Allthatjaz
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Posts posted by Allthatjaz
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4 minutes ago, TheBiscuits said:
Thanks TB, we had built her with the intention of taking her to the French canals but alas, my other half got cancer and just as he was getting through it, I was diagnosed with NHL so we feel safer staying here. She's lovely to live on but she's going to be a bit of a pain on the canals we want to visit. I think its best she gets sold on and we get ourselves a decent sized narrowboat.
That's close to ideal for living on and navigating most of the Northern system! You can't do some parts (Huddersfield Narrow, Huddersfield Broad or the Calder & Hebble) but you'll be able to explore the rest if that's your thing.
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6 minutes ago, MartynG said:
I don't suppose the Ouse has changed
I am struggling to picture what your boat looks like and to understand if it is capable of the journey.
Its a 60ftx12ft flat bottomed wide beam
6 minutes ago, MartynG said: -
Reading through these forums makes me realise how little I know about the UK waterways. I guess its going to be a whole knew learning curve and hopefully a great adventure. I'm very excited!
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1 minute ago, Alan de Enfield said:
Much more fun - we have a Blue-Water catamaran which we brought back from Croatia to Hull, 3050 miles in 28 days.
Ahouldn't be a problem - My Cruiser is 14 foot beam with 15 foot airdraft (with everythong folded) we needed Police approval for an agreed route, limited driving hours (no morning or evening movement) and an escort vehicle. Needed a special truck with 4" ground clearance.
Very nice. I love cats even though they terrify me!
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1 hour ago, mrsmelly said:
Dunno without checking presently. The thing is I wouldnt go round Trent end or indeed on and river such as trent, Ouse or even A and C without vhf radio, its a no brainer. A mobile fone is as much use as a chocolate fireguard if you break down and some coaster is bearing down on you unless you happen to have the steerers fone number on speed dial lol. I was once approaching skew bridge in Knottla and all I heard was Skipper of I cant recal which one but a 5/6 hundred ton barge stating skew bridge outbound no more no less. Seconds later after I had slowed it appeared or its bow wave did then the boat, had I not have had vhf i would have needed clean undies at best. being hit by one of those in a poxy little narrowboat would be like you or I stamping on a coke can. Just one ditty about some narrowboaters who are used to ditches, I was on approach to Holme lock one of many times with a boat full of passengers bright sunny afternoon and locky had swung the gates for me to enter topside when narrowboat with a stupid poxy pram hood up pulled off smartly in front of me from moorings to my right hand side, I had been carefuly watching and luckily managed to pull up and avoid the dick whilst blasting the horn with five short blasts then realising he wouldnt have a clue what five short blasts meant I gave him a hell of a long one as I crept past him. He followed me in the lock a short time after and apologised profusely for NOT SEEING ME!! 100 ton, painted white 86 feet long over 20 feet beam and over 16 feet air draught. Poxy greenhouse on the back of his boat must have obscured his glance round
Had this eejut been listening in on VHF he would have known the gates were being opened for me as did other waiting boaters who remained alongside.
We have VHF and Steve has his yacht master (not sure if that's the same thing) He is registered to motor up the Thames. We obviously have life jackets. On the Orwell we have massive ships who are continuously giving five blasts of the horn due to people not understanding the rules of the waterways (small vessels sticking to the deep channel and thinking they have right of way over 100,000 tons of metal.
Reading your experiences made me laugh. We once got stuck out in a force 9 for two days. We were close to the Thames estuary and getting nowhere and because of the size of our boat, in the shipping lane. Steve and me decided to get an hours kip whilst our supposedly competent crew member took to the helm. Steve woke up realising something wasn't right and realised a supertanker was passing us so closely in the other direction that he could of painted a stripe down its side! The guy at the helm just said, "its cool man, I saw it".
5 minutes ago, Alan de Enfield said:Fantastic... thanks Alan
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17 hours ago, ditchcrawler said:
I would talk to Tucky, they may have somewhere nearby where they can crane in.
Is Tucky on here?
17 hours ago, mrsmelly said:Ahh thought maybe it wouldn't accommodate cranage. It's not far from Naburn lock and a nice area isn't it. When do you need to move the boat? Is it imminent?
We've already moved our workshop up there. We have decided we will stay here till the NY but then we need to get going.
16 hours ago, Alan de Enfield said:What length, beam and weight are you ?
60x12 and 25 tons. By the way, we aren't keeping this wide beam which has been ideal for round here. We are selling it and getting a narrowboat.
5 hours ago, Alan de Enfield said:If you need it moving in the next few months it may be that you will struggle to find anyone willing to share such a confined space with you even for a day.
There are professional 'boat movers' who will do it for you (and normally would allow you to 'help) but are more than happy to do it themseves.
I'd want it to be professional boat movers. Funnily enough that's what my husband did for years but that was delivering yachts to far away lands.
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Around 11 years ago we were doing a lot of sailing. We had a 55ft ketch back then and she'd proved to be a great boat. We regularly got her lifted and attended to her undersides but the one thing we didn't pay a lot of attention to was the bow thruster mechanics (I guess we just didn't know much about them at that time).
We left the boat at anchor on the Sands in Poole to go off and do some work for three months but just into our second week we got a phone call from the marina to say she had sunk. They had recovered her and were busy pumping her out.
We arrived back to find our old girl was so badly water damaged that we didn't know if we could save her. The headlining were coming away, the floor was floating around the boat and all of our possessions were ruined.
It turned out that an internal mechanical part had fractured which had created a fast flowing fountain into the boat. It had probably taken a week to sink.
We did recover her but it took a long time to dry her out and restore her. The company that had provided and fitted the bow thruster four years earlier had gone bust so we had no comeback from them. Fortunately though, we were insured.
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On 11/12/2018 at 14:33, mrsmelly said:
Just a reminder to all you folks, myself included re the dangers of Co and possibly waking up Dead!! Alarm went off on boat next to mine late last evening, proves the worth of alarms. They had left their ash bucket full of hot ashes inside the boat!! Dont do it, they smoulder as we all know for a couple of days even if freezing cold outside. So ashes outside every time please. Thanks and sleep safely.
Having lived on a yacht prior to a canal boat, we buttoned down the hatches in winter and kept the log fire burning. Yachts are tightly sealed, they have to be because they have a tendency to roll over in a big storm. I have to say, that first winter we slept really well, in fact we had difficulty getting up in the morning. We put in a CO alarm and it took all of two minutes from closing the hatches for that alarm to go off. Yep, we were lucky and a bit naive/stupid. Our only blessing I suppose was, the lack of oxygen tended to put the fire out!
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50 minutes ago, mrsmelly said:
If u r going to stick it on a lorry why not straight into York marina? Anyway the ouse is no problem and yes you can pay for someone to move it if u wish.
Thanks for the reply mrsmelly.
They don't have a hoist big enough to lift our boat at York and they don't have a place where we can get a private crane in. Its all very manicured... a bit posh!
Good to know we can get someone to move it. It would certainly make me feel a lot happier.
36 minutes ago, Mad Harold said:Yes,take it by road all the way.
Much less trouble.
We would love to do that Harold but alas its not possible.
36 minutes ago, Mad Harold said:38 minutes ago, Jen-in-Wellies said:If you do decide to travel from Hull to York Marina, the only lock is at Naburn, which is manned by CaRT staff. This is assuming your boat can do the trip in one go, without needing to perhaps come off the river at Goole say, overnight. You will have to give them notice.
I wonder if we could get it lifted in at Goole. I'll check that one out. Thanks for the advice
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We are in a bit of a quandary. Due to some unforeseen circumstances, we are moving from Suffolk to York. Before lockdown, we drove over to have a look at the surrounding options (I'm originally from Harrogate so know the area but not the canals) and we really liked Boroughbridge, especially because its so close to my parents. Anyway, our boats too big for that final lock, so that's out... unless we sell this boat and get something shorter... 58ft.
So we came home and put our boat on the market but having done this before, we appreciate that it may take some time to sell.
My husband has been offered work and its a big deal which would be perfect if only we had somewhere to live whilst this boat sold.
I'm now at a stage of thinking we need to just lorry our boat over to Hull and motor it up to York marina, who have said they can accommodate us. The only thing that worries me is the river Ouse. Last time I saw it, it was flooded and a real fast torrent with trees and stuff in it. Whilst I'm used to sailing on fairly high seas, I'm also used to having safe open water, a keel and not a flat bottomed boat. The only experience we have with locks is our huge shipping lock where we presently are. I know I'm nervous because our boat is our home and I appreciate that a canal boat needs a whole new skill set, which we have yet to learn.
In the yachting world its not unusual to get a crew to charter your boat from one place to another (a kind of hired boat delivery). Is there such a thing in the canal world?
My husbands not worried about motoring it along the Ouse but I'm scared witless! I just want a paid crew who know the locks on route and can get this boat safely to York.
Sorry that's all a bit rambled!
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13 minutes ago, David Mack said:
It has an average power consumption of 450 W or 37.5 A at 12 V. So not really practical for the average narrowboat!
Most systems draw around 100w
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Okay, thanks Brian and Mike.
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Our dog is the fussiest dog in the world when it comes to dinner time but when he's out he eats anything. He once attempted to dine on a dirty nappy someone had thrown into the bushes ?
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2 minutes ago, Mike the Boilerman said:
Just inland rivers and canals as I understand it.
Broadly speaking, anywhere you have to buy a licence to use your boat will require a BSS certificate, and to get it, watertight/airtight cabins are not permitted.
Thanks Mike.
The thing is, you don't need to be watertight/airtight to have a forced ventilation system. I'm sure you agree that we need ventilation, we want to be able to remove damp smelly air and we want to reduce condensation but we don't want to throw away all the heat that's in that air. This system does all of that regardless of being airtight/watertight or not. Its just a very low energy option that for some reason BSS don't recognize.
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8 minutes ago, Mike the Boilerman said:
Yachts don't need a BSS.
Do boats on marinas need BSS or is it just inland waterways?
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32 minutes ago, ditchcrawler said:
Where would you mount the hopper
The one we had in the French Alps was small in comparison to the ones you buy over here and would of been a perfect size for a boat. The hopper was on top and needed to be filled once a day.
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2 minutes ago, ditchcrawler said:
Bit difficult to comply the BSS ventilation requirements with that system
I'm sure you are correct and yet people are making a living installing these on yachts.
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Has anyone here got a VMC https://www.archiproducts.com/en/products/fral/mechanical-forced-ventilation-system-f-vmc-rdc_267529 ? what it does is changes the air and recovers the heat. Its a forced ventilation system with heat recovery. The reason I ask is, these things are often used on large yachts and ocean going vessels that have to have watertight cabins. They are also used in houses situated in very cold climates like the Alps because the houses are so well insulated, they need a forced air supply. If you have one of these installed you won't get condensation problems.
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I loved our hot stove burner on the yacht. We lit it in the autumn and didn't put it out until the spring. The downfall was the dust which unfortunately we never remedied.
When we lived in the French Alps we had a very modern pellet burner. It was a self feeder, burnt very efficiently, was environmentally friendly and created very little ash and so we had no problem with dust. We haven't got a stove burner on our new boat because, although its a lovely thing, I didn't want the dust but if we do decide to instal one, I'd go for a pellet burner.
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11 hours ago, WotEver said:
Any electrician who understands the subject would know that...
Ring main circuits are not necessarily a good idea in and of themselves. They have their place. A narrowboat is not one of them.
99% of the calculations required for a house design are irrelevant to a boat which usually has a 16A maximum feed (often much less) with the biggest loads being a washing machine and a 1kW immersion heater. All of the spurs on a narrowboat are adequately served with 2.5mm2 cable.
Any marine electrician would also know that none of the cable types used in land based buildings are suitable for boats. He would also know that many of the 18th edition requirements are not only irrelevant to boats but would make for a poor and/or dangerous installation.
Some of the worst examples of boat wiring have been carried out by land based electricians who know nothing about boats.
If you know know what you are doing it is perfectly possible to wire a boat safely and tidily. If you don’t know what you are doing then seek advice from someone who does. Whatever you do don’t ask a non-marine electrician who won’t know the first thing about the subject.
We did use a marine electrician. As for me, I don't have a clue about electrics. All I know is, they are dangerous if fitted incorrectly.
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9 hours ago, mrsmelly said:It depends which canal. A thirteen foot beam is small on the many sections of commercial canal built for such boats. The Trent and Aire and Calder to name but two. 200 foot by twenty foot for instance. Problem is too many wide beam boats are built to live on by non boaters, living on a boat doesn't make you a boater. I love wide beams and fat narrowboats, yes some are pig ugly but so are many narrow boats it's all in the eye of the beholder. Main problem is ya can't get yer wide beam to the mucky or the greyhound
Of course, your right. I am not that canal savvy because I've lived too long by the ocean. That said, my grandparents both came from a long line of canal people in Todmorden, so in a way I feel like I've gone back to my ancestral routes.
I think the main problem for none boaty people living on canal boats is, its nothing like building a house. There's so much to think about and many compromises to make and it can work out very expensive. The shell, the fit out, the cost of insurance, maintenance and the marina costs are things many people don't properly consider. Our yacht was a bottomless pit that we threw money at! We lived on something that cost us a kings ransom and we never had a proper flushing toilet, could never have a Hollywood shower, much space to move around or the luxury of a big fridge and freezer. With this boat we were lucky. My husband has worked in the boat industry for many years and he has a business that employs all the trades that could come along and do things on a barter system. He's taken a lot of ideas from high grade yachts and implemented them on our boat because after living on a yacht for nine years, we understood exactly what we could sensibly do with a new fit and what we couldn't.
I still don't consider myself a boaty though. I've done a lot of sailing but never liked it much. I was always seasick, always looking at the shoreline and wishing I was there and not stuck out in a big swell ten miles offshore. I did it because my husband loved it and the boat was a little big to crew on his own but if I'd had the choice, I would of stayed on the marina. So for me, this is perfect. I'm happy to amble up and down the river and end up at a local pub for lunch. The yachtsmen around here would consider that very un-boaty but I don't care... it feels safe and it feels like home... that's all I'm bothered about.
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On 16/09/2018 at 21:42, WotEver said:
Not all of it. The ring main isn’t for starters.
Not at all. Why do you think this?
Quite besides the fact that it’s an 11 year old post that you’re commenting on.
Are we not supposed to reply to old threads? This thread was on the front page so not sure why its still here if its a zombie thread!
UK law has a lot to say about domestic electrics. From wire sizes to circuit breaker types, to notification for building control. All of this has been progressed over a number of years to derive a set of regulations that all new builds have to comply with. These recommendations and standards haven't been developed to make hard work for people but to make safe and reliable systems. As we know, building control doesn't apply to the construction of boats and only for that reason it is legal for someone... for example, to wire up there own kitchen (galley) on a boat. A new boat being fitted out by an untrained electrician could potentially be a death trap. Electricians train for three years for good reason.
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3 minutes ago, Meanderingviking said:
We are on the canals with our widebeam and to be honest very few people are sniffy. We quite happily cruise about talking to all and sundry in all their different boats, steel and plastic, and just get on with boating. It's what it's all about ⛴
Well that's good. The thing is though, you don't have to travel around on a manmade waterway to enjoy boat living or boat owning.
The marina we used to live on was full of beautiful yachts but probably 90% of them never sailed. People just came down at the weekend and entertained friends and when friends weren't there, they spent all their time cleaning the outer skin. Whilst that may seem like a waste to us, if that's what makes someone happy, who are we to criticize? Its the same with canal boats. We should buy what we want and do what we want with it and providing we don't cause problems for other boats, its all good.
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5 minutes ago, matty40s said:
This is standard build quality for this builder.
I would put money on the fact that there might be another picture tomorrow showing ......1. no blacking in bow thruster tube and 2. similar boatbuilding skills.?
Your boat is somewhere it should be, room to move and others to move round you.
The principle argument against wide beams on this forum is that they are not suitable for many of the narrow, shallow canals that they are currently invading.
Fair enough, though there's a lot of talk about ugliness!
We would never put this boat on a British canal. She's 13ft wide and simply wouldn't be suitable.
Dog preferences
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We have a miniature Russian hunting hound that looks a bit like a mini pincher. He's the perfect size for a boat, doesn't malt and isn't yappy.
I would like another dog and have thought about a springer, but when we were over at Woodbridge, which was tidal and so you ended up sitting in the mud a lot; our neighbouring boat had a springer who constantly jumped off to either swim or sink in the mud.
I've always had lurchers and so was doubtful about having a small dog. Got to say though, our little guy isn't just clever, he's fast and can take down a rat and kill it in seconds. My lurchers couldn't catch a rat and that wasn't for want of trying.