dmr

Its not a bend its more like a corner, but its a bit over-rated. Gillie got Vox (71 foot) round without touching the sides. It was a bit harder on the way back and I had to use the "bowthruster" pole to push the front over. Interestingly CanalPlan said we could not do this journey,, I assume because it thought either this bend or Salters Lode was not navigable in a 71 footer. You can do a lot of the system is a long boat! ...............Dave

As MtB says, at less than an amp cable size just won't be an issue. I am a bit concerned that you plan to wire these in series rather than parallel, please explain why?, or do you mean placing one behind the other???? I don't believe the spec of 6dBA noise level!!! .............Dave with 1.5mm cable and a current of 1amp over 25m I calculate a volt drop of 0.27 volts. ...........Dave

I reckon if you are a practical person familiar with steel and corrosion you could do a reasonable job yourself, but a few reservations... -Boats are a lot thicker than cars so not all of your automotive experience will hold -A good surveyor might spot other things that you will miss -It is useful to get some actual thickness numbers -The lift out can be a significant part of the cost, so maybe its worth paying for a hull survey anyway. -If something is not quite perfect a surveyor should have the experience to put in in perspective, though there are many reports on this forum of surveyor over pessimism. As JohnV says, a survey is only a snapshot at a few locations and will often miss unexpected localised weaknesses. I do wonder how much experience surveyors use in choosing the locations where they measure thickness. As many boats rust from the inside out concentrating on the bottom inch of the sides would make sense to me though I am not sure that this is usually done. .................Dave

I reckon both Hungerford and Devizes would get you more "property per pound" and both are better places to grow old (in my opinion). Not very much retirement property in Hungerford though, and Devizes does not have a train station, and does have a bit of traffic too but nothing like Newbury. ............Dave

One of the great things about life on the cut is that you can bend the rules quite a bit as long as you don't take the Pee. I would prefer not to inform CaRT of the detail of my cruising pattern in case some IWA bod with a law and order obsession gets hold of it. ...............Dave

Nightwatch, just don't worry about this stuff. There are many many boats moving just a few miles each year so if you do any approximation to real continuous cruising you are very unlikely to get any trouble from CaRT. Once in a while they do silly things so keep a minimal log of your movements just in case. The boat checking can be quite discrete, sometimes its a bloke on a bike who will cycle past, note your number, then stop a little later to enter it into his tablet. They are usually quite friendly if you talk to them. If they do catch you in the same place quite often they can instantly check your cruising record and once they see that you are a "mover" they will most likely just ignore you. ............Dave

We sleep in the back cabin. The cushions are in 4 inch hard foam. We put a memory foam topper on these and it makes a very nice bed. For us 2 inch memory foam is about right. We replaced this with a 1 inch version (so that it would pack away more easily) and this is not as good as the old 2 inch. I suspect 4 inch would be too much for us, you can get a "sinking in" sensation. Pay extra to get a removal cover that can be washed. Memory foam is available in various densities but most shops only sell the standard density and that's fine. It don't last forever, it loses its "spring" after a few years and needs replacing.The old ones make a good bed for the dog and visiting children. ............Dave.

I suspect those residential moorings are quite cheap but they are a bit of a special case. I believe they are full blown residential moorings with postcodes and were created by the council to rehouse a small group of boats that previously moored on the towpath side. I often wonder how those boaters achieved such a good deal for themselves. They appear to be a small and friendly community and I imagine it is very unlikely that there will ever be any vacancies, Will be good to see you back on the K&A. .............Dave

I am sure the availability of work vs the cost of housing is a big factor, but there is probably another significant contributor. I know nuffin about London but am rather more familiar with the K&A. On our travels we always seem to be a boat or two heading heading for the K&A and invariably for the western end and their prime intention is "to join the community" rather than to find work. I suspect this is also be a big factor in London. .............Dave

If you are seriously thinking of moving onto a moored boat on the K&A then you really should be doing hands on research rather than asking here. Get out and walk the towpath where you plan to "live" to see if you might actually like living there. You might spot suitable "farmers fields" at the same time. There is a "large house" field just above West Mills but it probably does not take residential boats (most marinas don't). Newbury really isn't the cheapest place to buy a little flat, and the Traffic is terrible. Buy a house (probably somewhere else) to rent out and provide income, then we you are really old sell that house and buy a suitable retirement flat, you don't know what you will need till you need it so don't buy it too soon. Newbury really isn't the best bit of the K&A ...............Dave

Have a look at the Charnwood Country 4, I think its much less deep than the Morso. We've got the newer Charnwood C4 which is certainly very shallow but won't take a back boiler. Otherwise the famous Boatman is quite compact too. In practice I suspect wot you burn is more important than having Defra approval. ............Dave

If you know who made the portholes then they might sell spare glass, otherwise it is a case of finding a local glass company who will make some for you. They appear to get this done elsewhere so are only acting as a middleman and taking a small profit so probably will not be too enthusiastic. You could get a couple of spares at the same time to up the size of the order. They might try to persuade you to use non toughened glass as they can do this in-house and make more money. I dunno who actually does the work or if we can deal with them directly. We paid for £65 for 3. Other companies quoted a fair bit less but it just never actually happened. ...........Dave

I dunno, its hard to understand the thought process, its hardly exciting stuff untying a boat is it???? However, I have an inkling that a lot of the untying is down to the same individual (or a group of three) and so maybe they have a desire to piss off/get one over on boaters?. In this case if they start seeing cable ties they might take it as some kind of insult or challenge and decide to up the odds? If I am correct then they pass through the area often (so probably live locally) but don't look like drunken revellers. ...........Dave

I am useless with facebook, it goes against all my "computer intuition". See if this works... I(f so there are two separate items if you scroll down a bit.) https://www.facebook.com/groups/178384468913736/ It might be a closed group now, not sure, it used to be viewable by everyone but some bad people did make trouble a while ago and so there was talk of making it private. ...........Dave

There are some photos on the K&A facebook page. Its a hire boat (again) and without wishing to make judgements, it was commented that there are quite a lot of empty beer cans visible in the photo! .............Dave,

The holding tank might be better done in heavy duty plastic. I have heard of stainless tanks failing but have not yet heard of a plastic tank failing (if correctly fitted). For the water tank I assume you currently have an integral tank as you talk of liners. Why not take the tank back to bare metal and paint it in suitable epoxy? Its not a nice job but if done well will last a long time. ...........Dave

and to answer your second question, assuming you don't have a BW key, heading from Reading westwards (which is going "up" rather than "down" ? ) you will get as far as Theale swing bridge just after Sheffield Lock. ............Dave

Do you mean a BW (Sanitary key) or an anti vandal (water conservation) key? You do Not need an anti-vandal key anywhere on the K&A, I would like to say that we do not have vandalism on the K&A , which is generally true, though a pot of paint was poured over a boat in Newbury last weekend. A BW key is required for many of the swing and lift bridges between Reading and Newbury. ............Dave

Going a bit off topic but I can't resist as its a favourite subject of mine. Outside of big cities most canalside pubs, and "almost canalside" pubs will take dogs.Those that don't will not get my custom. Surprisingly the posher the pub the more likely they are to takes dogs and have water and dog treats. Many "eating pubs" will also take dogs though you might have to eat in the pub bit rather than the posh bit (suits me fine). Do ask in shops, a few shops will take dogs. Almost all hardware shops will. Currently in Kintbury (K&A) and had a few drinks at the slightly posh Dundas Arms. They do B&B and every room has a bed for the dog and a cabinet for the guns!!!!! ............Dave

Is it a petrol or a diesel, and if diesel is it a modern direct injected diesel? What size of calorifier do you have in your car? ...........Dave

There are a number of serious engine problems that "might" be caused by running at very light load. Bore glazing, a hard varnish that forms in the cylinder Bore polishing; the cylinder becomes too smooth and shiney Ring sticking; a sticky gum stops the rings moving and pressing against the cylinder wall Bore wear; not many people appear to worry about this and its the most serious problem. These things can all cause poor compression and burning of engine oil (blue exhaust smoke) because the cylinder wall needs an amount of microscopic roughness to work correctly. Its not easy to work out just how much light running really contributes to these problems, there are many experts (some real experts and some self appointed experts) and they have different views. Here is one of many articles: http://coxengineering.sharepoint.com/Pages/Boreglazing.aspx The choice of engine oil MIGHT also be a factor which is why some boaters use API CC oil in older engines. So...some boaters run in gear to load the engine just to be safe. As said above its against the rules and anti social. The best approach is to fit a reasonably large alternator and a temperature guage. A big alternator will load the engine as much as the propeller. Run the engine quite fast at first till it gets up to temperature then ease off to a bit above tickover. If your running for a long time then maybe give it a few revs every hour. An engine running at tickover will most likely never warm up and this is a bad thing. ...........Dave

You have to look pretty hard on the www to find mention of this effect, but there is even a nice graph somewhere. I reckon I see something similar when equalising; the amp hours "regained" are more than the amp-hours put in during equalisation, though I have not measured this in a proper scientific way. Quite surprising as a lot of the amp hours are probably wasted in splitting the water into hydrogen and oxygen. ..............Dave

How do you know? You can hardly see the waterline! In big freeze a few years ago we were seriously trapped in the ice. Seven and a half weeks with ice up to about 6 inches thick, and this was the K&A. The ice held the boat tightly but the water level below fell an inch or so every night, maybe something to do with back-pumping?. Each night there would be a couple of blood curdling groans then the boat would drop down the inch or so. ............Dave

Very interesting, I had never thought about the weight of the snow. A bit of Googling suggests snow can weight between 50 and 300kg per cubic metre. http://www.sciencelearn.org.nz/Contexts/Icy-Ecosystems/Looking-closer/Snow-and-ice-density Water is 1000kg/m3 so using Archimedes and the denser snow (300kg) then very roughly the boat will sink by a third of the snow depth!!!!.... 6 inches of snow will sink the boat by 2 inches!!!!! I suspect that most snow is probably more 50 than 300 though. ............Dave

Was this the Sun or the Daily mail?. Up to 6 inches of snow on the roof is ok. Between 6 and 12 inches the boat looks abandoned and so will be squatted by immigrants from Eastern Europe. More than 12 inches and the weight of snow sinks the boat. -27 freezes the cut solid and the ice sheet cuts the boat in half. BBC weather shows no cold weather before next Friday, further ahead forecasts are fantasy. But seriously, just keep an eye on the real forecast and if its going cold get the water tank full, poo tank empty, bags of coal on the roof, beer and food in the boat and find a good spot to get frozen in, reasonable distance from a water tap and a pub but not too close to either. ..............Dave