nb Innisfree

I designed my own wheel steering on Innisfree (60' nb) direct mechanical linkage, 2.5 ish turns lock to lock, in practice afloat it was spot on. Only thing I changed was to fit a knob to the wheel, positioned at 12 o'clock when straight ahead + drilling another hole in the rudder plate to give a different radius and alter the wheel loading. Placed the steerer out of the way and gave more room for passengers, great in rain or hot sun as the steerer could stay under the pram hood. ETA: Just remembered, I eventually ditched the wheel and replaced it with a simple crank and knob knocked up from a piece of ply decking, even better.

Innisfree (60' narrowboat) 1st engine was 33bhp, enough for rivers but if batteries were in bulk charge the 100amp 24v alternator took enough power to bring max rpm (theoretical 2k rpm) down to about 1750rpm from 1950rpm. 2nd engine was 40 bhp @ 3k rpm (reworked prop) and had a few bhp spare at full alt output so was ok, we only ever used max rpm for emergency stops (narrow bridges & oncoming boats!)

Daughter's got a chocolate lab, 8yrs old now, very intelligent when it suits her, very thick when it doesn't! She's gorgeous, there will be lots of tears when she's gone.

Bought our first one in '84/'85 after attending a grim fire scene, very unusual to have one in a house then & not seen for sale to general public. When they became cheaper some time later and I decided to fit one in each bedroom (TV in each) my colleagues thought that was over the top, and that was from firefighters, funny how attitudes are fixed by convention.

Hats off to whoever thought of them in the first place

https://youtube.com/shorts/rqMZu_bRndY?si=aAGexb_AA6AT1gjA

We had a folding ladder thing as a boarding plank, 3m long, with chequer plate, pinned to boat & shore, moored where we fancied.

Yes ok whatever, I'm getting too long in the tooth to listen to you splitting hairs and commenting on something you seem to know nothing about.