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roland elsdon

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Everything posted by roland elsdon

  1. It was a fence not a house. It was a nature strip tree , and the council came and dealt with it after the junk doco. not a fricking great 1870s canal cutting. we lived in brinklow for some time, that cutting has always been wet, unstable and a liability. It always appeared to hold together by tree roots, and luck. The repaired towing path narrowed a shallow channel and pushed boats nearer the off towpath side. course in the end it was vandalism that did for it, not a hasty bit of cutting a new canal as part of the shortening scheme. Original line goes nowhere near the cutting.
  2. Broke our hearts last time we saw what was our pride and joy. Even in our worst financial periods we cleaned and brass polished. Painted repaired re skinned the cabin replaced the range , put on steel gunnels and had cloths made. All done by hours of overtime and our unskilled labour. Last time we saw her at Weedon couldnt bring ourselves to look properly at the hideous mess. And its Thaxted. Widgeon was a temporary Willow Wren name, appertaining to a short period of ownership. Less time than we owned her.
  3. Ive only put together the old one. It was very difficult and messy. Rust dust frozen bolts warped panels. In the scheme of things not too bad , Given that the whole boat was by then in kit form. At one point we had no bottom no footings, no gunnels no conversion. The Rayburn was by then on the dockside where I made new back plates and put it back together, cleaned out the boiler and rebuilt it. Once the footings and bottoms were in it was dropped in to the boat. I then had to put the floors back in and used trolley jacks and rollers to shove it into the right place. Then I put a new top on the boat. Fitted it out. and finally - lit Rayburn. Endless hot water cooking and central bleating, from september to may. Still miss it 28 years on.
  4. We just hung the Rayburn off the railway bridge below common moor , deconverted a bit of boat and swung it in with a chain hoist. However that was in the days when boats were more diy. At one point the rayburn was hanging of the bridge mid channel when we lifted it from boat a to boat b. Did enjoy the 80s
  5. When we were at university we used to have a little business fitting kill switch's to students cars .Many student had cars because the courses involved 6 month work placements with salaries. Any ford escort or viva was easy for the crims in uxbridge and slough. Only a few keys. We used to regularly have to go and find my wifes Singer Vogue until we did this. You could start it with a halfpenny. one day I got into my spitfire outside the swan and bottle span the engine and hit the hidden switch. Oil went everywhere. Little shits had stolen the oil pressure gauge and voltmeter, but hadnt been able to take the car.
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  7. You can circumvent those switches with a spanner in about 30 secs if you undo a terminal. if you put the spanner across maybe 2 secs. if you want an interrupter put it in the positive feed from the key to the starter. or get a handstart engine. Or a bollinder.
  8. You are thinking your priorities wrong. We can get at least 20 bikes under cover and out of sight. You just have to have the right boat. Our last living boat had a tandem 2 road racing bikes 2 mountain bikes and my going to work bike on board. Never put on roof. Boat far too shiny
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  12. Or 175000 for canalside flat in desirable town. with allocated parking ( address storage washing machine etc) Decent narrowboat 60000 865000 @4% = 34000 pa . Plus pensions. Screw Lunun.
  13. I can dig them out later in the year. They are 70 feet from the ashby canal.
  14. Yes. They are. We have a set of Star class butty drawings buried in our storage. Very poor quality but good enough to work out what had been changed on our boat.
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  16. its not too sharp here in Aus maybe should have handluggaged the boat Red bits where too late to leave yellow bits generally screwed. wont stop raining .
  17. Good luck I would give you a hand but while the boat is near we are trying to buy a new home 13000 miles away.
  18. Lock 10 is a known issue. Every time we go up crt staff ask us if we are overbeam. We have to explain we are the correct beam for our boat build. We have no issues. It is our nearest narrow locks. However we are only 55 ft nowadays and this makes a huge difference. Lock 10 is a banana shape. Has been for years and it gets worse the lower you go in it. Combination of slight overbeam and full length is critical. You clearly have tried before and failed hence frustrationI can see. You might get down backwards you might get down with a very full pound below you might get through on a dark winter day with a winch you might get down by holding right on the sill and then gate flushing. if when the bottom was replaced the width became greater than 7’ odd you are as you say stuffed. Old boats flex at the gunnels and this allows movement, so a quick nip flex flush grease and out ( a technique I employ on the welsh cut) just wont work for you as your open top box section at the stick point allows zero flex. However there are many mights and its not like it was 30 years ago when I spent over 24 hours stuck on that flight, before a combination of the above ( and greasing the lockside and hull side got our butty out. i In those days bw left you alone and your misfortunes were not displayed on the net. May I humbly suggest persevere with crane unless you can get evidence the boat went up those locks. Other strategies will just cause you pain. Our old butty is on the oxford summit we rebuilt her to 7 foot two from seven four. Has not moved since she went up the 12 years ago. Times and dimensions change.
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  22. Think the ‘designer’ woke up after a cheese induced nightmare and ordered his dream. Flinking blip.
  23. Canal time boats were of this type. 2 hatches each side of bow. Every working boat built meant you walked the planks to deploy off the bow. Yes you can fall off in the process.
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