TheBiscuits

https://www.yachtingmonthly.com/sailing-skills/crash-test-boat-gas-explosion-29779 says: We asked the Marine Accident Investigation Board (MAIB) for details of recent cases where gas bottles were involved in explosions and fires on leisure craft. Steven Clinch, the Chief Inspector of Marine Accidents, gave us a dossier with 18 reported incidents ‘of interest’, most of them within the last 10 years. Many involve motorboats and canal boats, but they also include sailing boat incidents, one resulting in a known fatality. A huge percentage of gas leak ‘incidents’ are not reported unless they involve the emergency services. But it doesn't give details.

Yeah, but in a gas locker. Cocking it up dumps a whole bottle of gas out of the gas drains but doesn't blow up the boat.

Fair comment. I'm delighted to see the boats are running, and it's only to be expected that there will be "lessons learned" from the first few trips. Maybe if CRT keep having to send a tug and pan out to lighten the load they'll agree to a bit more dredging! Heh. I used to do failure analysis for BTR / Dunlop hose, and one of the old favourites was chewing gum stuck over a pinhole with a jubilee clip round it to hold it in place. Full credit to the bloke for trying to fix it and carry on, but big hydraulic needs a lot more than a sticking plaster to keep the internal pressure.

Of course not. I'd expect them to be replaced on schedule as part of a programme of preventative maintenance!

https://www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/news/people/barge-operator-finally-makes-history-after-getting-grounded-2980268 Another direct link for @WotEver

Get her to ask the volly to open the gates for her then. I'm sure you'd enjoy watching them try with a 6" level difference. Mrs ditchcrawler

No, they happily do those with the canal open. We've seen quite a few where the police or the fire service draw straws for who has to go in the water and who gets to make cheap wisecracks from the side. They do ask you to slow down and avoid the swimmers though!

That sounds like advanced notice of a request to drain a few pounds on the flight. They'll be looking for something (gun? knife?) that's been used in a crime and thrown into the canal. When it's a body they are looking for they don't usually wait until the day after to start work!

For a minute I laughed so hard it Hertz ...

It suffocated! Seriously, it all depends on the position of the alarm relative to any leaking CO. Your tale is an excellent example of why everyone should have more than one CO alarm (and smoke alarms too) and why it's critical that at least one of the CO alarms is nearby and at your head level when you are sleeping. There's no point having a tidy CO alarm on the high shelf if you are getting poisoned 3ft below it!

@Alan de Enfield didn't you want a marina a while back?

I'm not surprised it went quickly. That is a lot of boat for £29k in the current market. Not to my taste exactly, but I love the super-sized hatch arrangement! Hmm ... I'll get out the tape measure and engineers' chalk ...

Thanks for that info - it explains the price perfectly. To get a £45k boat for £32k you need to spend around £13k on it! Scabblers are only a few hundred quid though! A large portion of the "back-to-metal" repaint is labour ... If you only care that the metal is protected and don't care about the shiny finish, a bucket of hammerite smeared over bare metal would get you quite a bit of boat for the money from what I can see.

They are not screws. they are push buttons that you need a thin rod (perhaps a bit of wire?) to push. One increases the setting, one decreases the setting. You need a mark and a separate, handheld tachometer to set it correctly. The other version of the Vetus tachometer can only be set at exactly 2600 rpm by pressing a button on the back of the unit, but you still need a separate tachometer to get the revs to the correct level before you press the set button.

Direct link for the lazy

... who have contributed millions of pounds to towpath upgrades around the country. With a decent mountain bike, you can still get the idiots coming past at 30mph on unimproved towpaths, and they splatter your boat with mud out of the puddles as they come past. Yes, there are idiots that go too fast on the improved towpaths, and we all note them, but I still think the upgraded towpath is a benefit to boaters. My only objection to the funding being spent is where they "forget" to either leave or add mooring provision. We are quite vocal about this at CRT pissups corporate events, and also online via twitter. Here's our most recent contribution on the topic:

Are they just frequently used bits of private land or public rights of way? I strongly approve in one case but not the other!

Yes, if you directly close your account the account is closed. Just requesting (but not using) a PAC doesn't cancel your account

I'm confused. If you don't use a PAC or STAC it doesn't cancel your account or number AFAIK. It's only when your new provider uses the code you provide them with that it closes the old account (and switches if it's a PAC).