Keeping Up

I'll add my comment, having seen the doors last month, they are really splendid!

We use "Bioforce Marine" from GOC Technologies. It's not on their website because they didn't get enough demand from the boating market and they stopped producing it as a stock item; however they can make it up for you on request, a 1 litre bottle which is enough for 50 treatments cost £30 inc VAT and postage earlier this year (contact David Moyce - dmoyce"at"goctechnologies.co.uk) It's a brilliant product which they were originally trying to sell to the hire-fleet market rather than on general retail, but the fleets didn't like it because if ever someone put Elsan in the tank (eg a hirer needing a pumpout part-way through their holiday) then it needed 2 or 3 flushes of clean water through the tank otherwise the Elsan residue would kill the nice biological thingies. Edited to add - make sure you ge tthe girlfriend a nice strong pair of gloves. If they should tear, there's the danger that they could block the pumpout pipe

We use a bacteriological fluid that is based on a septic-tank treatment and only once in 18 years have we suffered from a build-up of solids in the bottom of the tank: that was when a friend had borrowed the boat and put something down the toilet that shouldn't have been there. The aforementioned rubber product managed to nearly block the pumpout pipe (aren't they strong?) and acted as a filter so that we were only pumping out the liquids, and when we left the boat over winter it set solid. The only cure involved the inspection hatch on the top of the tank and a long poker (oh, and a good pair of rubber gloves)

We use a small spin dryer. They don't take a lot of power from the battery and if you can leave them for a long time they get the clothes dry enough to finish off in the airing cupboard (or hung over the bath). It's good that the moisture comes out as water rather than vapour so doesn't add to the condensation problems inside the boat.

A friend of mine, very experienced indeed, was sailing his catamaran off the south coast when the fore-hatch came off. Because there was a slight risk of seas filling the boat through the opening he notified the coastguard by VHF radio. The RNLI, who were his good friends (he'd just complated a round-Britain sailing trip photgraphing the lifeboat stations for their calendar) decided to come out and accompany him "just in case". The air-sea rescue people were looking for an excuse for an exercise and heard their radio transmissions and decided it would be good practice to send a helicopter too. Then the Navy who were exercising nearby thought they would join in, just for practice, and diverted a couple of ships there. Not to be outdone, the US Navy had a couple of ships there too so they joined the party as the whole flotialla headed landwards. My mate said it was the most embarrasing entry to port that he'd ever made - and all because of a broken hinge on a hatch cover!

You'll get so much condensation ....

That is correct. When I used to do type-approvals on imported electrical datacomms equipment we used to insist on there being separate studs, which often meant a modification by the importer, otherwise the equipment was not allowed to connect to the BT lines.

A couple of years ago we arrived at the one above Somerton, to find a problem. It was up and open for navigation but not chained in place. Just before we reached it the wind blew it half-way down and, as I engaged full reverse and blew clouds of smoke out of the exhaust it rocked back up again. As we watched, over and over again it would blow half-way down and then retreat back up again. It would have ben too risky to try and get under it, and there was no easy way of getting anyone off the offside, but you couldn't get toit from the towpath side. We had to wait until it came half-way down and catch it with the boathook, then pull it down so that Pingu could get across and hold it open it properly (no problem there) while I came through. There was nothing to attach the chain to, and so there was no way to hold it up or down. Pingu could esily walk back to the towpath and step off, leaving it to go back up again, but it would be a danger to the next boat that came along. We phoned BW, and reported it as an emergency and a safety hazard, there wan't much more we could do really

There's a difference though. The BSS tester will have first emptied the high-pressure pigtails of any gas they contain. They can hold a surpring amount of gas (especially as we have an additional 2 metres of fixed copper pipework in the high-pressure system as a means of reaching our second bottle which is on the other side of the boat). I don't want to waste this gas to do the test, I just turn off the cylinders, so I leave it the long extra time to allow any leak the chance to empty them for me. I found that my sytem empties the pipes in about 3 days. I had the system checked and it passed the BSS test easily (no discernable leak whatsoever on their digital tester) so I am happy. If it passes the 12-hour test (performed at night so I don't miss out on teamaking time) then I'm content.

Just try looking at it from the cat's point of view. He's thinking "Yuk, look what he's just done in my drinking water"

Like this perhaps? The large guy in white had been holding the bridge for his hireboat. He had passed the chain to our son David so he could re-join his own boat, but David wasn't heavy enough. Here is the hirer rescuing him again (taken on the Prees Branch in 1989)

He did our signwriting and back doors a few years ago, as well as a (non-canal) rose on the side doors. Beautiful they were too.

A few years ago my CH boiler stopped working, and it turned out to be a collection of oily fluid at the lowest level of the low pressure pipework. I cleaned it out and all was OK, it's been OK since. I also use my auto change-over valve as a regular weekly check, by turning off everything and the two bottles and waiting to see if the arrow has turned to red within 12 hours. It's not a precise test but would let me know if any significant leak occurred.

Just in case you don't know, and it doesn't look as if anyone else has covered it in this thread, the arrow on the auto changeover valve shows red when the bottle that it is pointing to has no pressure, it shows white when the bottle still has pressure. The usual way of using it, is that you start with two full bottles both turned on; whichever way you turn the valve it shows white. When it turns red you have an empty cylinder but the valve automatically starts to take its supply from the other cylinder. At the first opportunity you need to change the empty one. You wait until you have the chance to change it, then you turn off the empty cylinder and rotate the switch which should then show a white arrow. It is then safe to disconnect the pigtail from the gas bottle (anti-clockwise thread as someone above mentioned); there should be non-return valves both in the changeover valve and in the pigtail (once any bodges have been sorted out) so you can leave the unused one dangling until you connect the new full cylinder. Tighten it up and turn it on, then listen to make sure there's no obvious leak. Do not touch the auto changeover valve, which stays white until your second bottle becomes empty and you repeat the process with that one instead. HTH