Theo

Is Barney the whippet? Nick

I can't understand why no one wants to discuss my old pump out! Nick

That sounds a brilliant idea if I can make some assumptions about where the hose might start leaking. It snakes its way under the engine from the port side to the starboard before rsing agin to its coupling on the vee belt driven water pump I suppose that there is a warning that something is going wrong if the steerer notices that the water is no longer being squirted out of the exhaust. Nick

I am thinking of going but have not got further than that, yet. Nick PS: Thoughts complete. I have consulted SWMBO and she says that she would like to go. N

One inconvenience is that I will have to lift one of the engine compartment boards every time I operate it. I am wondering if I can organise some sort of remote operation for it. Something in the nature of wires and pulleys. I wonder if a couple of bicycle brake cables would to the trick. Nick

It has just occurred to me to worry about the fact that there is a flexible hose from the mud box to the water pump. The opening to this hose is from a point in the mud box below the waterline. If the hose were to be damaged I cannot see any reason why the boat would not sink. I would think it sensible to fit a stop cock to this and as a matter of course shut the cock whenever the engine is not running. Or am I being unnecessarily pessimistic/fussy? Nick

Oh, yes. I see. Nick

Please could someone tell me what a "troll" is in this context? Nick

I lost a nice kingfisher tiller pin at Lime Kiln. I can't think how. A rope surely could not have lifted it out. There was hardly anyone around to nick it. Nick. It just goes to show that behaving to others as you would like them to behave to you is a sensible motto for life Nick

I am sure that you are all delighted to know that we took the pump out loo out yesterday. Tank and all. It was the most uncomfortable loo ever in use. The previous owners had bought a left handed tank when they wanted a right handed one. This meant that it was mounted back to front with the inspection cover in front of the pan. There was a good 15" of plinth in front of the pan which meant that you could not stand in front of it unless you had a good aim, high pressure and instant cut off, neither could you sit down on it unless you were happy to have your legs sticking out in front of you and your heels off the floor. Interesting discovery: The boat appears to have been fitted with an integral pump out tank which is now not it use. Net result: one pump out loo to a good home. The outlets are such that it would need to be fitted facing fwd against the port side or aft against the starboard side. All the best Nick

The sucky pump is much mare expensive but it will suck up about a gallon before it needs emptying. Nick

Use a "Sucky pump" (My brother-in-law's name for it.) See here: http://www.canalworld.net/forums/index.php...p;hl=sucky+pump

Theodora's Kestrel alternator controller has a black button on the side. What is it for? Nick

I would concur with this but theodora's BMC 1.5 has not got any power to the glow plugs so I have not tried the glow plugs on/ tickover option. Nick

Theodora has Raw Water cooling. This arrangement has an intake for canal water which then goes to a heat interchanger to cool the water flowing around the engine. The reason for this complication is that you would not want dirty canal water flowing through the engine castings. This water is in a closed cycle and can be treated with antifreeze/inhibitor just like the water in a car radiator. Some narrowboats have a similar arrangement even though they have a skin tank. I have read that this is pointless and would tend to agree. There could be a theoretical advantage in this arrangment in that you have a smaller mass of water in the engine circulation which can quickly rise to the correct working temperature but I still think that you will get a close approximation to this with a single circuit and a decent thermostat. all the best Nick

The term "coolant" here means heat transfer fluid. But you could always use a refrigereation unit to make the radiators cold. Trouble is I would have cold feet and a hot head. Now that reminds me... Nick

Why is the weed hatch in the deck ridiculous? I have found access to it very difficult and it seemed like quite a good idea. Nick

Could you let me into the secret? Wots a dynostart?

As I mentioned in one of my early posts before Christmas, the temperature of liquid fresh water at atmospheric pressure cannot be significantly lower than zero Celsius. This means that if your engine space is not insulated below the water line it is highly unlikely to freeze unless there is lots of ice on the cut. In Theodora I am likely to be losing a lot of heat through the rather badly fitting board covering the engine space. Losing it to the air, that is. The air, of course, can be as cold as you like. This lost heat will mean that there has to be heat flowing into the engine space from the surrounding cut and will be conducting through the steel hull. All this theory did not stop me getting panicked last night and driving 35mins at 2100 to check that the old girl is OK. She was, and when I measured the temperature I found that even the air temperature was only just on zero. I have left a max/min thermometer in the engine space just to check. Theodora is a little more difficult to protect than more modern boats. She has a raw water cooling system and the only way that I have discovered to protect that is to open up the mud box, poor in a pint or two of antifreeze and then run the engine to pump it through the system. The difficult thing is to know how long to run the engine. Tomorrow when we go down to start really working on her I will take some fluorescein powder, mix up a strong solution and time how long it takes for the colour to appear in the water coming from the exhaust pipe. Nick

Got it, thanks all. Nick

I feel rather foolish! Of course you won't! Nick

One of the items associated with the Mikuni is what looks like a battery powered thermostat and time switch. It is not wired in at the moment but I would like to recommission it. If anyone has a set of instructions that they could scan and email to me I would be most grateful. TIA Nick

I find the flicker (50Hz or 25Hz or even 100hz? Someone will tell me.) rather trying. You don't get that with incandescents because the filament can't cool down quickly enough, but I haven't been on a boat which is fitted with them so modern ones might be better than the gangway illuminators in our local cinema. How do you find the type of light that you get with them? Nick

If yo are really concerend about the GI problem why not use photovoltaics? See Tom and Sophie's thread. Nick

There is very low head on the inlet to the pump (measured in inces in the usual way of things). When I changed mine I got SWMBO to put her thumb over the end of the pipe while I did whatever was necessary. No isolator required. When we needed to leave the boat befre the job was complete I tied the end of the pipe up at a level where the water did not flow out. Nick