Tortoise

thanks to all, yes, I had a great time. I'm happy for any pictures of me to be public, although they're bound to have my mouth open in. ;-) I haven't developed my 'memory card' myself yet, will see what the results are like before offering to post anywhere. was vaguely thinking of blogging the better ones, perhaps I'll hold fire on that. ;-( If any prove to be worth seeing, I'll forward on to the subjects themselves...

and I said I'd never post again ... I've used a linux EEE with the 3G dongle (E220, the round-end wider white one) very easily, the only problem being picking up the password to log into the site (which is sent as a text message to the units SIM card, and I needed to borrow a PC to use the inbuilt software to get it). The setup was great for blogging the summer's adventures (including sorting out pictures), as well as reading other people's. Shout if I can be of help setting it up. Car adapters as easily obtainable for the computer. I've ended up using it as a main 'sofa' computer for email etc - I'm using it now. It's what Apple should (and could) have made five if not ten years ago...

Note the smiley - I'm all for constructive answers, and added my own, in a constructive manner. I referred to the rather confrontational responses given, as exemplified above. As you yourself admit, there's rarely one right answer, and if that was acknowledged more often in these discussions, it would be a more welcoming place. Being told to 'b*gger off' doesn't really help anyone, not least the person who writes it. I haven't questioned the quality of the answers, or the fact that the question was asked in the first place - did I say it was a 'stupid question', or even infer such a thing? Would I have answered a 'stupid question'? I've no need to justify my education, thanks, although it's well worth justifying. I don't even need to impress by boasting about my daily rate, either. I'm sure everyone here is a great laugh in a pub, friendly at locks and loves their mother. It's a shame it doesn't come across that way. Call me an old hippy, but let's be nice to each other, 'k?

As usual this thread may as well be a proposal for 'electrical discussions on Canalworld forums' to be a demonstration sport in the 2012 Olympics... ;-) One offered rule of thumb (not definite, but what is in this world) is that if it's sold for car/mobile use - especially if it comes with a cigarette lighter adapter - then it should* be able to cope with alternator charging voltages, and if it doesn't at least you've a better chance with the guarantee. If not, then it'll probably work anyway. My little 7" freeview telly did, and is used in conjunction with a car radio/CD player - all I need. There's nothing wrong with voltage regulators/conditioners, by all means get one if you want one. I'm with Blueprince's thoughts, otherwise. ;-) * usual disclaimers apply

Looks like it was a good event there - I'll keep my eyes open for the next one. I'll see how cruising plans work out, but I may do it by bike & tent... ;-) Edit - will keep my eyes open to see who'll be at Little Venice in May?

and the opposite view.. ;-) 12v items are easy enough to get hold of now, for most people a car radio/CD player is fine, and a lot of flat screen tellies have a remote 12v supply on them now anyway*. Plug in a portable DVD player to that if you like that kind of thing. I have a 7" freeview telly that spends more time playing BBC7 radio at me, but when redesigning the boat I made sure there was a good place to hang the guitar... ;-) Keep it simple where possible, there's less to go wrong. * be wary of anything not specifically designed for mobile use - it'll be fine on the 12.6v from a charged battery, but may not like the 14.something from your alternator... but who wants to watch telly when cruising? Personally I've been running a 12v DAB radio on 14v when cruising wirth no problems [yet], and most kit will cope anyway (internal regulators), but some may not.

my whole boat has channel on the roof , sides I had channel on the roof/top of sides, so made small L-shaped brackets out of angle iron (drill the holes before cutting off the main bar!), & riveted one side on to the channel, screwing into the battens (vertical, 90 degrees to channel). Glued as well, but I prefer using screws/bolts if I can rather than relying on the sticky stuff...

Slow progress over the summer; I needed to get Mike to put more steel struts in the roof, but once that was done things were a little more solid. Inside steelwork got nearly as much paint as outside; red primer, 2 coats of grey undercoat and then a layer of domestic gloss. I could then put some battens in - inch and a half for below the gunwhale (matching the depth of the existing strengthening strut) and inch for above, again matching the metalwork. Although I did use grab glue on these, they were all alos held mechanically, screwed in in various ways, some using small homemade L shaped brackets, one arm of which was rivert to the square section metal struts. I've put in lengths of 18mm ply directly under the gunwhales; the sides overlap the gunwhale internally, so the battens could be be screwed into that via 4mm holes in this overlap. I got through a fair few 4mmm drill bits, I must admit. Again with half an eye on future condensation, I used sprayfoam insulation, a DIY kit. It suited me to do it myself, whilst saving myself some money it is was probably 50:50 whether it would have been worth getting a professional in. Anyway, the tanks were warmed up courtesy of Tony on Highlander's bath, and it went in OK, even under the floorboards in the outer thirds of the floor (some of which may need to come out for ballast in time). I wasn't sure how easy it would be to cut out the surplus, but a large panel saw did the job fine, which meant I could really go for it on the second pass. It's made a huge change - the boat is now of course warmer, reatains heat for longer - and also quieter inside. It sounds like other people's boats do, rather than a tin box, which of course it was. I've started on the lining itself, putting in the boards under the gunwhales first. Some of the sheets of ply have got water damaged whilst on the roof (I actually couldn't get them inside until the flimsy front wooden doors were actually taken out completely), so the worst bits have been placed whether they won't be seen when fitted out.

oops - two errors I'm glad no-one else shot me down for - you said 'diameter' and I quoted cable that was 10mm2 (the second error being not correctly quoting my units) - i.e. cross sectional area of ten square millimetres. Should be fine for the cable drops, but do the maths before trusting what anyone says, especially me... ;-)

CPC do 25m reels of 10mm for around £20+VAT. Their website is a nightmare, but order codes are CB09199 for black and CB09201 for red; put those numbers into their search box. I'm not 100% sure about ordering if you don't have an account, but you could do worse than give them a ring. Shame you're not more local to me, but get in touch if you get nowhere with them.

Wallingford bunkfest - Wallingford Bunkfest - if you fancy the Thames... note it got cancelled in full form this year, but they're having a mini-one Sept 1st - I have to work that day, which is a pain as mates are playing... ;-( As owner of a bicycle powered sound system but with no transport other than my boat, I'm always lobbying the festivals I do to move next to a canal so I can shift the kit by boat, with little success so far.. ;-(

heavens - I could have written this, and was going to at some point... Mine's v-bottomed - the old 'inner' hull is mostly OK internally, but there are a couple of holes at the bottom of the V in the old hull. I don't have self-draining decks - I keep covers over but inevitably some water gets into the bildge into the front of the boat. On removing this, of course, liquid that was between the two layers runs back in to the visible bilge, which was very distrurbing the first time i saw this... I've a low bulkhead across the bottom of the V - actually part of the rear cabin bulkhead (cruiser stern) but there's a sizeable cutout for access to the engine belts above anyway. My problem was that a fuel leak before I bought the boat left diesel in the bilge; the water tank turned out to have a slow leak into the bilge, which rose above this bulkhead and picked up the diesel, carrying it the length of the boat & dissolving the original bitumen bilge protection... It's now all cleaned out and repainted, but the two small holes 1/4" across remain in the inner hull. I want to seal these, but not until I know I've protected the internal steel surafces best I can... I know once it's sealed the lack of oxgen will minimise rust, but any suggestions of stuff to put in there gratefully accepted - Waxoyl was suggested, but didn't seem to be in a form I could easily get in there? We all are. ;-)

I'm not blaming single handed boaters entirely - I'd be blaming myself, and I do try to avoid sweeping generalisations like that. Leaky gates are down to many, many factors. Some might put down this damage to the gates - as reasonable wear and tear, but with the likelihood of decreased maintenance in the future, we may as well preserve what we have, that's all.

agreed - I've just bought one of these (from CPC, not Maplin) for a friend with a Dell laptop (and a boat, obviously) - it comes with several plugs, three of which are to fit various Dell models. She is very happy with it, although aware that it will be draining 6-8A when in use. (Generally, though, when finding a replacement adapter compare with the original mains one where possible - the voltage must match exactly, the power rating on the replacement shoudl equal or exceed that of the original, as stated above.)

Indeed - it's intresting scrolling up and down the page looking at the older photos... the new sides meant I could have the windows where I wanted them, making the internal layout better two. I do wish I'd rollered & laid off every coat of paint rather than just the top coats, but I'm learning a lot with everything I do... something I might consider in future is a red stripe along the upper part of the hull (where the yellow used to be, more or less), but that's what photoshop's for... ;-) I'm (thankfully) enjoying the project, but looking forward to getting out on the cut again...

Big changes - after investigation into how rusty the sides were (they'd rusted completely through in a few places just under the junction with the roof - possibly condensation from the inside as much as poor paintwork on the outside) the recommended action was new sides. On the way to a certain well-known Middlesex boatyard for a quotation, spotted a guy who did welding from a workshop boat who also quoted for the work. The upshot being that the boatyard couldn't be arsed to get back to me for a price with the work, so I went with Mike anyway. A month later he'd fitted new sides, and cut a much reduced window layout, as planned. I had the Cowley wet dock booked anyway, so after spending last week in there, she now looks like this: lack of prep time before getting into the dock was a pain, so the gunwales & upper hull didn't get half the sanding & filling I would have liked, just primer, undercoatx2 and then a coat of black. The cabin & roof had a better time of it - primer, two coats of undercoat and three of topcoat. The Blakes 'Bordeaux Red came out a lot brighter red than expected, but it's the darkest one they do - apparently the now discontinued Cherry Red would have been darker. Oh well - it's a lot, lot better than how it was. I've finally put in the raised ledges as a temporary measure on the inside - I've had one as a bed for a while, but now they're all the way down both sides, meaning I can not only put thinsg down without them sliding, but I can really start to play with the internal layout, see hgow it'll work - and I think it will work well, actually. I've also got a draining sink again, and somewhere sensible to put the electric cooker... ;-) Next jobs will be mainly on the inside - replace a roof support strut, then primer on the new metal inside, battens, insulation, and the fun bit of the fitout... ;-)

Not quite what your previous comment said, then... ;-) It has, in my experience, never been 'accepted practise' to fit 13A fuse in 'all' domestic mains plugs - the correct practise is to use the minimum appropriate fuse for the equipment & cable. When I talk about protecting the cable, it is essential that the fuse goes before the cable overheats... ... and that's especially important in 12v systems, where large currents are potentially available. Any distribution fuse/circuit breaker should fail in the event of a short in the equipment or along the length of the cable - possibly likely on some boats. I do know of a near-fatal fire on a boat where the cable between the battery and distribution point shorted, melting the cable, releasing poisonous fumes into the cabin - that's what happens when you don't have cable protection. Such fuses protecting this line aren't standard, but I intend to fit one even though the distribution panel will be only a couple of feet from the batteries - the joys of redesigning a boat. Incidentally, I'm not here to prove how much I know, or do anyone else down - but to learn from others, and offer help where I think I can. I suspect we're both trying to say the same thing, but even if a safety device isn't perfect, it's worth having, and in the correct place, that's all. My original comment to the original question was that even if the equipment is fused, the cable feeding it also needs to be fused at the feed end - this could be a cable running the length of the boat, after all.

apologies if I was a little forthright... but fuses are there to stop an overcurrent fault causing further damage, to equipment or cable, and do so. Please expand on your answer, though?

No - the inline fuse by the equipment itself protects the radio, but not the cable. The fuses at the distribution point protect the cables, in that the fuse/circuit breakers should be rated LESS than the current capacity of the cable - that way if there's a short in the cable run, the fuse goes, and your boat doesn't catch fire. So you'll need to run the power supply from a spare way on the fuseboard, and make sure you have the lowest rated fuse on that point you can get away with.

Everyone's solution is probably right for them - different sockets suit different applications, it's a shame there isn't more of a standard, other than for car cigarette lighters. For non-residential use, my 30' boat has [ok, will have when re-installed] a very minimal shoreline mains installation for a battery charger and power tool use - everything else is 12v. Most pluggable things will be on car cigarette lighter sockets where necessary, although I'll connect most things directly where possible). Things like phone chargers and pluggable adapters (that drop the voltage down to 3-9v, for example) are often built into the plugs, so there's no choice. Some boats have no use for pluggable items at all. I also intend to provide a regulated 12v supply for electronic equipment - I personally have had no problems with overvoltage, but there's always a first time. Most domestic equipment that has a 12v input has it's own internal regulation, but unless you've been inside to check, don't assume that. Anything that is supplied with a cigarette lighter adapter cable as standard could reasonably be assumed to cope with battery voltage under charge conditions. I looked into this a few years when building a sound system running from 12v - documented at http://www.pedalpa.org.uk. I needed a 12v connector that was locking, polarised and male/female (so you couldn't plug two sources together), and also outlets were protected from shorts. I went for the broadcast standard of 4 pin XLR connectors - available in both line & chassis versions. Most connectors are rated 10A per pin, so for the bigger amps I use p1 & 2 for 0v, p3 & 4 for 12v. This would involve changing connectors everywhere, but would be a good engineering solution - and would impress passing TV crews. ;-) In the case of the PA system it was a unique build from scratch, although we still have a couple of adapters for car cigarette lighter equipment, both outlets and an and input, if we need to plug into a car or similar. In theory I could run it all off the boat - don't worry, you won't see me cruising the canals with 200w of PA blasting away on the roof - but if a festival or similar warrant it, yell... Incidentally, I found a lot of domestic equipment that will run from 12v uses the 2.1mm power plug standard, with centre positive. Again for the PA system, I standardise on that, and modify any equipment that is similar but not the same - especially the music keyboard that was centre negative - not something you want to get wrong in a field in Wales... ;-)

although the original question didn't seem to be asking about music at all, I would second the hard disk music route - there's now external usb hard drives that will play their contents standalone (i.e. without a PC), albeit plugged into a screen of some kind to use the menu system. Beware some have more user friendly interfaces than others. I even found one that ran from 12v. An alternative, cheaper route is to burn CDrs of mp3s and then use a car radio/CD, or CD/radio that will play them - 10-11 CDs on one CDr - which will also play in a DVD player, of course.