Ratkatcher

OH NO!!! Ear Bug now! Worth a greenie, even if I dislike you intensely for the bug

A little link for a potentially useful regulator from Ebay Hope it helps.

True, I do not have to prove 'bona fide' continuous navigation and may return to the same neighbourhood on trips out from my mooring as often as I choose. The intent of the comment was regarding the 14 day rule on moorings not signposted to be of any other fixed period. Perhaps I should have made that point clearer. Thanks for pointing it out, Alan.

Ahhhh... That explains everything. (note to self: add sandpaper to shopping list)

I know! I know!! The positive cables are different thicknesses See, problem solved!

I bought a mooring at the same time I licensed the boat (i.e. the day I bought the boat), it was moored in a marina at that time and for a week following the purchase. Less than a week after the purchase (so boat still in the marina) I received an email from CaRT advising me that the boat had remained in the same place for more than 14 days... A quick and very polite call cleared up the obvious error with the lovely young lady at CaRT saying that it was obviously their error and corrected it there an then. Now wondering if, now the boat is at her mooring (53 miles and 31 locks - see - I've done my year's worth of travelling already!), I will receive the same sort of email after the next 2 trips out which will only be 'short' ones in the same general area (just being facietious!) CC'ers and those with a home mooring have to obey the same guidelines regarding stopping over, sensible enough to me. Although I do wonder if the same boat that was moored opposite ours will still be there when we next visit the boat, it was one of those who felt the need to store wood and coal on the roof and scrub out the name of the boat...

What a great idea! Now thoughts are drifting to the DAB head unit sitting around looking for a new home - that would be nice in the boat. (I took it out of the car as the USB navigation was a pain if you used subfolders e.g. 5 cd compilation, wouldn't make any difference in the boat as not travelling at a speed where briefly looking at what you are doing would make too much difference (except that a second not looking where the sharp end is means it heads straight for the canal bank / approaching boat!)

Grrr! I missed that one too So I ordered a set as well, just in case, at that price they are a gift and can sit around just in case they are ever needed. Well spotted, thanks

We made the mistake of going into a narrow lock (well 2 actually but the second was because the fenders had dropped unnoticed) with the slim side fenders down and getting jammed in the lock - needing a hit of full reverse to get the front end back out, followed by a walk along both gunwales to lift them up. A newbie error that we are unlikely to repeat I hope! Pleading innocence due to only having ever gone through wide locks before - and many years ago at that!

I missed that one! I spent a long time searching for a supplier with stock of equivalent plugs too... Bar 1, the glow plugs on the boat must have been out quite recently as they came out quite easily ( I had read the info suggesting the 1/4 turn method and watched a couple of useful youtube videos before tackling the job) and the holes were quite clean - the last had a little carbon in. (and a Champion plug!) Heat up time for all of the plugs is around 17 seconds (which seems to be about right) and current draw close to 5 amps (resistance is nearly 3 ohms) each but starting the engine, even with 90 seconds of heater plug on before cranking is difficult. Once started and warmed up a little it is fine for the rest of the day and starts very easily (turn the key and running in about a second) so the feebly glowing plugs are my first item to tick off. Any other suggestions what dreadful cold starting my be are most welcome! I'll be getting the injectors checked as soon as possible too, just in case. The injector pump was replaced with a refurb unit less than a year ago. Thanks for all of the the suggestions so far.

I did try both of these first, they have no stock currently - Calcutt Marine offer a set of 4 with a long drill bit to ream out the holes too, but sadly no stock. The Champion are surplus so are likely to be quite old... apparently unused though. Thanks for the suggestion though - I'd prefer supporting the 'boaty' places whenever possible.

The glow plugs in my engine are getting tired so I thought "order some on Ebay" - a seller had them listed at £8.00 each so promptly ordered and paid for. Received a 'dispatched' notice from the seller, all good. The next day I receive an 'order cancelled by buyer - refund' notice, obviously not cancelled by me but by the seller. The same day he is listing the same glow plugs at £113 each! If anyone finds they need some, about the only place in the UK that has genuine Champion ones (AG32) at a half reasonable price is: John richards Surplus at £18 each with free delivery (assuming that I don't receive another out of stock notice!) The equivalents from other manufacturers appear to be suffering a lack of stock or massive price inflation which is the sole reason I thought to post this littlle tale, if you feel you need spares, just in case, this may be a reasonable choice. David

I agree with the OP about keeping hold of DVD's, we have several hundred that bear watching more than once so have not been discarded - something to watch on those days that telly is junk and we just want to chill - most have been converted to mkv format files and stored on a NAS / Media Server (using MakeMKV, it really is a nice piece of software) and can be played on whim. For the boat we have a big USB hard drive and a little Android box that will play the MP3 and MKV files through the TV, minimal power draw from batteries and still good entertainment. Folllowing the suggestion of flight cases it might be worth the OP looking for alternative spaces on the boat also, on our little boat there is quite a large space in the bow between water tank and saloon 'wall' that we currently store 3 sacks of coal and the TV aerial - apart from the water pump it would otherwise be 'dead' space. Granted we are not liveaboards but still appreciate unexpected storage space (incidentally I feel the same way about books, something my OH doesn't so my library has shrunk a bit and is well hidden!)

All of the cars have NL number plates, (at least in the daytime shot!) so Ithink the Holland guess may be close to the mark... Nice photos though

Hello everyone, I have been enjoying browsing the content on the forum and adding a couple of comments... Tomorrow I have the handover of Tichitoro, a 43 foot Piper narrowboat to look forward to! The survey indicated overplating needed on the base and a few other details, not terminal by any means but quite expensive I had a lovely chat with Martyn Kedion yesterday who was very positive and will be doing the work for me when workshop space becomes available. We anticipate moving Tich from Heritage Narrowboats marina to her mooring on Shutts Green (only 52 miles and 31 locks - should do it in a week!) a week on Saturday - should be fun as the last time I was behind a tiller was nearly 40 years ago If any of the skilled members just happen to be passing next Saturday lunchtime we'd really appreciate some hand-holding... Looking forward to joining life in the slow lane... David & Trudi

I assume that from that very record you lifted the Vertigo logo as your Avatar Mike Still one of my favourites, even after 40 or so years...

The HP laptop I bought last Summer came with Windows 10 already installed, I played with this 'new' operating system for about a month before deciding (after many registry hacks (and a few re-installs) to try to get rid of its desperate need to call Microsoft to have it's hand held, whilst playing kiss and tell at the same time) that Microsoft's new baby had to leave home! I installed Opensuse and Windows 7 on the laptop as a dual boot system (the W7 install was the most difficult, but that is another story) and everything works just fine. Just backing up catweasel's comment earlier about Linux as a Windows replacement, Mint, Ubuntu (and its family) and Opensuse (and a few others) are mature enough as Operating Systems to transition from Windows with only a little effort, normal users are very unlikely to have to resort to using command line instructions nowadays and the desktop environment can even look a lot like a version of Windows if required. (We won't mention that Apple OS X is essentially Linux with a pretty wrapper and has been adored by Apple users for how easy it is to use!) Unless a user HAS to use an application that will only run under a version of Windows the transition to a Linux system is far easier now than ever before, and it is free - for everyone

I have a 'spare' 240 GB SSD that I would happily donate to your server if it helps, Rich. (not had a lot of use so plenty of life left in it)