billh

1977, part of our annual boating holiday was spent on the Weaver. £6.50 ( return?)to use the Anderton lift. Went up into Winsford bottom flash, got stuck in the mud for a while, dropped anchor in the middle of a yacht race while we had tea. Next day down to Weston Point docks, the wharves were piled high with automotive scrap metal. Return to Anderton we shared two locks with one of the above mentioned ships, just enough room alongside for a wooden NB. Lock Keeper: " You go out first , you will be faster than him" Ship was going to Winnington Wharf, opposite the lift. None of your namby-pamby regulations and instructions you get today?. Last time I was there,Winnington Wharf was completely silted up and you couldn't get even a NB within 30ft of it. I just remembered ,on this trip we ran a big end thrashing the Kelvin going down the Weaver, stopped in the middle of nowhere to change the bearing, got going again after half an hour.

And before that ,at Fairfield Junction. 3 or 4 boats, no on site office or facilities except a BW water point. Must have been a struggle . When at Ashton the business was sold to Portland Bill *(Worthington) who ran it for a couple of years before selling on. A starter for ten: name the owner before Portland Bill, is he still around? *so named because he owned the Junction Mill complex at PB.?

That won't have been an original fitted to 10RB,it isn't big enough at around 18HP. The 10RB had variously, 3VRO,3VRH ,3YC and 3YDA(air cooled) all around 30-35HP.Also some petrol engine ,usually export variants or electric motor. 2VSO is very suitable for a narrowboat though.?

Somewhat further north, Ashton Moss Colliery (closed 1959) East Manchester, sent coal by rail and canal . The pit was adjacent to the LNWR Guide Bridge Junction Railway and had extensive sidings , access to the main line was controlled from Ashton Moss Colliery Sidings Signal Box. There was a standard gauge line from the colliery to the Ashton Canal which crossed the LNWR line on what was actually Slate Lane road bridge, the rails in the stone setts on the bridge and then on part of Hanover St North, adjacent to the street canal bridge was a timber trestle bridge, from where coal was dropped into a hopper device at the side of the canal ready to load the colliery's own wooden boats. The distance from the pit yard to the loading point was about 100yards and was last used c1933. Much of the colliery site is now under the M60 motorway and Snipe retail park- the B&M store there is built over one of the pit shafts (depth before filling was over 3000ft!) . Some of the loading point brickwork is still visible from the canal. An old map of the area is here: https://maps.nls.uk/view/126522962

I am quite sure that the late Dr C.T.G. Boucher, an acknowledged expert on the design and history of canal lock structures will have written chapter & verse on the features of Marple Locks. ? Cross country running at Marple Hall? Bin there done that,about 1963. Part of the course involved jumping into a freezing babbling brook in February IIRC. There was a reward at the end of the race: The young ladies from the Domestic Science class had made cakes for us runners. I was not an inmate at MH.

The scene is set about 50years ago, when things got done and nobody died ( probably by good luck than good management). Those Ace barrow hoists were scary weapons in the wrong hands? I'm not advocating a return to those days, but a lock clearance then with volunteers could be achieved for less than £100. Now, it costs C&RT, five figures to do similar even with some volunteer input.

I expect large pumps were in use to de-water the lock. This would cause a flow through the dam where it hadn't sealed properly, notably round the sides against the washwalls and in the opposite direction to normal flow in the canal. The washwalls could be undermined right next to the bridge and this may be the result. In my opinion these plastic and steel temporary dams are a poor and expensive substitute for traditional stop planks for which provision there will almost certainly be grooves at the head and tail of the lock. I am no engineer, but have experience of de-watering lock chambers going back half a century.

In theory,your sin will be "stealing by finding". Unless , of course, you own the waste tip. Even then, you may need a license to "mine" coal. I'm now guilty of creating a problem that probably doesn't exist.? Part of our moorings is a colliery waste tip, some coal is still to be had, 60 years after the pit closed and 80 years after our tip was created.

No idea of the location but the horse driver is in a dangerous position between animal and canal.It Might be for photographic posing reasons but he should be the other side of the towline and swingletree. Where he is , if the horse deviates sideways , as they do when e.g. starting away from a lock , the driver gets knocked into the water .

Can we attach any significance to the red waste skip next to what I think is the tug Aleida, an interesting boat with what i imagine is now a rare air start Widdop twin diesel?

That's the one! The only time I have seen a working Amphicar was at the Floating Bridge (Higher Ferry). Yes, would have been about 1964. I didn't imagine it then.

Moored less than a mile from where the engine was built and very likely the only operational National engine of any type resident in Ashton Under Lyne.(part of Tameside Metropolitan Borough since 1974)

We recovered several of those poles from the canal at Guide Bridge, Brookside sidings. it would be when BR gave up loose coupled wagons in 19mumblemumble. they acquired a definite curve of the pole after years of use, levering the coupling on or off using one of the buffers as a fulcrum.They also got damaged levering the "hand" brakes on the wagon sides. The curly ends have since got new poles and now used as an excellent prop cleaner. Talking of recovery of transport things from the canal, late 1960's also at Guide Bridge, a long bamboo shaft with hook that used to be for replacing errant trolley bus trolleys at the 219x turn round place on the canal bridge. The overhead "points" were worked with a hand pull on the traction pole by the bus conductor. Sometimes went to school on the trolleybus in bad weather, fare was 1d. Then there were the brand new production Deltics on delivery to Doncaster from Newton le Willows 1961, D9007 and later D9009, absolutely fantastic at the time .(the Deltics were passing through,not in the canal!) More recently, like 35 years ago, passing the sidings on the boat and a Sulzer Type 2 came off the road with a heck of a crash, all wheels on the floor.

Some sprinkler systems don't use pumps for the actual fire, a pre- pressurized water tank ,fed by air compressor is installed. When a sprinkler head is activated in the fire area the tank water is discharged by virtue of the tank pressure. I wonder if you could use the normal boat water tank for this? You would need to keep plenty of water in the tank and maybe a reducing valve for the domestic supply?

I heard a rather strange tale , third hand , about permanent mooring in Castlefield. Some boats there do not have Bridgewater licenses,though they may have CRT license,BSS,Insurance. Consequently, they are fined £40 per week by B.C.C. The moorers consider this good value for money for a central Manchester spot. Bridgewater make more money that way than from an annual license , so no pressure to do anything about it. Can anyone confirm the facts about this , it seems unlikely to me?

If you need one of those on a boat, you're in big trouble, it's either sinking or burning.However, it will easily pressurize the domestic plumbing , 50psi and around 500gallons a minute. fuel consumption might be a problem? Mention of Godwin pumps, we have a fire fighting pump by them fitted with a Lister SR1 that runs flat out , a bit scary for what is usually an old plodder engine.

Be very careful near the limit of navigation on the Irwell,just past Victoria Station. The river bed becomes shallow with rocks and debris. Also, the level can drop very suddenly if the automatic sluices open at Mode Wheel,usually at times of heavy rain (like the last few months!) . I have seen the river drop by a couple of feet in a matter of minutes. If you happen to be at the top end and notice a sudden increase in flow, get out quick as you can and head down stream, otherwise you could be stuck mid river for some time.

There were a lot of these used on the Ship Canal as standby power for the hydraulic systems at locks and bridges. I don't know if some are still in place. Contact MSC or Peel or whatever to see if they still have spares? I may have some documentation somewhere for this model of engine, obtained years ago from a retired Petter's engineer .There was some connection with Fowler's at Leeds as well, the latter's diesel shunters often had McLaren engines. The radiator on your engine is a bought in item from Reliance(or Serck?) , its design being very similar to that fitted to Ruston engines of similar age and size.This may be an indication that engine parts were manufactured other than by McClaren and slightly more obtainable.

My mate Bob has a rather good OO scale model railway that features ,amongst other things,a narrow lock on a derelict canal with a PFCS (you remember that organisation?) working party active in and around the lock- features an Ace barrow hoist, a series 2 LWB Land Rover, a wheelbarrow or two, some scale mud and assorted debris. I think it is all scratch built though.

Both horses appear to be fitted with solar panels and the vessel looks like one of those whale harpoon boats used in South Georgia.

That's OK if you have a grand or two to spend on your IT provision. Me, I like to upcycle old kit at minimum cost,more as a challenge than financial reasons . My free 2006 Dell does very well with Ubuntu 18. For example, I plugged an old scanner/printer into it last week, instantly recognised it, got hold of the drivers without prompting and was ready to use in a few seconds. This post is coming from my 12year old iMac, it's been great until a week or two ago when support for the OS was ended by Apple and it can't be upgraded any more. Safari has started to go a bit flaky, so switched to Firefox browser but it's the start of the end for the Mac, unless I install Linux instead of OSX. I visited the Apple shop last week, I will not be spending four figure sums there when there are free and quite adequate Linux options available.? As for Microsoft, I have thankfully managed without it except for XP on an old laptop that runs the diagnostics and things for my Rover 75.

Joel on the Hollinwood Branch of the Ashton Canal, date I think 1933. The last boat to come through to here from the main line. This canal suffered badly from mining subsidence, to the extent that it was found necessary to have a pile of ballast kept at Cinderland bridge (near this photo) to be loaded into empty boats to get them through the bridgehole.Apart from maintenence duties Joel was used to deliver coal to the lock keeper at Waterhouses(Daisy Nook) and elsewhere on the LNER canals.The pumping engine at Waterhouses was stopped permanently about this time and the canal became derelict soon after.