Jen-in-Wellies

That is not a problem. If the cars are still the same shape afterwards is the question!

Mine isn't the same, but might offer some clues on where to look. Here is how to get at the cable connections on my boat. On the handle, there is an allen head grub screw that holds it to the splined shaft. Opposite end to the handle. Loosen it and the handle comes off. The black plastic cover can be unclipped to reveal a metal frame, held on with four bolts to the steel pedestal. Undo the bolts, then wiggle the mechanism around till you find the way to remove it through the pedestal. Alternatively, drop it down through the pedestal and get it from underneath. Jen

Here we go! A bit of google-fu gives the answer. Jen

We need to know who the haulage contractor is. People are always asking on CWDF for recommendations.

My Beta 43 engine (2007) has 33C morse cable ends. I carry a spare, but have not had one fail. I have donated my spare cable to other boaters who have had one break, in exchange for a new one, so they fit many boats. Cable routing, with no sharp bends seems to be key to a long happy cable life. Worth having a look to see how they are connected before having to change one. Particularly at the control lever end, so it will speed up swapping while stuck in a lock, or wherever. On my boat, getting the control lever out of the pedestal is the tricky bit. Jen Next trip out one is going to snap now I just know it!

That is pretty much what I do too. Fuses should be present and sized to protect every cable, so I don't think switching off the master switch when leaving the boat is necessary, although a lot of people do. If the electrics on board are so ropey that random short circuits can happen when someone is away, then perhaps that should be looked at! Jen

Correct. Depends how you want to shut down power when not onboard. Some people just throw the big switch and have things like bilge pump and charger permanently connected, bypassing the main isolator. Others, like me, turn off individual switches at the main panel for everything that isn't needed. My suggestion works in the later case, but not the former. Jen

Are there any thick, large cross section cables already running between the batteries and the inside of the boat cabin? Perhaps to a set of bus bars, for distribution to various circuits in the boat? If so, then mount the battery charger close to the bus bars, shorten the wires to the charger and connect it to the bus bars, with a fuse to protect the smaller size wires to the charger. This would save you having to install new large diameter cable, but give you the same effect and reduce the voltage drop to levels that the charger is expecting. Jen

Your location says Gr Manchester, so Boatman Stoves are local to you. Several boating neighbours have these. Nice no nonsense stoves. Welded construction as far as I can make out. 4kW, not 5. They sell some cast iron ones too. Jen

Depends on the length of the tunnel and how good the ventilation is. There is CO being produced and going up the chimney. A product of incomplete combustion, due to the limited air flow in to the stove. If you are choking on diesel fumes in summer, then it makes sense not to have the fire lit in winter. Harecastle has fans to give some air circulation. In working boat days, with inefficient, smokey diesel engines on many boats and stoves lit, they had an electric tug to pull them through. Standedge would be another obvious one, where you would probably be asked to put the fire out. Can't be bothered to check the CaRT rules, but you can see clouds of diesel smoke coming in from the adjacent train tunnel. I wouldn't bother putting the fire out for the Newbold tunnel! Jen An actual boat on fire in a long tunnel with no towpath would be a disaster and unlikely anyone would survive the flames, or hypothermia from the wade/swim out.

Anything you're not used to is hard to get in to and seems weird and problematic for the first few days. Give any change a chance. I've used various forms of linux for twenty years (yikes!) for home, after having some exposure to unix at work. Back then it was hard work to get it to do what you wanted. These days, for most things, it just works out of the box. Current OS is Xubuntu. For work, I still have to use windows and each new version needs a few days to find where things have been moved to and what has stopped working and how, or if it can be fixed. I managed to avoid windows Vista, 8 and 8.1 fortunately. Generally, the same hardware will run faster on linux. Installations and updates take minutes, rather than hours and with only a reboot needed if the kernel is upgraded. When you get problems, windows "help" never ever does! You are then down to forums and generally, the linux ones are more likely to get you out of trouble. You can actually understand what the fix is going to do, rather than just "run this black box bit of software, downloaded from god's know where and it might fix it", which tends to be the windows approach. I set up my Mum's laptop with Linux, as she only uses it for email, web browsing and a bit of word processing. I can make sure that after each upgrade, including an entire new laptop, each icon is in the exact same place and does the same thing. Much easier for her as she does not share my geek approach to life. I don't have to worry about viruses, or tech support phone scams as they mostly only target windows. Jen You are probably using Linux already. Your TV set top box, or smart TV will be running it, as will your wifi router.

The tunnel isn't lined through long stretches, just blasted through the rock. There are sticky out bits of rock below water level that might hole a GRP hull. Steel and wooden hulls only. Jen

My apologies. The cassette, or pumpout question is a bit of a running joke on the forum, along with the ecofan one and I couldn't resist. Afraid I can't help with your boat moving question, but I'm sure there is someone who can. Welcome to the forum by the way. Jen

And is the Thetford cassette, or pumpout? ?

Most engines, there are two water circuits. A small bore one, which can go to the calorifier, and a large bore one, going to the skin tank. Out from the top of the engine and returned to the water pump. The large bore, skin tank circuit has a thermostat that acts as a valve that opens at a set temperature, 60 to 85C, depending on the engine and this keeps the water coming from the top of the engine to the calorifier at around this temperature, once the engine has heated up to its normal working temperature. From cold, the thermostat is closed, so no coolant flows to the skin tank and the engine heats up quickly. There are variations in how it is done of course.

If you get a custom made cauliflower, then a third coil is easily done for a few more £. If/when you do replace the existing cauliflower, then you need to match the pressures of each of the components. Water pump shut off pressure needs to be less than the opening pressure of the PRV. PRV opening pressure should be less than, or at most equal to the max operating pressure of the cauliflower. There are recommendations for the pressures you pump up the accumulator on the cold water side and the expansion vessel on the hot water side, but I can't remember what they are! As an aside, if copper calorifiers are soldered togehter, then solder suffers from something called low cycle fatigue. If a joint is stressed, then the solder creeps to accommodate the stress over time. When the stress is reversed, then it creeps the other way. Eventually cracks in the solder form. The stresses in a calorifier heating up and cooling down and being overstressed from the high pressures from a missing expansion vessel are perfect for causing this. My first cauliflower didn't have an expansion vessel and failed at the top seam like yours. Jen

Even if the canal doesn't have a river section, it can share a valley with a river and if it is not high enough above the normal river level, a flooding river can also flood the canal. @David Mack's example of the Calder & Hebble a few years ago. The canal shares the bottom of a deep valley with the river and in places there isn't much height difference between the two. There is a wide catchment in the hills around that quickly funnels the water in to the river. Jen

I've tried zooming in on the picture and it pixelates before I can make out any manufacturer name. One thing that does strike me is that it is enclosed in a bog standard waterproof electrical junction box, with bog standard cable glands for the entry and exit cables. I'm not saying that it is, but this is the sort of construction that could be home made, or very low production run. That isn't necessarily a bad thing, but can you be sure that the person responsible for its design has taken in to account the very high currents that may have to be dissipated in a fault as @Tony Brooks describes. More likely to be properly designed if it is from a larger manufacturer. Their isolators tend to have massive metal heat sinks as part of the casing. See Victron and Safeshore. A possible reason why this one is in a weather resistant junction box is that it is for mounting outside. Safeshore do models that look similar to this for outdoor use. What is the price they are asking compared with Victron and Safeshore? It is significantly cheaper there is a reason and it may be skimping on the size and power handling of the internal diodes and their heat sinking. Jen

The story behind Letsby Avenue.

Any window can be opened. You just need the right opener.

A quick google suggests that a fully charged lead acid battery won't freeze until the temperature gets to levels that you just don't see outside Siberia, Northern Canada, or the Antarctic. -50, to -70C or so for a near fully charged battery. A flat battery can freeze in a British winter though, which is another reason to keep them charged. Jen

I've got a mixture of 3/8 and 1/2" socket drivers, with adaptors between the different sizes, including down to 1/4" for teeny tiny sockets. If I was just buying one set, then I'd probably go for 1/2" drive. which will do everything on a boat. My batteries live under the rear deck, unheated, all year round. No insulation, including some excursions to minus silly temperatures in bad winters, where the canal was frozen a foot thick. No problems. Lead acid batteries are fine like this. Insulating them will only slow down their cooling, not prevent it. Jen

Also, it may depend on having a normal house size height to work properly. Twenty, or thirty feet high, not the six or so feet in a typical boat installation. No idea if this is the case, but more details would be good. Jen

I have a Midland SwinChandlers 4.5" flue on my Squirrel stove. This is number three in twelve years of use in a live aboard boat, so around five years use per flue before the tin worm eats through them. No idea if the Morso one is better in terms of life, or draw, as I've not used one. If there is an offset between the stove outlet and the collar and you want to use a straight flue, with no welded angles, then you may need to use a 4", or smaller pipe to fit through at an angle. Jen

Maybe not!