Justyn

The issue here is that there ARE noisy diesel heaters. Noise at whatever time of day CAN disturb users of the waterways. Anyone generating excessive noise SHOULD be considerate of others. For those who generally are not considerate of others you should not be asking for new enforcement rules. I was canoeing on my way back from collecting wood for my stove when I heard a noise I thought was my neighbour at the time's generator. He was having trouble with his engine and using a noisy generator during the 'legal' times. I was approximately 1/2 mile up the canal at the time and was astonished at how far the noise was travelling. As I approached where I was moored I realised it was not my neighbour's noisy genny, but actually a diesel heater, that once on my boat I could still hear even though it was moored 3 boats away, approximately 50m away. Being inside the times I was allowed to use my engine to heat my water and charge my batteries I cranked my engine up. I could still hear the diesel heater over my engine which has a cocoon around the engine and a hospital silencer (which were luckily installed when i bought the boat as I couldn't have afforded to fit them myself). I went back to the boat with the diesel heater simply out of curiosity to find that I could not hear my engine over the noise emanating from the diesel heater. Being relatively new to boating I was stunned by this and also smiled to myself about how lucky I was to have a nice quiet engine. I switched off my engine and listened to music to drown out the heater. However when I went to bed at around 11pm the noise from the diesel heater went on throughout the night and eventually I became used to the drone and managed to sleep, rather later than usual. This boat fortunately had gone the next morning. If my calorifier ran my radiators why should it be ok, rules aside, to run a noisy diesel heater through the night, but not my quieter engine? A few weeks I encountered another boat on a permanent offside leisure mooring, using a similar heater. This was used until later than the normal times allowed for running an engine, but seemed to be switched off at around 10pm, I presume in consideration of all the other boat users in the vicinity. This is surely acceptable, but what to do about those who don't consider others? Rules should only be put in place if they are fair... Should all boats have a decibel meter? Should vintage engines be banned? Should all diesel heaters be banned? A bit of live and let live is surely necessary, but please consider others everyone

Having thought about this a fair amount i'm rather confused by by the outlook on society that a few people here have. By talking about everything being charged in a fair manner and it being equal for everyone it makes mer think that these posters have an idealised view of society where everyone is equal, yet they are clearly capitalists. If you are so keen on equal charging your energies might be better spent on campaigning for equal wages for all at which point everyone can also pay the same for the same services. Spend your time resolving the issues of poverty and financial inequality and you'll no longer have to worry whether you pay more than someone else for your licence and services. By the way Dave and Alan, I'm presuming you both have 72' boats and so pay more to BW than anyone else. Correct me if I'm wrong

I figure you could cut the wages of everybody who works for BW. Then it would cost less to maintain the system so licences and mooring fees would cost less. Then continuous moorers may be able to afford moorings and the gin palace brigade would be happy because they could buy more gin

Oh, to say I haven't got a mooring as the one we originally were going to be at turned out to be too short for the boat we ended up with. Planned to buy a 60', sorted a mooring (as advised to do so before getting boat), then found engine wouldn't start on boat we wanted so ended up buying a 70'. So far have travelled from GU leicester arm, across to Stockton on GU and down as far as Kidlington on Oxford canal. CC'ing for several months now

But are you a liveaboard? Do you have a long term mooring or residential mooring? And whether the towpath is tidy or not, if it has items on it that haven't been agreed with BW it's a contravention of the rules and as there are so many who are upset about rule breaking i thought they'd like someone else to have a go at

Very interesting read Just wondering how many of the people posting are live aboard and how many of those have residential moorings. A view is that those on long term moorings should be treated the same as cc'ers. Break the rules and get your boat taken. This means no more planters, sheds, wheelbarrows, coal stores, bicycles, solar lights and other such items cluttering up the towpath causing dangers to cyclists and pedestrians If you are going to be a stickler for thye rules, then do so. Don't just pick on the poor, after all, rules are rules The towpath is a towpath. If you want a shed then go get a house, if you want a garden, go get a house... You pay for a mooring in a stretch. You do not pay for your little piece of the towpath Or maybe just live and let live

It is already out of the boat. It wasn't integral

Thanks for info... Sorry for posting elsewhere too, i realised that this section was probably a better place for it

We're in the throes of refurbing a narrowboat and have found our water tank had a hole. As it's too small anyway rather then try and repair it we're after a new one being made to fit in the bow Anyone know of anyone good we can go to to make either a plastic or stainless steel one?

I've been trying to get my head around what both of you (Gibbo and Chris W) have been saying, but it's eluding me a little. Partly due to the fact I'm reading but not stopping to digest, which I guess at some point I'll try and do. I'm just wondering whether you two could meet up at crick and have your own little sideshow where you both had the same engines, battery banks, alternators and chargers, then proved your theories with the good old basis of science and controlled experiment. Surely it's as simple as that or doesn't science work like it used to in the old days On a side note, we've just bought our boat and I'm not sure what setup there is regarding battery charging from shoreline if any. Nor do I know whether there is an alternator charge controller. We have a 1500W sterling invertor, a 350w invertor, a 3k5 electrolux travelpack generator provided with the betamarine engine and a sterling display panel showing battery voltage levels and an amphour counter which is rather confusing. Not sure of the state of the domestic batteries at the moment, though had to replace the starter as it wouldn't charge. Boat is out of water being welded at the moment and have much other stuff to be worrying about like treating rust, fitting a kitchen and all the other total refit worries. This battery charging issue is sure to becoma a major deal though once we start to liveaboard and I'm still no clearer as to which method to use other than the fact that single-stage is not on the cards... Of course money is going to be an issue too, ho hum

Well I'm in the market for some LED bulbs for our refurbishment project. Having used a search engine I ended up at ultraleds. Luckily I also checked here too. Thanks for making this public. It seems the MD of this company lost my business too with his objectionable manner

Great advice salty splash. I subsequently started out from crick with the intention of doing exactly that if the same weather prevailed. In fact the trip was much more pleasurable tho I hadn't realised watford locks would be closed when i got there. Ho hum, I moored up and wandered back to the car. Returned a couple of days later and started single handedly through watford locks. Realised I hadn't bitten off more than I could chew, more like bitten off more than I could get in my mouth! Having managed to get down a couple of them I was fortunate enough that Sean, the friendly lock keeper came to my aid and helped me through the rest. I'm sure I'd have managed but my system left a lot to be desired. Nothing like being dropped in it at the deep end. All part of the learning curve anyhow. Baptism by water an' all that

I voted yes. Having bumped (not badly) a couple of other NB's whilst moving our new purchase toward the yard where it'll be overplated and having had a total nightmare in the winds being unable to get out from the bank when a side wind connected with 70' of steel and pushed the nose into the bank, we were very disheartened. I'm sure many of the problems would have not happened to an experienced NB'er. I could have caused some serious damage. My only prior experience was on a few holidays and I'd like to think I was as courteous and safe as I could be, but they were much better conditions

We built a canadian canoe designed with plans from Selway Fisher. They also have designs for motorboats and even narrowboats. Take a look at their site, even just for interest. http://www.selway-fisher.com It was much fun and a great learning experience and was ultimately responsible for our decision to take on the renovation of kingfisher of bath. We were out canoeing near Limpley Stoke when we decided to investigate the possibility of buying and living on a narrowboat. Anyway details of our project are at this link http://www.songofthepaddle.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?t=5411. As has been mentioned marine ply was not necessary as sheathing with fibreglass cloth and epoxy rsin was done, but we decided it would be prudent as we were bound to scrape the hull on rocks and other objects in the shallows of the rivers and canals of the UK I'd recommend using selway fisher's designs simply from the perspective of how helpful Paul was when I called up.

Also gas detectors on sale for 8.99 Personally I'll need 2 fire extinguishers and a blanket in order to get a BSS so I'm hoping these will do the job. Currently I've taken the fire extinguisher and blanket from my fire juggling kit to keep my mind at ease whilst renovating, but that's not a long term proposition as I also need them to satisfy insurance company for fire performances. If the gas detector is marked with standards I'll probably pick up one of those too. I have a CO detector, but nothing to indicate a propane leak. I could be sorted for £28 on this front which would be awesome as I'd budgeted £50 for extinguishers and blanket from chandlers and was still searching for a gas detector.

Just to add fuel to the fire...! They are also selling fire blankets that may or may not be up to the correct standards. Let the battle commence

Not really looking at being away for long as we'll be liveaboard. If we plan on it then it'll be a matter of emptying fridge before going

We'll start with it and if we have troubles keeping up with the charging we'll see if we can afford a gas fridge or revert to the teeny weeny one we have at the moment. It's all going to be a steep learning curve

Thanks for responses. We bit the bullet and followed the idea of invertor and domestic fridge. Found a 108l fridge freezer at B&Q today that fits into the space we've allocated. It's only 456mm wide Also is energy efficiency rated A and at £80 seemed like a snip. I just hope the 'spare' 300W invertor will run it so we don't have to have the 1500W one on 24/7

Distributors of what exactly or is this just everything going up?

Hi folks. I'm a newbie here and have just entered the world of NB ownership with a project mentioned in the 'New here?' section. The current fridge is reminiscent of the 3-way one I had in my VW camper. It's pretty small and being someone who likes cooking a lot I have come to depend on a decent sized fridge freezer. As we'll be living aboard I think I'll want to replace the current one, but as we (probably) won't have a shoreline I'm concerned about draining batteries too quickly if I use a 12V fridge. Currently there's a bank of 4 x 110AH batteries on the domestic cycle. We'll have a TV set up but probably little use. PC will be used a fair amount tho I'll have to curb by usage somewhat. There's a 12v car stereo type CD player which will be used pretty extensively. Otherwise water pump and lighting is likely to be only other electrics. What I'm hoping for is people's preferences with reasons. Discussions about this have probably been covered elsewhere and I have tried searching, but seem to be reading so much on the forum I'm losing track... Soooo much to learn

Hi everyone, I'm new to narrowboating as I've just bought a 70' springer in need of 'a bit of TLC'.... Well rather a lot of it as it happens I've been hovering around for a while now trawling through for advice on all sorts of things. Thanks so much everyone for all your posts it's helped me a lot in the preparations for what is going to be a mammoth journey. My fiancee and I are planning to live aboard as soon as the overplating and a few other minor inconveniences such as lack of running water, a safe oven and rotten floorboards are sorted! We've been looking forward to life on the cut since passing a few boats on the Kennet and Avon canal in the canoe we made last summer and realise it's going to be a drastic change but we think we're ready for it I'll be sure to be asking lots of questions, though most have already been answered ten times over so I'll try to find my answers first through the search facility We may end up as continuous cruisers, but that depends whether we can get a 70' up the Thames as far as Lechlade and into the riverside marina. Apparently it's tricky. We did have a mooring booked there for a 60' boat we'd put an offer on, but when the engine wouldn't start we pulled out and have now ended up with an extra 10'. Great for the extra space, but a bit limiting in some ways... Ho hum We look forward to meeting some of you out there

Hey vince, what local boatyard is this as we're just about to embark on a refurb project and will need some hexagrip board for our cruiser stern... We live in oxford too