Pluto

A friend in Germany operated a 1300 tonne boat with just his wife for crew - they are retired now, so no more trips up the Main or down the Danube for me :-(. He told me that he would not have a bow thruster, just as he didn't have radar or depth sounder. If you can't get by without them, you're in major trouble when they go wrong, and coming down the Rhine gorge at night when something goes wrong is not for the inexperienced. Interestingly, his boat, a 9 metre wide 1930s dumb boat with the stern cut off and his old 8.5 metre motor boat stern welded on, handled very much like a narrow boat, though with a slightly higher potential for causing damage.

The Leeds & Liverpool Canal Society are in the process of taking over the heritage boat Kennet, built in 1947 for Canal Transport Ltd., from BW At the moment she is at Greenberfield, above the locks, and we are opening for visitors on Saturday afternoon from 2 till 4. We are also having a walk/drive on Sunday, meeting at Altham Barn Bridge at 2 for a visit to an old colliery site where local enthusiasts are excavating the water wheel which powered the colliery. The colliery is one of several near the (Lancashire) River Calder which were connected to the canal by tramroads.

FMC did try to get some traffic up to Blackburn on the Leeds & Liverpool at one stage, and they contacted the L&LC about hiring wide boats. Perhaps they hired boats around Leicester, or had them built to a local design and then sold them off very quickly.

You're right; my brain to finger co-ordination seems to be going. One of the maps I have suggests that the branch canal on the opposite side of the aqueduct was also part of the Ashton, though the map is one produced in 1889 when the canals were under railway control and the boundaries had become relatively unimportant.

The Ashton/PF junction is not at Portland Basin, but on the far side of the aqueduct opposite the basin, and my copy of the LNWR survey of the Huddersfield suggests the junction is at Whitewalls Bridge, by the first lock.

If you want something traditional, but different, you could have a look at my new book on Brightwork, traditional boat paintwork on Leeds & Liverpool Canal boats. Although scrolls and geometric patterns formed a major part of the tradition, decoration also included scenes which could be of almost anything. At the yard my co-author worked at in Blackburn, they had a selection of Christmas cards and postcards for boat owners to choose ideas from. The book is available from http://www.canaljunction.com/narrowboat/brightwork.htm

That's because of their terminology, they have racks and not paddles.

It's about the recruiting boats used by the navy in the 1970s. I did write an article on Wartime Waterways for Vol 5 of Waterways Journal, still available from the Boat Museum Society. It is a little L&LC biased, but I can't see anything wrong with that, and it does cover other canals as well!

Certainly agree with the first. On the second I always call them 'notbarges', as I had one friend who, on someone using the term barge, would always say its a narrow boat, not barge.

The Lancaster Canal has the air hole system designed by Jessop on used on many of the canals he, or those trained by him, built. The ground paddle by the upper gates has an overflow weir built in to the side wall above the top gate, excess water flowing over this, through the paddle tunnel, and thus into the lock chamber, ensuring that it would fill automatically. The level of the weir was just below that of the top of the upper gates. Such locks originally did not have the more normal bywash. The top of the lower gates were built such that they were about one inch higher than the top of the upper gates so that when the chamber was full, excess water ran over the top of the lower gates. However, as the upper gates were covered, there was no pressure differential to make them difficult to open. The system can be seen on several canals today - including the Lancaster, Johnsons Hillock Locks (L&LC though built by the Lancaster), Peak Forest, Royal Canal (Ireland), and the eastern end of the Rochdale. The western end of the Rochdale has the more conventional system, possibly because by the time they built them they had found problems with leakage through the chamber walls, though the flow of water through the lock rather than over a bywash must also have made the locks slower to operate.

What you need is Barcrfoft's semi immersed propellor, as used on the weed-infested Ulster Canal in the 1890s. Two four feet diameter propellors, half immersed in the canal from a frame fixed over the boat's stern. It was not quite so successful when tried on the L&LC, particularly around the turns near Gargrave, with the boat trying to wind itself out of the canal.

It could depend upon the original Act, which could contain a time limiting clause. The Douglas Navigation Act certainly had one, the permissions granted by the Act disappearing after ten years, IIRC, if construction was not completed. In this case, there was a second application to extend the time limit by ten years, and construction was rushed through to complete the navigation in 1741, twenty years after the initial Act.

If you think internal combustion engines are the future, you are sadly mistaken. It is impossible to get an efficiency of combustion inside a cylinder head where fuel is being ignited several thousand times a minute to compare with a steady-state external heat source. It is just that most engine builders have too much money invested in out-of-date technology for them to consider changing from internal to external combustion - and with the latter, electronics would be much less important than for internal combustion.

My old boat, a wooden L&LC motor boat, was a dream to steer and rarely made any wash, even at 4mph. That's what you get when the underwater run aft is as it should be, smooth and naturally-shaped. The strake next to the keel was 10 in by 2 in and twisted virtually through 90 degrees over about fifteen feet to create the run. A narrow boat, with its flat bottom, cannot have such a good design and will never steer as well as a wooden wide boat for this reason. The way they steer is also different, probably because narrow boats are square chined and L&LC boats are round chined. On an L&LC boat, you put the bow where you want to go - wind permitting - whilst narrow boats tend to pivot part way down the hull so the bow has to go further into the bend.

Doug Moore originally built boats on the old slip at Riley Green. The yard had been used by the Crook family for many years as a boat building and timber yard. It was an historic place, where all the buildings were built with knees, just like a wooden boat. In fact, some had been repaired using the remains of old boats. The toilet was the cabin off a motor boat raised up, with wooden walls to p against. Doug lived on the former Canal Transport Ltd boat Weaver, and moved to Barnoldswick when the Riley Green yard was pulled down and a pub built on the site. Doug continued to build boats at Barnoldswick for another ten of fifteen years before retiring. His boats had a reputation for good strength and detailing, though you paid for quality - as you should.

MBA? Oh I know, Master of B****r All.

Looking at the new pics, the bow is perhaps a little full for a Lancaster boat, and stem post should be more vertical. The toe rails around the bow are unusual for a north west canal boat, and Lancaster boats had wooden decks. AFAIK, the only iron/steel boats on the Rochdale were steamers with rounded sterns; Bridgewater carrying boats were always wood until the Kellog's boats were built, as were those on the MB&BC. The L&LC did have some iron horse boats, but I have never seen a photo of one and they seem not to have lasted that long. Square transoms in the NW also tend to continue down to the keel, whilst this one seems to finish above that level, something which suggests a southern English origin. However, it is difficult to be definite over the boat's origin as there has been so little research into early iron/steel wide canal boats. Prior to the development of iron/steel boat building in Northwich, most NW iron/steel canal boats were built in Liverpool or on the Ribble. Some research has been done into the yards, but mainly related to the sea-going ships they built.

It looks very much like a Lancaster Canal boat. If so, it is almost unique, the only other surviving one having, by all reports, had some very poor hull restoration. Almost all Lancaster boats were horse drawn, were made of iron, and often had a raised cabin on the stern deck, the tiller passing over the cabin and the boat steered from the space between the cabin and hold.

I also thought the Leigh branch boring the first time I travelled along it, when there was still coal mining going on along its banks. Today, knowing more about the industrial heritage of the area, it has become more interesting. Just try working out the effects of subsidence as in some places the surrounding land has gone down over thirty feet. Former canal basins can now be seen at the bottom of high embankments carrying the canal.

It was built by Roger Lorenz about 15 years ago for Alan Holden, a former L&LC boatman, so he could access all the canal system. It has, I think, a single cylinder Lister, and with that he has been up and down most of the tidal and river sections on the system. Who needs a large engine if they know what they are doing. I have been surprised that no one else has built a similar 'traditional-style' boat as it has several benefits for a small boat over a narrow boat shape. You can use the whole length of the boat, as it has a small cabin in the bow under the deck, and without a counter, not only is the engine well back, but no weed hatch is needed as it is easy to get to the prop from the top of the rudder - as with all L&LC boats. The underwater shape is excellent, allowing plenty of water to prop and rudder, making it easy to steer and creating little wash.

We, the L&LC Society, had Kennet on show with recently improved displays, and we had over 1000 visitors over the weekend. I was able to 'launch' my new book on the traditional boat painting on the L&LC, with copies available via the canaljunction pages as well as elsewhere. Some members are bringing Kennet back to Greenberfield today, and as I look out the window there is some nice rain to refill the reservoirs, which I am sure they're happy to be boating in. The society is in the process of leasing Kennet from BW and are looking for sponsors and volunteers to help with restoration of both the boat and the displays inside. Kennet will hopefully be open to the public on the following days and locations: June 13 Greenberfield June 21 Salterforth Festival July 11 Greenberfield Aug 8 Greenberfield Sept 12 Reedley Marina, Pendle Waterway Festival/Heritage Open Day

When they were in the process of selling off Greenberfield lock cottage I had a lengthy correspondence with Robin Evans, pointing out the not only did such sales destroy much of the heritage value of the canal, but also restricted future developments, such as more community involvement. Lock cottages, IF surplus (personally I think lock keepers should live next to their locks), they would make good visitor centres, etc. Having sold off so much of the traditional canal infrastructure, they now want to create something akin to the National Trust. I will support such a change, but it is a pity that they were unable to see further than making a few bob from property sales over the last few years. I do put the problem down to government intervention. They required BW to be more self-sufficient without specific instruction as to what their actual targets should be with regard to things such as heritage - but that's government for you, a load of tick-boxers hiding behind their employees. rant off Anyone going to the Skipton Waterways Festival? I'm launching my new book on traditional L&LC boat painting on Saturday at 2-30 on Kennet, next to Coach Street Bridge. The L&LC Society is taking Kennet to Skipton and we are in the process of negotiating a heritage boat lease from BW. Perhaps, with their new direction, they will be more supportive of such schemes, for example giving free license and mooring to heritage boats leased out from their fleet. In fact, their heritage boats would be a good starting point for the sort of community involvement they seem to be suggesting.

The remains of a Roman inland waterway boat were uncovered at Alphen, on the lower Rhine, and several harbours and other navigation works have been found in the area. As with other waterways, those on the European mainland are somewhat larger than those here. I have put a pic taken from a book at http://www.mikeclarke.myzen.co.uk/images.html

One of the best books on the subject is working Boats of Britain by Eric McKee, published in 1983. There are also the drawings by Mr Oke, done in the 1930s and kept at the National Maritime Museum. However, my favourite book is From Tree to Sea by Ted Frost, describing the construction of a steam drifter. Having just finished a book on Brightwork, the traditional decoration on L&LC boats, I am now starting to put together a book on the construction of wooden L&LC boats, again working with Sam Yates who served his time at Whitebirk boat yard. We wrote an article about the yard for Aspects of Blackburn a few years ago, and will be extending the coverage to look in detail at the construction of short boats.

The wharf was almost certainly for manure. Night soil and street sweepings were an important traffic between Liverpool and the farms of West Lancashire, with 150,000 tons being carried annually in the late nineteenth century. Boats used in the trade had double bulkheads to make the cabins less smelly, though boatmen I have talked to said that following such a boat was not the most pleasant occupation. The last manure boats operated around 1950 from Bootle. Gorsey Lane had a second wharf, on the offside of the canal. This was built in the second world war so that boats did not have to make the difficult journey into Liverpool, down the locks and into the docks during the blitz. Instead, goods from the docks were carried by road to Gorsey Lane for onward delivery by canal.