Dav and Pen

Mooring on bends are now part of the sport

Think this is possibly a missed edit and it should say gear wheel which was the normal set up either with a speed wheel or lever.

There are some things that are unique and should be seen. The Ronquieres plane and the Strepy boat lift in Belgium. There are trip boats that do both of these and the 4 old lifts are next to the Strepy. one of my favorite routes is in the Ardennes on the river Meuse in Belgium and France and in England the Thames above Oxford.

People with plywood cruisers like the Dolphins certainly panicked when we were ice breaking and we understood that but a steel hull should not be affected in any way and if it is it should be on the bank. If you want to see the effect of ice google ice river Hudson to see what flowing ice on a river can do. There’s a big trip boat jammed under a railway bridge after being swept from its moorings.

This is ice breaking the summit to Braunston dock for a survey didn’t need to pressure wash the waterline.

Actually they used a crane the bank at Stalin’s is probably 20ft high. The boat was tied to a no parking sign.

It just floated ofwhen the trailer got deep enough. This chap was absolutely fearless. He had my 50 narrow boat from Stockton to Sallins near Dublin overnight and in the water before we got off the fast ferry in Dublin the next day

It all depends on the size of th op’s barge. When we were in Ireland with our narrow boat there were a couple of small tjalks that had been sailed across from Calais to the Thames through the k and a and then across the sea to Wexford and into the canal system. The locks on the r.barrow will decide if this is viable. whilst we were there an Irish haulier, actually the one we used, brought a Sheffield size barge over and backed it down a slip at Bannagher into the Shannon.

Hi, no we have n ver been right down south and for the last few years have been based in Burgundy. The reason for not going south was the shear number of boats and my wife being told that the eclusiers didn’t help with the ropes and the semi circular sides made it difficult to get ropes off. Anyway it’s hot enough in the centre of France.

Strangely enough we are doing the opposite and selling our barge because at 77 and 79 we are finding it harder to cruise and do the maintenance.

Yes spell non checker should learn to read before posting.

Think proper coal shovels were No 9. 3 shovel fulls for 56 lbs if you can still Romberg old money

Never been really convinced about anodes in fresh water. Our narrowboats built in the 1930’ never had any and my 100 year old barge never had any until a few years ago. and at the last docking were hardly worn although I do understand that being moored against steel piling which is now virtually everywhere can accelerate wear to the hull if not protected by anodes.

When I was with Shell tankers we took a 36thousand ton ship to japan where it was cut in half a a ready made section put in and a bulbous bow tacked on the front. Now over 50 thousand tons with same engine using less fuel and little bit faster. On the cut the big factor as to revs and speed is water depth my barge at 1200 revs on the smaller French canals does 5 to 7 Klms per hour but on a river 10 at least.

Tadworths steerer that day was the late Graham Palmer. He had telephoned me to say that the engine PD2 wouldn’t rev up. I came up to top of fradley by car and when the boats arrived I dropped into the engine hole flipped the butterfly stop fully over and reved the engine. The stop rod on the pd2 had a semi circular end and this could finished up in the halfway position so the engine would start but not rev up. by the time I got to Fradley I already knew he’d been in the field and any way the foreend had plenty of mud on it.

Chris. I took that one.

Alan’s photo at Braunston must have been taken straight after we had brought the pair up from Brentford when we brought Tadworth. UCC had brought Bakewell from the same tender list and we towed it back for them. Tadworth had an hole in the chine stopped up with a pice of sponge forced down by a block of wood held by a broom handle under the gunwale. We had a quick patch done and went to Atherstone to load. the picture of Chris at Bourton lock probably few loads later. You had to be careful delivering there as the coal place was down a passage at side of house which was slippery when wet and pitch black. Seem to think there was no electricity Tadworth and Bakewell on lime juice run.

Thanks for the photo of the pair at Thrupp looks like we were still working on Tadworth and it still had the wonderful headlight that consisted of old car sealed beam headlights trouble was when they failed the next one might have dip beam working rather than full. They came with her from BWB so assumed the Dell’s had a contact in a scrap yard. Later I found a good headlight right at the back of the counter. Aubrey at Thrupp was a real gent and I got a drop down table from him to replace the full height door that was on her, it had been used as a wardrobe as they lived on the butty.

Can’t remember who was steering Tadworth then but looks like he had sold some coal was it you Chris. It was hard work then bagging up and chucking it out of the boat. Jaguars side wasn’t so deep as the Tadworth’s made it a bit easier.

I have a headlight from one of our working boats. I tried to sell it on eBay but the “buyer”never paid or collected it. pm me if interested.

One of the things UK builders get wrong is the size of bollards and some even have a bar between the pair. Going uphill the technique is to put a noose over the lock side bollard or in deeper locks there are pins or small bollards set in the wall and then you move the noose up the row of pins. In modern deep locks there are often floating bollards. It really is necessary to have good strong ropes as even the automatic locks produce strong surges and some of the lock keepers on the manual locks,of which there are still hundreds, seem to take pleasure in causing problems especially after Sunday lunch.

Paul. To use the boat in France you need an icc with cevni endorsement. Bisham abbey does the course. nobody yet knows what Brexit will mean to those of us with barges on the continent but the Americans and others can get a 12 month visa so if the worst happens that should be available to us. Make sure you have a vat invoice even if it shows zero vat as your boat was built and paid for whilst UK was in the eu. Having any red diesel in your tanks can be a problem so make sure you have good invoices proving duty paid but this might change before you go. all the best

With temperatures reaching 40c a lighter coloured roof makes sense but it still gets very hot. Our narrow boats were always red oxide which is very easy to apply and good for climbing on something we don’t need to do on the continent. some of the French commercials just use a varnish over bare steel and boy do the side decks get hot. Once moored alongside one who had this system and when I lifted the dog up ,so we could cross the peniche to get off ,he stated hopping about his feet were burning.

I have just had my gas certificate renewed on my old barge in France and the surveyor was confused by the dates on the flexible pipes. The orange one was brought in the uk and dated 2016 and the high pressure between bottle and regulator brought in France dated 2020. Had to get e.mail from uk supplier explaining it was year of manufacture whilst the French one is limit of use which actually seems more sensible.

This was a very cold day. Ice breaking is good until you get to a bend.