grunders

My first creation: I forgot to do the bathroom hence why the shower is in the Saloon . Edited to say the boat is a 52ft trad narrow boat.

Has anyone else tried out the Waterways World Boat Planner? I have had a little play and I have to admit I was impressed. Having tried a few of these sorts of things, I have found that the designer is not given enough freedom but this one is certainly an improvement. As well as having standard items, it also allows you to just draw lines and rectangles and edit the size of those standard items (I was tempted to have a 10ft long bed just for a laugh!). You will need to register to use it but it can be found here: http://www.waterwaysworld.com/design/ Once I have designed a boat, I may have to post a picture of it! I realise this sounds like an advert but the planner is genuinely quite good.

Yeah, I don't think that a boat with a vertical stem would fare so well as I'm sure the downward pressure on the ice helps to break it and you wouldn't get that with a vertical stem. As for the upside-down camerawork, I was trying to get a shot close to the water looking forwards on the left hand side of the boat holding the camera in my right hand and that was the easiest way to do it. Didn't work out too badly in my opinion.

Hi all, I realise I may have missed the boat a bit with this (pun intended) but I have just had the chance to edit my video from our recent trip on Beatty. We were moving her from Brinklow, near Rugby on the Oxford Canal, back up north to Leigh on the Bridgewater Canal. As it happened, we got stopped by ice in Stretford having been going painfully slowly for the rest of the day before we stopped. I hadn't been boating in ice for ages, if ever, and so the video is just shy of 7 minutes long. However, I think it is worth a watch if you like ice breaking. Here are some photos of icy scenes: Descending the Cheshire Locks: Ice covered canal Frosty top to the ice in this one Relatively thick ice Slightly thicker ice And finally, here is the link to the video: http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=o5_wFMUcX9c It is best if watched in 'high quality' by clicking the little blue link below the video.

One of the most impressive results using the Nottingham Uni connection: Edited to find a quicker one:

These videos were shot between 28/07/2008 and 17/08/2008 on a round trip from (and to) Brinklow on the Northern Oxford Canal. We went down the GU to Brentford, then up the Thames to Lechlade before using the Duke's Cut to get back to the Oxford Canal and heading North back to Brinklow. http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=E991FF5B65B8055C Enjoy!

When on canals, our rope will generally be found on the back cabin roof. This is because we don't use it very often. On a river like the Thames when the rope will need to be used in every lock, the rope will not hang on the tiller pin (with the risk of losing the pin) but will normally be found on the deck near the base of the tiller already attached to the dolly.

Various videos now available at http://www.youtube.com/profile_videos?user=firedemonbjg

I think it is called Mecca

That was Owl if I remember correctly. Here is a selection of pictures, click on the thumbnails to get a larger version. Click on the text to see the last one: http://img82.imageshack.us/my.php?image=sany0148zt0.jpg

I had a great weekend on Beatty. Unfortunately I didn't manage to meet any other forum members. To add to the list of boats there: Beatty (Barlow's) Vesta (Tug)(was definitely there on Saturday) Starling Laplander Lupin Kent Pacific No.4 (Tug) Mecca (Another) Mecca? Panther Olive Camel Planet Swallow? I will hopefully get some pictures and video up sometime soon. Edited to remove reference to Nutfield as already stated.

Beatty will be at the gathering for the first time this year. Feel free to come and introduce yourselves; it would be nice to meet some forum members.

Thanks for drawing attention to that photo, Max. It is the same boat. My Grandfather, Martin Grundy, bought her in 1968 from Jack Craddock. She is now, as you probably saw from the above photo, converted. As I mentioned above, more pictures of her as she is currently can be found in the gallery: http://www.canalworld.net/forums/index.php...m&album=112

Thanks for the name, I will edit my above post again. I knew about the under-cloth conversion as it can be seen in my other photo of her.

I've now edited my above post to add some names to the boats.

What bargeeboy meant, I think, was that if the boats go through individually then you send two (lockfuls minus the boat's displacement) down into the lower pound. If both boats go through together then you only send one (lockful minus the two boat's displacement) down.

Here are some photos of what may (or may not) be notches on bows of boats. NB President: Tug Enterprise: NB Lamprey: NB Cyprus: Identified from the below picture:

The best site I've found for working this sort of thing out is http://www.mybroadbandusage.co.uk I don't know how accurate it is but it lets you specify quite precisely what you will be using the net for and will then calculate how much bandwidth (is that the right term?) you will use in a month.

Perhaps because they can use the centre rope to pull the boat into the bank without losing control of either stern nor bow. They then secure the rope so as to keep the entire boat at the bankside without having the trouble of having to loosely tie the centre rope (so as to be sure the boat doesn't drift away from the edge), and then securely tie both bow and stern lines. Basically, I think it is a time-saving measure. I hope the OP was only thinking of short term mooring in this way, e.g. waiting for a lock, as I wouldn't moor for any length of time on the centre rope for reasons already stated. The boatman's/tugman's hitch is extrememly useful and I dislike rings because it is difficult to tie the boatman's hitch to them. I thought about standing the ring on its end etc. but have decided that that is too much hassle and it is easier just to pass a loop through the ring, pull the boat in and then secure the end of the rope to the boat where the boatman's hitch can be used. Also, quite a useful little video of the boatman's hitch here: http://justcanals.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?f=34&t=1834 Though I think the video shows it differently to how I tie the knot after about 12 seconds.

To my knowledge, 70ft boats have been through the tunnel. Information from the maximimum craft dimensions thing available somewhere on waterscape.com (don't know where, sorry; my copy has been downloaded) states that max headroom is 5ft but doesn't mention length restrictions. Edited to say: Keeping Up beat me to it! and: I'm not sure I believe the height thing though that may be the max available height at 7ft width - I'm just guessing.