Tony on the Lancaster

Hi Everyone, Thanks for your all your feedback on my last posting re the Springer 23 Waterbug. It was snapped up before I got to view it! Looking at something totally different now, a Freeman 23. Very popular on the Lancaster & quite a few for sale. Most seem to be the Ford Watermota engine (Escort / Cortina equivalent) 35hp or I have seen one with a Perkins 4108 diesel (needs some work doing though!) The diesel looks huge & fills the engine area, so not a lot of room to work on it. The petrol does look better for that & good access. A few different reports reckon approx 2.5 litres per hour cruising from the petrol engine & 1 litre per hour from the diesel at a steady cruising speed? What does everyone think please? Another thing of course, these boats go back to late 60's, early 70's, is there anything else I need to watch out for? With the age, I will need a survey for insurance of course. A couple for sale have the hot water heater fitted but no heating, maybe a 12v heater would do the trick or maybe better with a small generator (CRT mooring, no power). Good ones for sale look to be in the region of £8500/£9000, others slightly less but need a lot of work. What is a slight concern is the age! You're paying quite a bit of money for a 45 ish year old boat!! OK folks look forward to hearing from you all!! Tony.

Thanks again everyone, great feedback! Mary P, I read a while ago this boat was the old Ford Fiesta of the waterway, but Morris Minor is well suited!! Laurie.Booth, I was going off previous write ups online & WW said majority were 3mm,maybe some are slightly more. Odana - thanks for the movement details. Anyway viewing tomorrow - I'll let you know how it goes.

Thanks everyone for comments so far. The insurance aspect I may have a slight advantage here, I used to work for the Swinton Group for many years and know the market reasonably well. Nautical Insurance Services of Leigh-on-Sea have an excellent policy with Lloyds underwriters and will offer fully comp cover for £95 with a £100 excess based on a value of £10,000 (asking price of the boat). No survey required as yet but possibly when the boat reaches 30 years old. If I go ahead I'll definitely go ahead with a hull survey at least. Yes, hoping to keep it for a while subject to the report of course. If the report is good, must be worth £8K at least?

Hi Everyone, Looking to purchase a first narrowboat, a 1991 Springer Waterbug 23'. Been reading a few items on different forums and I see the steel used on this boat is thinner than newer boats, this being 3mm all over instead of the usual 10-6-5-4. The engine is a 9.9 Honda outboard which I imagine would push it along quite nicely & economically. If I decide to go ahead, will probably have an out of water survey done on the hull. Then the snag of bringing it back home to the Lancaster Canal. The Ribble Link is closed until mid/late April. Are these boats suitable for a trailer, some reports say they are too heavy? May have to think of a low loader & crane (boat is near Ashton-u-Lyne on the Huddersfield Narrow). Portland Basin, Dukinfield have a dry dock for survey but no crane or slipway. Does anyone know of a marina around there that has a crane lift and a dry dock together please, unless there is a suitable trailer out there somewhere? Thanks everyone, look forward to your replies!!