Phoenix_V
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Posts posted by Phoenix_V
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11 hours ago, David Mack said:
Which means fair comparisons of the 'efficiency' of CRT and independent navigation authorities cannot really be made.
See my previous comment, the EA deal with weirs and flood relief on the crt Lea and Stort so if the figures were made public a fair comparison could easily be made
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2 hours ago, Paul C said:
Fair enough, if you just feel that CRT are more inefficient, its okay to have an opinion and own it.
opinion based on hard experience would be interested and suprised to learn whether anyone has come to a different conclusion
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12 minutes ago, Mike Todd said:
I thought that EA had a role.
nothing to do with navigation just weirs and drainage same as Lea and Stort which are crt rivers
1 hour ago, IanD said:You said "it is run far more efficiently than CRT" and then followed that up with "Notwithstanding that canals generally cost more to run than river navigations".
If CRT have (for example) 5x as much maintenance to do and need (for example) 5x as much money to do it, they're not less efficient, they just have 5x more work to do. If they have 10x as much work to do and manage with 5x the money they're *more* efficient, not less.
So please give some facts to back up your "far more efficient" claim, otherwise you're just indulging in the usual CRT-bashing... 🙂
Ah so that is your gripe.
Don't have any figures but many years of cruising said navigations and observing how they are run have given me an opinion. The figures are freely available from the independants but I don't know if crt produce separate figures for river navigation costs. I could make a freedom of information request but that would only remove more money from the front line - perhaps Narrowboat Albert has some.
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43 minutes ago, IanD said:
How do you come to that conclusion, given that their costs are lower (they're mostly-natural rivers!) and they have far less to maintain?
I'm sure if CART had hardly any locks/paddles/reservoirs/banks/culverts they'd also be able to do a much better job than they do now... 😉
I'm not quite sure what your point is - someone said that ANT is subsidised by the government and I pointed out that was not true.
I went on to say that however rivers do cost less to maintain than canals.
But if you delve into ANT's running costs they do appear to be more efficient on a like for like basis than crt.
Which bit did I get wrong prey?
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On 30/03/2023 at 00:43, Mike Todd said:
It may be independent as a navigation authority but it does have significant public funding to keep the river navigable!
Point of order that is simply not true
"It receives no funding from central or local government." https://www.avonnavigationtrust.org/about-us/
What is true is that along with Wey Navigation and Chelmer and Blackwater it is run far more efficiently than CRT.
Notwithstanding that canals generally cost more to run than river navigations and it is doubtful if any canal navigation could be self funded, that is why the National Trust handed over the Southern Stratford to BW.
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ttps://boatlamps.co.uk/pages/navigation-lights-led-replacement-bulb-information
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42 minutes ago, Richard10002 said:
You seem quite bitter about this?
Home buildings insurance is based upon rebuild cost, which is completely unrelated to value, (other than by coincidence).
Given that we generally give our insurance companies the rebuild figure, (often on the advice of a surveyor), I don't see how it can possibly be a con by the insurance company?
That is correct and if you don't want to take the time to find out the estimated rebuilding cost plenty of policies out there which don't need this just ask what type / size house
1 hour ago, cuthound said:I specifically asked this question for the two increases I agreed with my insurance company and have their written agreement to pay out the insured sum provided the boat is kept well maintained and in good condition.
Marine policies (as distinct from motor) used to be "agreed value" and paid out the sum insured in the event of a total loss (unless fraud involved) but I think some are now just market value and if you overestimate the value you are wasting your money conversley if you underestimate may not get full payout. It will be in the policy wording which it is.
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Canoes nowadays seem to be made of polythene (not sure if hdpe) rather than the previously popular glass fibre and seem to stand up to the rough and tumble of going over rocks etc so maybe this is an idea that could fly. Given the current state of canals a shallower draft might have advantages.
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21 hours ago, magnetman said:
Just out of interest the lock keeper at teddington has no control whatsoever over when you choose to leave the lock.
Obviously it is best to follow guidance but as it is part of a PRN waterway with a 24 hour lock keeper on duty you can pass through it whenever you want to.
Some people advocate a different approach to Brentford and it is one I have used on a number of occasions. You check what time Richmond are going to open the half tide barrage (phone Richmond lock - they do answer) and leave Teddington to arrive just before the barrage is due to open. You may have to wait but there will be no flow so it is not that arduous unless windy.
This will be slack water from Teddington to Richmond as the barrage is closed. when it opens you can punch the tide as it starts building (as long as you have adequate power*) and get to Brentford a short while before high tide. In some ways this is more relaxing than going out on a falling tide.
It may be better to follow lock keeper instructions but they can't "let you" do one thing or the other. They can only advise.
* IF you don't have adequate power to deal with tidal flow then there is an argument to say you shouldn't be there because you don't know what is going to happen.
Another advantage of going early is if there are a lot of narrowboats waiting on the tide, the lock keeper will have told them the theoretical best time, which is when they all set off, this has the benefit for him of fitting them all into one locking (or two) When they get to Brentford the lock will only take 2 boats and there is a lot of shuffling around. Go early and miss the rush.
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https://shop.waterwaysworld.com/product/NBBUILDERS/the-narrowboat-builder-s-book
https://shop.waterwaysworld.com/product/NBPLANNING/ww-guide-to-narrowboat-planning
both books a bit long in the tooth now but still worth a read
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Lifted from facebook, I take some comfort from this as presumably they went looking for dangers and the worst thing they found was Chinese standard documentation and no China Export lable
Suffolk Trading Standards
Suffolk Trading Standards Imports Surveillance Team have detained 973 diesel heaters at the Port of Felixstowe over the last two months. All products were found to be unsafe, with listings for all sellers removed on eBay.Consignments arrived at the Port in October and November and were stopped by the team, with samples sent to a test house for assessment.Each of the products did not meet the requirements of the Supply of Machinery (Safety) Regulations 2008 because they could present the hazards of fire and death due to poor supporting installation information.Manuals supplied with the products failed to give measurements for installing and did not give the minimum distance the exhaust pipe can be installed from flammable material, or material that could give off poisonous fumes when heated, such as insulation material.No warning was provided about heat and dangers to the user if installed incorrectly.Large parts of the manuals were written in poor English and had incorrect words used. The intended meaning was, in some cases, difficult to understand.Additionally, the products and instructions did not have the name and address of the importer or manufacturer, and did not included the required Declaration of Conformity (DoC). A DoC is a formal declaration by a manufacturer, or the manufacturer's representative, that the product to which it applies meets all relevant requirements of all product safety directives applicable to that product.If you have purchased a product that you think may be unsafe, stop using it immediately and report it to Trading Standards via Citizens Advice Consumer Service on 0808 223 1133. -
14 minutes ago, AndrewIC said:
You can only insure a thing in which you have an insurable interest. If you haven’t paid for it, you don’t yet own it and can’t take out insurance on it.
But there is no reason not to arrange the insurance to start on the date you will take ownership. (Or earlier if you have any financial interest in the boat)
Be aware that in the case of an older boat the insurer (unless third party only) may insist on a survey.
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2 hours ago, NB Alnwick said:
One of the problems we all face is the rate at which the cost of essential goods is escalating. As an example, the last tin of grease that I bought for the stern gland greaser was a little over £3. The current price at my nearest chandler has almost doubled. The same is true of antifreeze. We have not used Antifreeze before in Alnwick because during the fifteen years that we were living aboard, the inboard engine and central heating was always maintained at a comfortable temperature. We added Ankorsol anti-corrosion fluid to the coolant and that worked well when we were using the boat regularly. Now that we live on the land, we need to consider our options - do we continue to keep the boat heated (we did this last year) which is an expensive option when using coal and electricity or do we use antifreeze? The latter will be a major investment because our engine cooling system alone will require 30 gallons (136 Litres) and with the Universal Prestone product that MtB has found, works out at about £35 a gallon, that means that we will need to spend over £1,000 on the stuff. Certainly not a cheap option and for that reason we would want to choose a product that will do the job and last for many years.
I am sure there are cheaper long life antifreeze products especially if you have no older stuff to worry about mixing it with but by my maths 33% dilution of 30 gallons equals 10 gallons which would be about 12 of these concentrated containers I.E. £250 https://www.amazon.co.uk/Prestone-Coolant-Antifreeze-Concentrate-4lt/dp/B009T5NZLI/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_product_top?ie=UTF8&th=1
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4 hours ago, Bee said:
Some of the French canal lock gates have two long sectionss of plastic - probably nylon or something really tough on the mitre faces, that is probably simple cheap and effective and repairable.
they all have a rubbing strip on the mitre faces but on the (rather urban) Roubaix this year we were told that they were going back to wood having trialled plastic as the local rats were very partial to the plastic.
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7 hours ago, magpie patrick said:
Which waterway is that? Like many in France, it seems to capture a certain air of genteel neglect!
The Escaut part of the St Quentin, a lovely but neglected canal. Commercial traffic has been in decline for some 50 years ever since the Canl du Nord openned, before that the traffic was really heavy with the locks all doubled. Now only one lock of each pair is in working order. The famous Riqueval tunnel used to see long strings of barges behind the obligatory tug (due to lack of ventilation). This year we saw 2 empty working boats going south and a couple working the Northern section ferrying grain from the silos. Few pleasure craft too as most of us are wary of the tunnel. The towage system is due to be scrapped in 2024 and will be replaced by a number of CO alarms apparently.
The electrification of the locks is quite old and appears to have been done in stages, the first being attaching an electric motor and gearbox to the existing paddles and gates but still keeper operated, then the boater operated system using rods which are pushed and pulled to set all in motion, currently we use a remote control and much of the equipment has been replaced by hydraulics. Though the photo appears to show the motorised original paddle gear. It was weedy this year and the keepers had to be called out for a couple of locks but really quite reliable.
The gates are steel with wooden facing where they meet, they seem to last a long time.
1 hour ago, Dav and Pen said:On the restored Shannon Erne canal in Ireland the locks are mechanised and operated by a prepaid card .
Interestingly the semi automatic system selected appears to be identical to the ones on the River Lee, but from what I remember broke down/were vandalised less often
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On 29/11/2022 at 09:28, magnetman said:
If you automate the gates so that they open fully without an operator you introduce the risk of crushing anyone who falls in between the gate and the lockside. This is why the system on powered locks requires an operator to be holding the button down and it would not be appropriate to enable full opening with operator not present.
I think some locks in France might be fully automatic but the French do have a completely different attitude to H&S to the British.
It isn't normal in France to even get off the boat when working the lock, there is a siren and flashing light when the gate starts to move, no balance beam to knock the unwary over and an emergancy stop which halts everything.
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A foreign take on this issue from the Franco German TV station Arte
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16 minutes ago, Tony1 said:
I've misunderstood the discussion here.
The BT4000 is a landline type phone, right? What I was hoping was that you could use an adaptor to connect an android smartphone to a wifi router, so that the router would use the smartphone's SIM. I suspect the OP is ideally looking for something that saves him having to swap his SIM from the wifi router into his smartphone every time he leave the boat.
It would be a very handy feature for a lot of people, I bet.
I suspect that is not possible. The reason we do is that we have minimal credit on the separate mobile phone number/simwhich we obviously use when off the boat but just for calls and not data. But we have a large call/ datapackage on the router sim so it seems to make sense to use the router phone as much as possible.
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2 hours ago, Tony1 said:
This could be really handy for me - I could use my EE SIM without having to take it out of the phone, in those places where the normal O2 SIM has no signal.
The idea of simply plugging the phone into the router and then using the phone SIM is great.
Do you need an adaptor for the phone? Presumably it would be micro USB or maybe type C at the phone end, with an RJ11 plug on the other end to plug into the router?
As said you need a BT / RJ11 adapter abou £3 on ebay and apparently a dect type phone. I am testing one now with an Asda (vodaphone network) sim which works fine at least on that network! - the phone I am using is is a BT4000. The only drawback is those phones need a 7.5 volt supply either from a mains adapter or a 12 volt adapter. You need the 235 variant of that router the normal version sold in the UK does not have the phone socket you can see the socket on the photo on the ebay link I posted if you look at one of the other variants it is clearly absent.
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3 hours ago, john6767 said:
Personally for use on a boat I still think the wifi route will be more successful, and clearly legal, as having the phone on wifi and allowing it it use wifi calling is not an issue.
Its the way to go and probably cheaper. You can by routers that allow an ordinary dect phone to plug in and use minutes on the sim card for calls https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/UNLOCKED-HUAWEI-B535-235-CAT7-300Mbps-4G-LTE-WIFI-ROUTER-WITH-RJ11-TEL-PORT-/195472234450?_trksid=p2349526.m4383.l4275.c6
and add an outside aerial https://www.3grouterstore.co.uk/oldstore/Poynting-4G-Antenna---Cross-Polarised-LTE-4G-Antenna---Outdoor-Omni-Directional-4G-Antenna-with-5m-cable-and-SMA-Poynting_4G_Antenna.html
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1 minute ago, EllaGlssp said:
helpful- thanks! i imagine the current roof is wayyyy to heavy to lift on my own (though i haven’t tried). in which case i’d really need it replacing. Canvas could work though I like to use the wheelhouse as kind of an extra room, so ideally i’d have something like thin wood i can take off in panels. I’m also a little confused about how the metal porthole bits are removed as they are not hinged .
I'll try and find some photos (might not be today) though mine is not the best design having "evolved" rather than thought out, the full width front and rear windows act as a frame and then there are 2 beams running front to back above the side windows and doorwith cross beams just slotted in to them. If the weather is cold such that you are getting condensation then you probably don't want to be using the wheelhouse as a room, in summer it is fine. If you use panels as some do then the issue is going to be leaks along the joins, which probably ends up with the complication of a canvas covering over the panels.
It looks like the blue frame for the portholes acts as a stiffener to the whole construction so the bolts attaching it could be replaced by clips if you retain that feature.
Perhaps a start would be to take the roof off (with help) and review how many changes you need to make. The 3 way protex clips are very good and hold in 3 planes where required rather than just 2 but probably not a significant time saver over undoing a few nuts and screws, main consideration is how to make the roof design more easily manageable and retain stiffness of the structure.
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If you want to just replace the screwed on brackets with clamps have a look at the protex website, probably something like this https://www.protex.com/8903-1069MSZN-YP-catchbolt-with-90-degree-keeper-and-safety-catch-mild-steel-zinc-plate-passivate-yellow
We have a canvas roof which is fine and has withstood all recent gales, BUT it does have a frame above the side windows and cross beams for bracing and to provide a rain shedding curve to the canvas
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if it is missing maybe get a plate engraved and attach to boat job done
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On 03/10/2022 at 19:14, Chris G said:
Self adhesive magnetic strip: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Magnetic-Adhesive-Tape/b?ie=UTF8&node=1938391031
good (it comes in different strengths) velcro would be stronger
Engine Alignment and R&D Coupling with Cutless Bearing and Sealed Stern Tube
in Boat Building & Maintenance
Posted
especially considering that it would have been like that for at least 45 years to my knowledge and probably 87 years