Neil2

Most interesting! The original owner obviously didn't have the boat very long as the cabin legend is different to that in your colour photo. No windows either in the original boat. Thanks for taking the trouble to find this.

Crikey I wonder what they would make of my uncle Jack Gough from Haverwank.

That's a surprise - we have a Miele washing machine, a semi commercial thing I bought secondhand ten years ago and it has cost us literally nothing, despite being in almost constant use. Mind you, that might be the reason..?

Alan - unless I have read it wrong I think that is his argument - ie that the licence condition is unenforceable because it isn't covered by the Act. I may be wrong, perhaps @waterworks could clarify?

I remember my wife was round at a friends house once and a guy turned up to fix the washer. It turned out to be the PCB which didn't take long to replace, then the guy calmly hands over a bill for just shy of £200 which at the time would have bought a brand new replacement. Unfortunately the government's plan to make household appliances repairable is the product of muddy thinking. Just forcing manufacturers to make spare parts available isn't going to end planned obsolescence if the cost of repairs is still ridiculous.

I suppose "we" get what we deserve. The culture of the canals has changed a lot since I started boating, I think the rise of marina culture is largely responsible, providing a safe, secure, environment with mains electric and water - it's hardly surprising that the emphasis has shifted to cabin space and the fitout when so many boats are never going anywhere. There are a few builders around who are still producing distinctive boats with style but the sad reality is that unlike say the 1970's and 80's there are no budget, or even middle market builders doing it. There isn't a modern equivalent of the Springer, Harborough, Barney Boat or Hancock & Lane's Norseman, for example.

Part II of schedule 2 of the Act (paras 1&5) does give CRT a fair amount of leeway when it comes to imposing licence conditions. The issue is then whether CRT imposing an 8pm curfew on engine running is a reasonable "standard" within the Act. I see the point you are making, it's a little like property landlords imposing unreasonable tenancy conditions - even if the tenant signs an agreement - eg not to keep a pet - it doesn't make the conditions enforceable. But it's not an argument for saying there should not be any measurable standards in the licence conditions. The law says it's ok for CRT to set standards for the operation of boat equipment and engines, so you have to start somewhere. You might argue about whether 8pm to 8am is reasonable, but I doubt you could argue about the principle of having stated restricted hours.

I guess I'm telling you what you already know, but... If you really want a trad or semi why pay over the odds for a cruiser? I reckon the sort of new buyers who are flocking to the canals at the moment prefer cruisers. so Aqueduct (pah!) are probably going to get something close to the asking price, maybe even more. In the end narrowboats are still boats, and the boat market is highly seasonal, so once we get into the colder darker months some sort of normality will return. Looking at boats on a cold windswept day in November is worlds away from these balmy summer days.

Squall blue can't be far off. From what I can remember Nauticus boats were not painted, the original light blue colour is simply the colour of the original gel coat so if you repaint it all you can do is try and get the closest match, which I guess is what a previous owner has done.

Yes how ridiculous that's like paying people to not go to work. Oh, hang on....

It looks as though that part of the bilge is sealed all the way round..? That would make life a bit easier. From the pictures it doesn't look too bad ie no obvious danger of the baseplate being perforated. Don't know what others think but if it is sealed, I'd get it dry first off then remove all the loose rust and treat it Vactan say, or Owatrol, you could then treat it like an integral water tank actually it's easier as you don't have to worry about the coating being toxic, just standard blacking would do. Better still IIRC Jotun do a range of epoxy based products for treating old integral water tanks but I don't think you can buy them in small quantities so it could be an expensive exercise, though you could use the rest for the outside of the boat I suppose...

The people who believe that this country is on track towards an electric future, with electric cars, boats, even planes, and heat pumps instead of boilers - just observe the hand wringing that's going on since we lost that subsea cable connecting us to France. We're already having to fire up fossil fuelled power stations to make up the shortfall. The fact is, in terms of electricity generation and consumption the UK is right on the edge most of the time. What wonderful thing is going to happen in the next 30 years to provide all the extra power needed for this emission free world? Politicians and governments can spout on all they like about aspirations for the future, but on the strength of what's happened so far this century who would place any faith in that? And much less efficient..?

Running with a petrol o/b isn't nearly as problematic as it used to be now we have the internet but still involves a bit of forward planning. Rather than look at engine alternatives I would just buy an electric folding bike for trips to the filling station. But you think it's an issue on the inland waterways, I remember reading an account of a couple who circumnavigated the UK in a petrol outboard powered cruiser, and it was all about the adventures they had finding fuel. When they got to the North West of Scotland I seem to remember on one occasion they had something like a 20 mile hike and a couple of taxi journeys.

It's not too difficult with todays technology. In another life I commissioned a lot of level entry showers/wetrooms which invariably were fitted to suspended floors, the issue in a boat - a narrowboat especially - is that the wet room is a lot smaller than it would be in a house so the sealing has to extend up the walls a fair bit. On the boat I had it meant there was about a 6" "lip" at the entrance to stop the water escaping. The bilge pump sat in a little "sump" in the corner and the floor was laid in such a way that the grey water drained into it to be pumped overboard. The advantage of course is that you can use pretty much all the available space in the room.

How interesting - but a bit frustrating as I can't quite make out the legend on the cabin side though it looks like "A R" something and "Bulwell Nottingham". I see it did have a stove in the back cabin which has since been removed, and I can't see a chimney where the stove is now, up front. I'd ask Pete Gilbert but I can't find any contact details and I'm a long way from Bedworth! I think @Laurence Hogg might have more information.?

I have spent enough years working in large organisations to know when a reply has come from the person signing it. I have no doubt that Mr Parry dealt with this personally.

You have "self draining" decks then. I suspected that was the case, so if your boat was not designed with a wet bilge you really do need to sort this out. That is a truly dreadful way of designing a shower/drain, certainly no professional fitter would do it that way.

With respect, your list of requirements is not compatible with your spec. For a bike that will handle "all manner" of towpaths you'll need tyres wider than the typical hybrid. I was only half joking about the fat bike, one of these with electric assistance would handle any towpath you are likely to come across and a lot more besides. But it would be a dead weight. I'd still go with a straight fat bike though. They are not as slow as you might think. I friend of mine was doing a cross country tour with a group and they were all on full sus MTB's. He somehow broke an axle though and the only thing he could hire at the time was a fat bike, unsuspended but 4" tyres. He said he was leaving his mates for dead from that point on and he ended up buying one. Plus where I live we get proper snow in winter and these bikes are about the only thing you can safely ride in snow.

That is genuinely the only reason I haven't got one - yet.

It's not a good way of operating a shower/drain. Think about it, your steel baseplate is being exposed to water constantly. Just like it is on the outside except the outside is protected by blacking. That pump is a bilge pump but it won't drain all the water so that part of you bilge is going to be constantly wet. As you can see, it's already rusty, eventually the rust will perforate the baseplate - it might take a long time but it's inevitable. Many years ago narrowboats were built on the "wet bilge" principle. Rainwater etc could enter the bow section and the idea was it would drain all the way to the back of the boat where a bilge pump in the engine compartment would pump it out. At the same time water from the shower would be allowed to drain into the bilge as well. Some of these boats are still around but not surprisingly most of them will have been overplated by now... But in the days of air cooled engines the engine would create an airflow through the bilge which would help keep it dry. It could be that your boat is a wet bilge boat, and at some point because the water from the shower is not draining to the stern, a pump has been installed under the shower room. Or it could just be bad design. Either way you need to find a way to stop the water entering the bilge. There's nothing wrong with using a simple bilge pump in a waterproof tray for a shower tray, it just means that the tray will be permanently wet. So if you could find a way of turning that part of the bilge into a sort of tray, or even seal the platform that you stand on at the moment and have the bilge pump in that. I had a boat with that sort of arrangement, the floor of the shower room had been made completely waterproof up to about 6" from the floor so it held the waste water while a bilge pump pumped it overboard. The pump was actually in a little recess in the floor so almost all the water got pumped out.

Ha, six and two threes. In my case two guys were in residence for two days which is a lot of money at todays rates. Doubtless you know, but they said they hate these jobs because in the end there's usually nothing to show for it, just a certificate. Got to say it's one of the many things that is killing the small trader, fire safety is another. It's ok for the big boys that can absorb these costs but sometimes you look at the books and think we are supposed to be making a profit here...

I'd get an electric fat bike. Go anywhere. Getting it on/off the boat might be an issue...

Not quite sure what's going on there but that looks like your baseplate and you don't want standing water on it. As you can see it's already quite rusted. Where/what is the "pump" that it supposed to remove the water?

Sounds like he was right. TBH I was mostly impressed that he had even checked, mind you for what they charge us I would expect everything to be taken apart.

Sorry, I made the assumption because your comment came directly under the post about the "Joe Gilbert". I found some more pictures of Jenny Wren on the move and she really does have lovely lines, do you have any more info or do you know anyone who might?