PeterF

I expect most of the visitor moorings on the Severn or in the basins just off the Severn are only 2 days at most so that means regular cruising required.

The volunteer diary for Johnson's Hillock to Greenberfield locks states that putting your plans on does not mean that there will be volunteers, but if volunteers are present for part of the day they can synchronise their time to coincide with boat movements. Therefore there is value in the system.

This sounds like it could be some grit/scale in the valve holding it open or the seal in the valve leaking or the spring in the valve sticking as well as possibly the solenoid sticking open.

How about this diagram from the Victron community to exemplify the wiring, but Nick has already answered.

Went to Whightwick Manor (S&W just south of Wolverhampton) a few days ago as we were passing. NT property, we are not members, £15 each for an afternoon, it was raining so we did not go round the gardens. In reality it was £30 for the wife and I got in free and stood around like an ornament as she talked fabrics, designs and paintings with the curators for hours. Bloody good value in marital karma points.

If the inverter has its own isolator you can work on the inverter or 230V ac without shutting down the whole DC system. My boat has sepeirate offtake direct from batteries via isolator for the inverter and another for the rest of the electrics. Also puts less load on the master isolators once you are up to 3kW inverters.

Pretty much seems OK to me. Changes I would make is add an isolator for the inverter, and you need a connection from -ve bus bar to hull ground point. You show a negative from the alternator, that is unusual, they normally have bodies connected to negative so you still need a connection from engine block to ground or -ve bus bar.

Had the Webasto running the last few evenings heading south on S&W, not cold enough to bother lighting the Refleks. Vollie at Bratch said he had got up to some frost.

Although the Wigan Flight Crew page is independent of CRT, many of the crew are (were) proper CRT vollies. Apparently earlier in the year some of the Wigan flight crew were helping a boater and something went wrong and the boater was injured. Apparently, whilst the people helping were CRT volunteers they were helping outside of their operating hours so not acting as CRT vollies. Subsequently CRT said their services were no longer required and started recruiting new vollies. I guess this letter means that they continued to help and CRT are re-iterating they are not to.

The state pension is a state benefit. Government response to a petition The State Pension is described in legislation as a “benefit” in order to root it within the existing social security framework as a statutory scheme paid out of monies in the National Insurance Fund. See https://petition.parliament.uk/archived/petitions/121267

Acrow Props may well work, you can probably hire them easily enough. See link to see examples. https://www.scaffolding-direct.co.uk/acrow-props-prop-mates/

Just guessing here, someone has done 6ft 10in at 2.5cm per inch gives 2.05m so we will list 2.06m rather than using the correct 2.54cm/inch. It would be interesting to ask CRT about this.

Very squarish stern, very on trend for this type of builder and buyer but completely wrong if you are tight on length on the Calder & Hebble. Just can not tuck behind a gate for that extra squeeze.

Yes, the hardware will support bi-directional charging but the firmware does not as of the date of posting. Victron are being coy about if / when this will be implemented saying they have more important things to sort out first.

I use muc off dry lube on mine, seems to work and unlike grease does not trap dust. However, it does need reapplication from time to time. https://www.halfords.com/cycling/bike-maintenance/bike-lube/muc-off-dry-lube-bike-lubricant---120ml-955310.html

If you only go out for a few days at a time then cassette is probably best if you have a spare cassette you could do 4 days with 2 of you. A small pump out would need emptying after every trip out and if at some point you go for longer trips, 100 litres would hold less than 1 week giving you very frequent pump outs.

We were on there June / July and it was the same, straight through Grindley Brook in both directions.

That is exactly how the system works, arrive at Anderton, go onto the booking site for today and choose the next slot then wait for your turn.

The 5kW Webasto Thermo Top Evo I got installed in 2020/2021 throttles down seamlessly from 5kW to 2.5kW and runs happily at this. If I am not moving in summer then I will fire this up for 45 mins to heat the calorifier with ju7st the bathroom towel rail on rather than using the engine as solar does the batteries.

It was like that around 20th July when we came through, CRT were aware then.

CRT seem to check BSS and insurance expiry dates now when you try to book any passages on line such as Frankton locks etc and will not allow you to make the booking if out of date. I recall someone else being refused a booking by telephone as their insurance date on the CRT records had not been updated.

Wesley Marine Windows have just started selling some at a price, mesh with strip magnets. https://www.wesleywindows.co.uk/fly-screen.html.

I have just done cleaned and reproofed mine myself but did consider "Cover & Canvas" who are based in the building at Venetian Marina, between the chandlery and cafe as several people have had good work done by him.

Being at the top of a hill is the difficult part because the Calder navigation being river based is at the bottom of the valley. I was based at Shepley Bridge 2006-2009 and Brighouse 2009-2019 and have tried to recall locations. Boats were often repaired at Shepley Bridge, Dewsbury Saville Town, Ledgard Bridge and Sowerby Bridge. I never went around the river area in Wakefield to know what is there. Can you remember going through many locks on your trip or how long you were out on the trip. I remember Safe Anchor Trust based at Shepley bridge right from 2006.

Or boaters leaving top and bottom paddles up on a lock flooding downstream.