embis

Thanks Dave, Unfortunately the concrete bricks in the lockers fore and aft are on the side I will have to add ballast to... maybe i just have to accept having less room in the lockers and add a few more bricks there!

Hi, We are having some work done on our narrowboat; pullman dinette and a cross bed adding. This makes me wonder whether the end result will mean that the boat ends up being slightly out of trim. We have kitchen units, & pullman dinette on the same side of the boat I will be having a trap added so I can access the bilge and was wondering about how feasible it is to redistribute ballast if I can reach it from the trap? If I take some ballast out from one side of the boat, should I secure that remaining somehow so it doesn't shift? I notice that we have some concrete bricks piled in the lockers fore and aft I assume these are correcting trim and assume that the ballast in the bilges will also be concrete bricks.

Does this gap really need to be filled? is there any advantage to putting sleeves in?

Much as I hate to bring this back on topic, fitting a simple mixer bar without thermostat works just great.

Thanks to everyone who has contributed.. hot and cold are the right way around, I have ordered a mixer bar without thermostat since that seems to be the most straightforward solution and I will report back when I have installed that.

We have a bar shower fitted in our narrowboat. Hot water produced by the oil fired heating system. The water is either boiling or freezing never adjustable beyond these extremes. I have replaced the bar once, assuming that a thermostat on the mixer had failed, but it still does the same. Seems unlikely that the second thermostat is also faulty so that leads me to suppose the problem is elsewhere. Not sure how the hot water arrives at the outlet, is there likely to be a separate pump for this? Might that be the issue? Whenever I turn on hot water elsewhere in the boat the main water pump kicks in... I assume that's pumping cold back into the calorifier? Any suggestions gratefully the received.. it would be nice to be able to have a shower!

Alan, Please elucidate. Sounds self explanatory to me?

Thanks John, Yes, hopefully I will never have cause to speak to the coastguard!

Reading up a bit about VHF marine Radio and have a question or two: I understand that Ch 67 is the small craft safety channel: 1)what size constitutes a "small craft" for these purposes? 2) why would size matter when it comes to safety.....Why have a separate safety channel just for small craft?

Yep, just a few clicks of the mouse and I could print out my licence..

I was worried this might turn into a thread about tropospheric ducting. Thanks for all your replies,

I am based near the Trent and expect to be travelling up and down there fairly frequently, and whilst I know I could easily manage without one, having one will make life a bit easier. The cost isnt really an issue....and its fun learning something new!

Thanks Alan, thats one form I dont need to fill in then!

I am looking into getting a Marine radio and about to do the RYA short range radio course. From the reading I have done so far it looks like I will need to get a Ship Radio Licence? Is this right, or have I misunderstood something? the licence is free so its no problem getting it... just feels like its a bit OTT! which makes me wonder if I have misunderstood.

Thank you all for your replies, The Edwardian Bedding Co is familiar to us as our current mattress and as everyone says, excellent quality. Some good ideas and food for thought, thanks to you all again.

We are planning to fit a crossbed and a Pulman Dinette to our narrowboat. There are many different designs and features out there. What are the most useful features that you have come across? Any photographs to illustrate would be very helpful.

Can anyone recommend a good boat fitter in the Doncaster area? We want some alterations doing to our narrowboat; a cross bed and a Pulman Dinette.

Thanks for all your replies, a couple of suggestions that I might attempt. I wasn't expecting to back cast, the river I fish is in a heavily wooded gorge so roll casting is the only way to go and I imagine this wouldn't be too tricky on a canal.. like the tenkara idea as well... Thanks again.

I saw someone who seemed to be using a fly rod and floating fly line on the canal, but he seemed to have some rather significant bait on the line rather than a fly... Anyone any idea what he was after? Anyone had a go at fly fishing on canals? I'm pretty new to fly fishing but I quite fancy having a go at it next time I'm on the boat.... Any (sensible and polite) suggestions for fly's, leader etc? Would quite like to go after zander.

Many thanks to all that replied. I can now see what the problem is. Will check the wattage of the invertor and electrical equipment at the weekend. Running the engine would make no difference would it? is the reason for running the engine whilst using high power items just to avoid draining the batteries too much?

Whenever we have the shoreline plugged in we can run hairdryer or microwave with no problem, When we are on leisure batteries trying to use any high power items such as these instantly trips the inverter. Is this a fault or to be expected?

Can you say why you think it was "utter crap" what was it that you didnt like about it?

Hi All, Have been lurking here for quite some time, but decided it was about time to say hello. I'm due to take early retirement in about 18 months and my wife and I plan to take to the water shortly after that. We have successfully launched three lads into the world of work, one is about to grandparent us, another threatens it. One more is yet to be levered all the way out of a world of comfort, currently at University, but we are working on that! Ideally we Intend to move more or less straight into liveaboard life with a "go anywhere" size narrowboat.The plan has been in the pipeline for a couple of years so we have a good idea about what we want, what we need, and what we want to avoid...we just have to find the right boat, a very enjoyable work in progress so far. We have two Crick shows under our belt, I think that made us decide we needed to be looking at good secondhand instead of bespoke, or off the peg new, but of course that makes finding the right boat a world of complicated tradeoffs. Anyway that's us, and that's the plan. We have already found this forum a great source of wise advice, so although I may return to lurk mode for a while, I am sure I will be popping up with a few questions fairly soon.