Norman Bond

I know the area well and would never moor behind the Tyburn. This is mainly because I think it is one of the worst pubs in the area. That's my personal opinion and may well be out of date as the last time I went there was to see Dave Swarbrick and Whippersnapper - who had only just been formed. The local housing estate is Castle Vale and your policeman is a bit behind the times. It used to be the biggest shithole in Brum but gave up that title about 10 years ago when they pulled down the tower blocks and decanted a lot of the residents. I still wouldn't want to live on there ( I did for a short time and worked there for about a year) but would choose it over some of the other places that Birmingham can boast. The biggest problem with mooring behind the Tyburn is that it is close to a lot of dodgy areas. There's Castle Vale and Pype Hayes, Walmley/Minworth just down the road and you are just along the canal from the Showcase cinema which is the local car-theft hot spot. Best tactic would have been to either moor for a short time at the Showcase and get a takeaway from the Kingsbury Balti opposite, or take a short walk up to the India Gardens if you want a sit-down meal and then move the boat afterwards; or moor down by Minworth middle lock and get a takeaway from Chilli Spice on the Kingsbury Road. Either way I would cruise down an extra mile to moor at the back of the Kingsley or 2 miles to the cutting behind the White Horse. Both better pubs and both do reasonable meals. And if I remember correctly ( and these days my memory is something that can't be relied on ) you need an anti-vandal ( "water conservation" ) key to reach the Tyburn. Unless you do what most of the locals do which is to give the top of the mechanism a sharp tap with your windlass at which point they spring open. The vandals just tap them with a brick. And you had better not drive past at 70 mph. The speed limit on that part of the A38 is 40 and there's a camera! Norman Edited for crap typing

Be very careful with any of the stronger solvents such as acetone and lighter fluid. They will dissolve the glue, but when they evaporate off you will find that the glue will have been spread over a wider area and in the meantime the solvent WILL have attacked the plastic surface. Something like 1,1,1-Trichloroethane would be ideal, which used to be available under a number names such as Genclene - but you would probably find this even harder to get than acetone. I have 2 methods that I have used successfully for a couple of years (i.e. ever since my 5 litre can of Genclene ran out!). One is a small bottle of Mangers' De-Solv-It which I bought from a DIY store. Useful for lots of different stains and also removes label residue very well. Try B&Q or a wallpaper shop. The other is gaffer tape. Any strong self-adhesive tape will do. Stick it on the glue and peel it off again. It may take several goes but the glue will stick to the tape and peel off with it. This is my preferred method for removing label residue from CD cases. And unlike acetone or lighter fluid you can even smoke while doing it without losing your eyebrows! Norman

Yes, there is a precedent here - but I don't think it is "We have been here before !" I think it is "Times change." Go back your 30-40 years and the attitude of British "management"(?) in the motorbike and car industries was "We've been making these things for 50 years. No bloody foreigner can teach us anything." Just keep trousering the money and failing to invest in plant, research and development, design and quality assurance and when the shit finally hits the fan rest secure in the knowledge that your rich pals who own the papers will just blame the workers. Sorry; rant over. British "top" management may not have changed - but everything around them has. Try buying a new narrowboat that doesn't already have an engine based around an extremely reliable far eastern design. Inverters, battery chargers etc will have been made in somewhere like Hong Kong. Heating supplied by a company in Europe. Steel sourced within the EC. China has 2 big advantages at the moment and both of these are likely to change. First is low-cost labour. I'm not saying cheap because that has an implication of poor quality and we don't yet have any evidence of that in either direction in narrowboat construction. Labour costs will start to rise as the Chinese start demanding Western levels of living standards. The Japanese managed to keep these ideas from their workforce for some time but with the rise of t'internet and globalised TV the Chinese will find this much more difficult. The second is the low cost of shipping an extremely heavy steel shell half-way around the world. This is probably an anomaly that will be ironed out over the next few years as fuel costs start to rise again. At that point they will move into smaller higher-value goods. Such as all of the parts that go into your narrowboat. Just the shell will be made over here - and that will probably be in somewhere like Poland. Because Chinese management know that times change and they will be prepared for it. Norman

I agree with John. The only place I have seen East West boats for sale is at Whilton marina and I can't believe they would be selling boats that did not meet all the required standards and came with the certification to prove it.

I doubt whether you will get any real depth of information. As you might be able to guess from the name they are built in China, so all anyone will be able to talk about would be the design, the fitout and quality of workmanship in the painting and welding etc. They haven't been around long enough for anyone to tell you how well the steelwork will last or how well they will retain their value if you come to sell one in a few years. I personally like the almost vertical cabin sides and the uncluttered well deck as it makes the boat look wider. If you like these it might also be worth looking at some of the "concept" Chinese boats. They also have some nice design touches but will again suffer from a lack of an established history. Norman

I was suffering from (what now seems to have been the last day of) a head cold and I am normally a bit deaf anyway, so don't take any of the following as absolute. However, we were told that it had been commissioned by a couple who had returned from boating in Europe and a lot of the design features were based on what they had liked on the boats out there. This included the window design and electronic controls rather than the usual cables. It also had full air-conditioning. How that would fit in with the low energy consumption eco-crowd I wouldn't like to guess! Though all of the windows were sealed doubled-glazed units. The one part of the window design that I could see as being practical was the replacement of a single large window with three separate narrow ones. For those who specify portholes for their heightened security this could offer similar levels while letting in more light. They had hoped to have had it completed and on the water at the show but there had been a delay in the steel supply. Launch was now scheduled for June. Pity it wasn't there as I think it would have created quite a stir! Norman

Did you see the stand with an illustration of a red and white boat with what I called "go faster windows". From looking at my program it would seem to be Fernwood Craft. Some very interesting ideas. I was even hearing it this morning. I bought the CD! Someone complained about the price at the curry stall and was told to look around. "Compared to what they are charging we are good value". (Quoted from memory, so not verbatim.) Beer wasn't cheap either. Called in one of the villages on the way back and got a nice pint of Landlord for £2.00 Yeah. Me too! Norman

Me too. But the second, and probably more lasting impression, was that our political masters were a bunch of sleazebags. An impression that is reinforced with every passing year! Norman

Right scandal John, but wrong person. "He would say that, wouldn't he?" was said by Christine's colleague, Mandy Rice-Davies. Norman (Who is also old enough to remember, but unlike John took more of a prurient interest in these things).

Surely the biggest canal comedian is Barry Gardiner? Norman (DEFRA as the Keystone Cops?)

I have seen the boats at Whilton and have to say that I really do like the shape. Not as elegant as most, but the almost vertical cabin sides make them look much wider than standard and make them a bit more imposing. But as a wide-shouldered fat bas***d I need the room at that height. And I think the well deck and locker look really good. But the 57 footer is the same price as the new Colecraft at Whilton. Admittedly the Chinese boat has a 12mm bottom, but I still think I would go for the Colecraft as I know the kind of quality I would be getting and the Chinese one would still be a bit of an unknown quantity. Norman

But not that far off "The Straight Story" - the man who drives 260 miles on his sit-on lawnmower. Synopsis Norman

Thank you Ian. Glad to know there's someone around besides me who still remembers these things. Once upon a time I used to use Gopher as part of my job. But don't get me started on the old days....... I am not sure whether this would mean anything to Maverick though. Whereas if my link hadn't worked (this was before I knew I had cross-posted with Gary) he could have gone to Google, clicked on the groups link over the search box and either browsed the list for recreation or typed waterways into the search box where it would have pulled up a number of interesting groups (which is how I found it originally). He would know he had the correct one because it is called "groups.google.co.uk/group/uk.rec.waterways" Norman

Its a Google group and not even in the same league as this forum. They tend to be faster for breaking news and closures, but do not share the same level of technical discussion (though looking at some of the names involved the experience is there). Work permitting I will log onto here 2 or 3 times a day. Uk.rec.waterways probably once every 2 to 3 days unless I am following a news story on there. You can access it here. Link There is also a Yahoo canals group. But that is even less impressive. Norman

This has always struck me as one of these technologies that came to market too late to be useful. TFT TVs are dropping in price by the day and making the £150 for a slingbox look less and less like a good idea. Besides this unless your laptop is very new it will probably have a poor response time (designed to show stationary text and images) and will suffer from significant ghosting of fast moving images. Check the TV that Aldi will be selling on Sunday. 19" TFT, inbuilt freeview tuner 8ms response time and a DVD player built in all for £250. Bigger and faster screen than your laptop and a wider viewing angle, teletext thrown in for nothing and it doesn't need a broadband connection. IF you don't need the DVD player or are happy with a smaller screen you can find even cheaper options. Norman

Good point Neil, The BW station at Camp Hill top lock has good shower and toilet facilities but is fenced off from the road. If you want to get out at night you have to go back across the canal to the towpath side. Might be worth it for the short walk for a good balti. But despite the fences I have been told by a BW worker that local kids still get into the site and vandalise it. Never heard of them doing anything to a boat though. Cuckoo Wharf has a basic toilet and shower (at least it did the last time I was there) but has some residential moorings and is on a fenced estate with a security guard. Not only is it safe, but the guard will let you in and out of the gate. The trouble is that unless you want to catch a bus into Brum there isn't really anywhere to go. The local pubs are very "basic" though there used to be a cafe next to the gate where I am told you can get a good bacon sarnie in the morning. Can't vouch for that as I am a veggie myself. But kowaton is right in one way - I wouldn't call either of them "pleasant". Norman

Having spent some of last year 40-60 feet up in the air cutting branches off trees I can say that there are some rare occasions when a chain saw is safer than a bow saw and that a Stihl 011AV is one of the best chain saws you can get. But for cutting logs for firewood I would choose a bow saw and a double-handed axe every time. Go for the Sandvik bowsaw as recommended by magnetman (the couple of pounds you would save on a cheaper saw would be a very poor investment). Save a couple of branches and lash them together with some old rope to make two "X" shapes and join them together with a couple of longer branches to make a cutting cradle. It will get damaged as you use it but this doesn't matter when you can easily make another and you can burn the remains of the old one. Drop a log into the cradle and cut to an appropriate length. Keep one large section back for a chopping block and split the others on it with the axe. If you want to know how to do it watch an old cowboy film. As John Orentas would point out people have been doing this for a long time and have already worked out how to do it in the most efficient manner. I wouldn't be without a chain saw, but its a bit like having a velociraptor for a pet. The day you get over familiar and take it for granted is the day it will rip your leg off. Whenever I am tempted to use it I stop and try to think of an alternative method to do the same thing. Norman Edited to add the following (sorry, it was late and I'd had a couple of hectic days at work) The chainsaw also has 2 other drawbacks. It goes blunt much more quickly than you would expect and although, with practice you can learn to sharpen them reasonably quickly the time spent on this and other maintenance should be considered when you think of a chainsaw as a "time saver". And watch out for the wood chips. They go everywhere. Not only will your working area need a lot of cleaning up but they will also get everywhere in your clothes. This includes any pockets. If you put them in the wash make sure to turn the pockets inside out and brush out the chips first otherwise you may be looking at a blocked filter and a rather wet floor.