nicknorman

LFP = Lithium Ferro-Phosphate - the particular lithium battery chemistry suited to boats (there are lots of other lithium battery chemistries) also written as LiFePO4 LA = Lead Acid, ie conventional batteries Li = Lithium BMS = BatteryManagement System. Often built into Li batteries but anyway a necessity to protect the Li cells from over-charge, over-discharge or over or under temperature. Lithium batteries are great because they can be charged at a high rate right up until they are virtually full, can be discharged to nearly empty without any degradation, and can be left in a partial state of charge for long periods without any degradation. Of course ultimately they don’t “make” electricity, you still have to put back the electricity you take out, but they are a much easier and more efficient way of storing electricity compared to LA. But at a cost and some complexity, because they have different charging requirement from LA, and so putting Lithium batteries in a system designed to charge LA can be problematic. The charging apparatus has to be modified or adapted for Li.

Is the new system up and running satisfactorily yet?

I suppose on the plus side, it does teach people that you can’t believe anything you see on the internet. Better to be fooled by this and learn from it, than to be fooled by something more serious.

A lovely photo of the engine. Just a pity there is a great big leg obscuring the bit in question ie the gearbox! However it does say “ATF” which suggests a mechanical box

What a tragedy. I am so sorry to hear that. I never met him but he came across as a thoroughly decent bloke.

...edited due to being wrong!

I guess it will depend on exactly which product was used. In our case it was Sigmacover 300 coal tar epoxy, done in 2011. It is great stuff but unfortunately, like all great stuff, someone in EU said it was too toxic and so it was taken off the market. We took it out again in 2016 but really needn't have bothered, once the slime was jetwashed off you couldn't see the waterline. Anyway as per the instructions we abraded it with an orbital sander and overcoated with the last remaining stocks of Sigmacover 300 I could find. That lasted quite well and again we took it out in 2023 - again not really any rust apart from rubbing strakes but we had to put on SML Ballastic blacking 2-pac. Which I don't think was as good. It has been OK though. Next time I think we will be better off with a shot blast, but we have done 3 overcoats and 14 years since the original shotblasting and I don't think it will need doing again until around 2029 so we will have been 18 years between shot blastings. So to get around to answering your question, probably doesn't need shot blasting, just follow the instructions of the original and new (if different) coating manufacturer. And I would put on 2 pac again, the cost difference is not that much, it is mostly about the preparation (ie the cost of man-hours). But if you are having it done by someone else, make sure they follow the correct procedure and don't just slap it on after a quick jet-wash.

The clincher is that the guys don't flinch when a great big wave crashes down on them!

Surecal marine calorifiers (which are a common narrowboat brand) are copper. I think most are. Stainless tends to be reserved for domestic mains-pressure (unvented) hot water cylinders. Anyway assuming the OP’s is copper, I’ll just mention my experience of having a leak in the immersion heater boss. I removed the IH and replaced the gasket (which is quite a hard fibre thing) but it still leaked. One doesn’t want to put too much tightening force due to the possibility of twisting the cylinder skin (although this can be helped by doing it with the cylinder full of water). But it still leaked. Then I read/discovered that it’s a good idea to put some PTFE tape on the threads. Not because that makes a seal on the threads, but because it lubricates the threads. Sure enough I could easily turn the heater another 1/4 turn which stopped the leak.

All we can really see is some sort of deposit on the blue foam insulation and the red plastic cover over the immersion. Not sure where that has come from but perhaps it’s a long term slight leak? Anyway you should take the red plastic cover off the immersion - it’s just held on with that one nut - and see what the actual element etc is like underneath. And try to work out what all that white deposit is!

I think the label says it was manufactured in 1992, so 34 years later it is probably overdue for replacement even if you manage to get it working a bit better with some fiddling. It must surely be on its last legs! And I would also say that 16psi (just over 1 bar) is a rather low design pressure for the pump. The purpose of an accumulator is to stop the pump rapidly cycling on and off when a tap is partially opened. So you only need to service/replace or fit an accumulator if that annoyance presents itself.

Trouble is it’s not broken paddles that are the problem, it’s short pounds, leaky locks (in some cases causing voids behind lock walls), leaky canal bed, rocks and other debris in the canal bed, and reservoirs sold off for profit. Oh and I forgot the bloody noisy ducks and geese that kept us awake at Uppermills. Apart from all that it’s quite nice! But don’t let the idiots drive your boat through the tunnel, they’ll scrape it.

Only if he has a protected characteristic. Which now I come to think of it...

I imagine it’s a deliberate design feature to make the transfer relay fail open (ie open when unpowered) otherwise there could be a nasty clash between inverter and mains if it failed closed😱

It looks like the allowable input voltage is adjustable. The minimum "maximum voltage" is 230v so perhaps someone has fiddled with the settings. Worth checking anyway once the OP has the laptop to hand. Have you ever actually had one in use for any length of time? The cleverness is mostly useful. Our one has been in service for 12 years and never put a foot wrong (yes I know it will now proceed to blow up!). The people who fairly regularly try to influence other people on here against Combis, have usually never actually had one.

I think you will be struggling with that. You might get in touch with Sellweb, based in Tamworth, who do repair that kind of thing. https://sellweb.co.uk/services/leisure-inverter-repair/

So presumably this is a combi inverter charger? What happens if you disconnect the shore power and switch to inverter power, does it work? I am thinking along the lines of the transfer relay having failed - the thing that either passes through incoming shore power to the output and the charger circuitry, or isolates the input when there is no shore power connected. It's something I have heard of happening before and I think it would work in inverter only mode if that were the case.

It is abnormal for electronics to smell of smoke/burning when under no load, because it means something has got very hot, which shouldn't. I would open the inverter case and see if the smell lingers in there and if so, identify what has burnt. Assuming the smell does come from it, if the inverter is brand new you should consider sending it back under warranty because it doesn't bode well for a long, reliable life!

Charging a lead acid battery from a LiFePO4 battery via (more or less) direct connection is never going to work properly. A Li battery when being charged will sit at around mid 13s voltage most of the time, only spending a very short amount of time above say 13.8v. This will not charge a lead acid battery properly. And this of course is why you are seeing only 13.7v at the VSR. You should charge the BT from another lead acid battery ie the starter battery. Although of course first, you will need to replace the BT battery as it will be knackered having sat at 2 or 3 volts for a while.

Ah new information! So if it is a new engine it’s unlikely to be eg corrosion on the multiway plug. The glow plug light wiring is pretty simple, a positive on one side of the bulb, other side going down to the heater relay thingy. It can only be either a partial wiring short in the loom (unlikely) or an internal fault with the glow plug relay. Which also seems fairly unlikely! But either way I can’t see how it could be related to the engine cutting out. Can you give more details about the nature of the engine cutting out? Under load just cruising along? at idle? when selecting idle? or what? Does it stop dead or struggle a bit and then stop? Any smoke at the moment it stops? How long has this problem been going on? Since new, just recently etc? I am thinking new engine = debris left over from the installation in the fuel supply. That is just a guess though But the main point is that as said, a new engine is covered by manufacturer’s warranty. Either the manufacturer or the installed needs to come out to fault find. The diagram on the case (the square wave pulse) suggests a timer function as you say. So it’s more than just a relay.

It’s a little confusing but I think bottom mid-right “glow relay” is misnamed. It and the 1 second timer relay bottom left all seems to be part of the stop solenoid, the clue being in the 2 stop solenoid connections “pull” and “hold”. IMO when the starter is activated the “glow relay” puts voltage on the “pull” part of the start solenoid, which will be a low resistance high current high power winding to move the solenoid into the run position. After a second, the timer operates to disconnect this high current “pull” and just leave the lower current “hold” winding operating. All this to avoid excessive power drain and overheating of the solenoid. The actual glow plug relay (near the top) is unrelated to all that stuff.

That diagram is just the engine side of things. There will also be a wiring diagram for the panel. The grey wire is obviously important as you say. Worth bearing in mind that power for it is routed via the panel and ignition switch. So the flow of power is from the battery via starter solenoid, via F2, via the brown wire, via the multi-way connector, up to the ignition switch on the panel, back down via the multi-way connector, via the grey wire to the stop solenoid etc. So there is plenty of scope for bad connections! The multi-way connector is renown for being problematic due to corrosion etc, so that is perhaps the best place to start. Unplug it and check the contacts for corrosion. Also check the fuse F2 as sometimes they can corrode too. As for the glow plug light, it’s difficult to suggest a cause as the panel wiring diagram, which includes the light, is not shown.

OK fair enough. It’s just that eg your first paragraph that I’ve quoted above seems to imply something abnormal - else why would you have written it. But of course if the generator has stopped for any reason, the inline RCD will trip because it has become unpowered.

There are some in line RCD devices that need power to stay on. You say “non-latching in-line RCD” which implies it’s not one of those, but I struggle to see how an RCD can trip when there is no current flowing through it. You do mention starting the genny and then setting the RCD. Can you set the RCD to on and THEN start the genny? If not I suggest that the inline RCD needs power to remain set to on. In which case not surprising that it trips off again when power is removed (generator turned off).

I would suggest waiting until the tank is empty before cutting into the pipe.