well, but only use it when not worth lighting the fire. If cruising have engine heating water, or Webasto or SFS with backboiler. If land based immersion heater. The only real disadvantage of gravity heating is it's not as neat looking with large 28mm pipes fixed along the side of the boat, but no electricity used! I think secondary form of heating is important as if ill much prefer to flick the switch than mess about with fires. I have my Webasto timer in my wardrobe at the foot of the bed! James

I bet when the government say we should scrap our old cars and buy new, I bet these calculations aren't included in the CO2 outputs, only when driving? I have a 1989 Volvo 240 GLT petrol automatic, was my daily and only car for 8 years, now on 233,000 and a 1996 Volvo 940 Turbo auto petrol on 194,000. This is my work vehicle. I have probably ruined it now with buying a 2006 Lexus IS 220d! Its high mileage at 175K, but lovely and comfortable and cheap at £1500. We should be encouraged to keep old cars on the road and not buying new. James

Henry for me. Lives in the back of my modern trad. Our first one we left at our last house move. Still working great and no spares needed at 22 years old. As a maintenance man I have used a few customers cleaners and generally disappointed in Dyson. Some are not too bad but wouldn't buy one. James

Hope all 3 make a speedy recovery and no long term effects. James.

You need to change the battery type to "user" I couldn't work it out too, then you can adjust the voltage settings to your own values. If no posh inverter occasionally do an equalisation charge using the EQ charge function voltage on the MT50 Meter. I wouldn't take it as gospel the battery charge indicator as mine is showing half charged on the MT50 meter and on mains victron charger. Best first thing in the morning when no solar activity is to start the engine and see how many AH is being charged. If under 2% of the battery bank then full. This way you won't kill the batteries. James

As said the Remote MT50 meter for the BN series controller is a great piece of kit as you can adjust the controllers voltage settings under user settings and every now and again do an equalisation charge at 15.5v - 16 volts to get rid of sulphation on your batteries. I can also do it on my inverter charger but if no mains available can't do it, but can with the solar MT50 meter. James

No idea of the ebay items. Have a look at bimble solar. I bought some used panels and a new Tracer 40A MPPT controller. Very satisfied customer. They do kits, or just look for what you want. If you have space the single 260watt used panel at £99 is a good price, then add a 20,30 or 40A MPPT controller depending if you plan to add more panels. What do you need to power during summer? Winter forget solar. Only get an amp or 2 at best if lucky. http://www.bimblesolar.com/solar/individual/canadian260w-used James

Hopefully with us Friday! James

I have owned 3 villager stoves over the last 25 years. A villager Medium in 1991. A villager AHI Boiler model in 2008 A villager Berkley boiler model in 2012. The best one was the Villager A range with flue damper and 45,000btu boiler. A friend has a villager puffin for 10 years and he loves it. The glass does get dirty as I found out with all our villagers. I now own a woodwarm fireview 4.5kw stove the last 5 years on my boat and it's excellent. Double glazed glass. Can adjust grate flat for wood or open for coal with the door tool. Excellent airwash. Rope seals fit into a channel that's cast in the door so no glue required. Apart from cracked vermiculite fireboards not replaced anything. I like Oxbow Red. James

I see solar output is starting to get better. Seen 10A so far from 380 watts with my new 40a MPPT tracer controller around a week ago. Today I turned off the mains and was getting mostly 4.1A It was enough to run my 12 volt undercounter fridge and separate under counter freezer. Voltage went up to 14.6 volts in slight sunshine and varied from 12.6v upwards. It will be interesting what I get in the Summer. Best on the old PWM controller was 13A. I am on mains so presume if batteries are fully charged then solar would cut out. James

The new name could be "British Waterways Number 2" If anyone contacts the complaints department they just say "were sxxx at everything" James.

I have a 50ft trad narrowboat. When I viewed it, I knew it was right. Space wise perfect for me. Done a few alterations like refit galley and created a walk through bathroom. I have everything I need in the 8ft Galley. Sink, 12volt separate under counter fridge and freezer. Cooker, Full size washer/dryer. If I get married or had children, I would either buy a 70ft or most likely buy a widebeam sailaway. James

Looks great, I bet you're well pleased with it. James

Brings a whole new meaning to CC. Constant Cruising Crxx. CCC. James

Thank you both for the info. It's something I'll need to know when out cruising. James

What tail current on the nasa would you stop charging? I'll stick to this method when out cruising and not take any notice of SOC. This evening I turned off my mains charger and the voltage went down from 13.2 volts to 12.7 volts after around 1 hour with a discharge of 5 - 7A with 12volt fridge or freezer running plus lights and 12 volt tv and when these items were on the voltage went down to 12.5volts and stayed there unless fridge/freezer switched off then recovered to 12.7volts. SOC saying 75 or 85%. I tried it for 2 and a half hours, just to see how the voltage and batteries would react. Seems ok to me? I gave up as ready to cook food in my electric mini oven and switched the charger on and it showed 70a very briefly and continued to fall to around 18a then walked away. Thanks. James

My charger is always on as I live in a Marina for work purposes. The charger is generally in float and reads around 13.3 volts. This drops slightly at night to around 13v. Why, I don't know. I noticed yesterday and the day before the solar controller was doing an equalisation charge as I had set it up to do it at 15.5A weeks ago and have now disabled it as don't want to do one every time its sunny! Have mastered doing it on the Victron. So re altered the max voltage and EQ voltage. When I'm out I'll ignore the SOC and see when I start the engine how much current is going in on the BM2 and how long it takes to get less to about 5A? I hear the last tail current can take a long time. I also think it will be good for the batteries to cycle them a bit, and recharge with use, as I never have, due to being permanently on a charger. They might like the excitement of powering my 12 volt freezer and fridge and not having a lazy life on a charger. James

Thanks for the info. So long as I never let the battery voltage drop below 12.2 volts at night, that should keep them healthy so long as I charge them everyday. When in the Marina I'm using a Victron inv/charger., When out crusing start re-charging at 12.2v or before preferably. James

You reminded me. About a week ago I fitted 2 new Trojan T105's to my existing 2, so now have 4 batteries of around 440AH or a bit less caused by sulphation which I did an equalisation and SG readings. I have just changed both monitors to show the size of the battery bank. Before put 200ah in. What else should I do? James

I have a tracer 40A MPPT solar controller and the remote MT50 meter. I also have a NASA BM2 battery monitor. Is the tracer remote battery indicator accurate? As the MT50 meter shows half full and the NASA BM2 as 104% SOC. I would of thought both should be full as charger on permanently on the Victron inverter/charger. Voltage reading 13.3v on both. 0.3A charge according to BM2. Is it also normal for a victron inverter/charger to hum/buzz slightly? What is the voltage when at 50% SOC? I can then see if it tallies with my battery monitor. James

My thoughts too, so didn't buy! Your price more like it. James

My windows are channel glaze. If I ever in the unfortunate position in needing to replace any glass I would contact the manufacturers as the toughening process isn't cheap. I had a little 400mm x 150mm bathroom window hopper shatter late one night in the Marina and so far haven't had it toughened as it was £5 for the glass and £22.50 to have it toughened! I plan to take it to my other more reasonable glaziers and may have 2 other bottom fixed panes toughened as well for spares. If you can find a glazier that stocks 4mm laminated you could get them to cut it there and then. My glazier I know would have the frame and cut the glass to size and fit it for you if you wanted. James

Lets hope the battery thief gets caught by the police and they come down on him "with a tonne of batteries" It would be nice if he is found with them or other stolen goods. The other issue is sentencing is too lenient. Always seem to get a suspended sentence. I hate thieves. If I want something I work, save up, like the majority of people. James