PeterF

That was the end of last week.

Aqueduct marina have some HVO in, they set up a small skidded tank complete with pump, meter and hose. Selling at road duty though, no domestic rebate. About £2.20. Not sure what red diesel was selling for. At the same time. https://aqueductmarina.co.uk/hvo-now-available-from-aqueduct-marina/

Give Way is the only road sign using the inverted triangle. This is to make it known as a give way sign even if unlit.

There were loads of Coots on the L&L from Wigan round to Liverpool in May, most with 3-5 chicks and a lot on the BCN old main line this last month.

We passed through Birmingham and Wolverhampton earlier in the month from the Birmingham and Fazely. Moored in Oozels Street Loop then to the Black Country Living Museum via the Old Main line then down the Wolverhampton flight. This was our first trip on these canals, we met no boats on the Old Main line and enjoyed seeing all the fish in the clear water. We passed a couple of boats from the BCLM to Wolverhampton and 3 or 4 on the flight. The only weedhatch trip was to remove some genuine weed including bramble stems when I pulled over to drop the rubbish off at Wolverhampton services.

I have noticed that the chromed tiller tube on my boat never gets too hot, it has a high reflectivity so it does not take in much radiant heat. It is always much cooler than the dark grey painted swan's neck. Therefore the ultimate is bling your boat like a footballers range rover by having it chrome plated. For a quicker slightly less effective alternative, 20 packs of Bacofoil taped over your boat shiny side out. Oops, just noticed the title said practical advice.

The OP said "I've I've put the good one in series...." , i.e. I have as in the past tense, not "I will" or "can I" or "should I" so the deed was done, it was not an intention.

Taking it as written, the failed string has had one panel removed (the good one), thus that string is no longer working, therefore good to pull the fuse. The question only asks about leaving the MPPT connected, reading between the lines that the panels are disconnected. However, your caution is correct that the failed panel must be confirmed as being disconnected before pulling the fuse.

Most modern / good quality MPPT controllers do not allow reverse current flow through the panels so you should be OK, but it is not absolutely a given. The easiest option, assuming that you have them wired up correctly is to remove the fuse in the positive line between the MPPT and the battery. Then put the fuse back in before you connect the new panel.

As many have noted, leaving diesel with bio-diesel in can result in fuel bug. We had a bad case once, the fuel filters were clogged with a gloopy gel. We now use Marine 16 as has been noted above and keep the tank full. The one thing not mentioned is that bio-diesel has a shelf life and it degrades. I have no idea what the outcome of bio-diesel degradation is, perhaps this is the issue. Could you rig up a temporary fuel supply with fresh diesel and see how the engine runs on that.

Many of us use the brolly mate and have drilled an extra hole through the horizontal tube for the tiller pin. Been using mine like this for years.

Still waiting for an email, I assume there system is dribling them out slowly over the day.

OK, happy to provide some advice if you want it. On your Victron battery monitor can you get to a settings screen like the one below. What values do you have for "charged voltage", "tail current" and "charged detection time" and after you have been boating for 3 to 4 hours what voltage are your batteries at from the alter and what current is flowing into the batteries.

I second Alan's question and add some supposition.I Assuming lead acid batteries. Do you have something like a Victron BMV702 or Smartshunt battery monitor or another manufacturer's. Have the battery full settings of voltage and tail current (SOC synchronises to 100%) been set to match your alternator. The voltage should be 0.1 to 0.2V lower than the alternator voltage. I ask because if set incorrectly, the battery monitor may well not reset to 100% full even if the batteries have been revharged enough. If your generator and 230V battery charger ( or inverter charger) charges at a slightly higher voltage then this could quickly meet the battery monitor reset to 100% even though it did not in effect do much. Your example sounds very much like this.

Yes they can, but narrow boating is mainly done on the cheap, very few boats have built in generators like this. For a some people a generator is an open frame construction site unit with a 2 stroke engine blatting away at 3,000rpm fitted with one of those small pressed steel exhausts. Many have the better suitcase generators which are much quieter.

Aqua Narrowboats, they buy in the shell, will use whoever you want otherwise Colecraft, a good solid shell builder, and then Aqua fit out all the internals, engine, electrics, carpentry, fittings etc. The quality of their joinery is very high, all nicely rounded off corners etc.

I put a small radiator after the calorifier in the cupboard behind our shower to act as a drying cupboard, it worked well, it started warming up after the calorifier was getting hot.

Another thing on the battery charger, it should be the type that goes to float at a lower voltage when left long term, 13.8V or lower. My Victron inverter/charger goes down to 13.2V for long term. 14.4V absorption for 4 hours, then 13.7V float for 24hrs, then 13.2V storage if no further use after the 24 hour float period.

You need to find out what voltage the battery charger gets up to because at 7.2 Amp charger on 330Ah is definitely enough to boil them left on permanently if it does not have voltage regulation or the regulator has failed. To get to fully charged you need perhaps only 1 Amp or less. My 690Ah bank if left charging at 14.4 volts will get down to just belowth 2 Amp. 7.2 Amp is not a trickle charger. If I continued to force 7.2 Amp through mine the voltage would rise and boil them. Check the charger as it may well have failed to work properly.

CAUTION You state that your are using the same panels as Foxes Afloat. They used 120W mia sole CIGS panels. A quick google and I can not find details for 160W panels but I have found info for 110 to 140W and they have a Voc voltage of 37 to 40 V which is above the rating of your inverter. If you truly have the same panels you will burn the solar controller part of the inverter out and you definitely need a stand alone controller. Please please check the Voc specification of your panels to verify this. If it is below 25V, preferably 22V because when cold the voltage is higher and they usually quote Voc at 20 or 25deg then you will be OK, if it is higher than say 22V get a standalone controller.

Qualified for domestic electrics does not equal qualified for boat electrics, there are a whole different set of regs and does / don'ts.

Have a watch of this, about a student living on a boat. https://www.channel4.com/programmes/my-floating-home/on-demand/69039-002

89cm from the gunnel to the top of the cabin, then the handrails make it 94cm. Note many boats have raised handrails at the corner of the cabin side/ roof but have drainage slots in so that may reduce the available height. In the random photo you selected you can see such a drainage slot in the red handrail just between the two painted panels.

Or when you have a sunny day, turn on a large load if you have one available, if you have an inverter, something to draw 1kW, then the solar should deliver a high current.

You state that you have a fuse protector, I have no idea what you mean by that. P!ease be aware that some types of breaker/ fuse sold for solar are known to be poor such as the types shown below which can givine a high resistance due to poor contacts. The high resistance vauses voltage drop so the solar controller sees a higher voltage than the batteries actually are at so it backs of the charging current. You need to check the voltage directly at the MPPT output terminals and compare this to the battery voltage. Another cause of this is if your MPPT to battery cables are too long or too thin, you state your cables are 4mm, I hope the MPPT to battery cables are much more then 4mm2 for 50Amp. See a thread a few weeks ago which covered this very topic showing one with high resistance. https://www.canalworld.net/forums/index.php?/topic/115089-solar-controller-over-voltage-cutout-problem/#comment-2791824 Some other advice, the Victron MPPT itself will not be able to deliver more than 50A, it is limited to that, you do not need to fuse it to protect against that. Victron will recommend a 60 or 70Amp fuse (I have a 150/60 MPPT and that is 80Amp fuse), the fuse is to protect the cable in case of a short circuit. I have recorded 630W output from my 680W panels at this time of year around mid day with all panels in clear sunshine when I have had a large load on the inverter so that the batteries were not limiting the amount of current that could be absorbed. But that was a one off.