Onewheeler

For only 20 p more you can get a 2 kW unit (scrolling down on the eBay link) 🤠

Our french boat has a wheelhouse something like that. Toggle clips hold the roof on and it was a two person lift to get it off (plus some hassle with the back door). Now, with solar panels on top, it's a four man lift. Never taken it down though, there's enough air draft everywhere in France to let us through.

On my Beta 38 the only oil filter tool I've found that works (other than banging a screwdriver through the body) is a rubber strap wrench due to the difficult access - I bought mine as an Aldi special but Ebay has lots. I've found no need for any other special tools for a routine service other than a socket set and screwdrivers for hose clips.

I like to have isolators on taps and toilet cisterns, mainly at home, it's not a problem on the UK boat. Our shared boat on the mainland has a much more complex heating and domestic water system with lots of isolators and drain valves which get used for winterising as it get's much, much colder than here. I've never tried to open our drain valve. It's also about 30 years old. I only drained the calorifier once, reasoning that it's bottom is pretty much in contact with the water about 30 cm down and unlikely to freeze. The one occasion I did drain it, I took the PRV off the top and sucked it out.

Although we're only just the other side of Stroud we seldom need to descale anything. I've never done a kettle. When we were in Wotton only 10 km away, we had to descale the kettle almost weekly.

Ta! They aren't cheap, but the extra would have been well worth it to save having to drain everything.

True... I can still piss like a donkey, but don't always know when.

I've been doing some modifications to the domestic water circuits at home and have found that most of the gate valves and "washing machine" ball valves I fitted twenty-five years ago are inoperable (won't close properly). I don't have anything quite so old on the boat, but wonder if anyone has ideas for valves which maintain their capability after long periods of not being used?

I thought that my tiller was fine like that, but my son and his mates proved otherwise. However, I find the small resulting bend in the tiller arm rather satisfactory from the point of view of standing in the rear doors and steering.

I'd have guessed that those pipes with gate valves are for bleeding the system. It looks a bit difficult to use them to top up, but then people do weird things on boats. What happens to the water when it expands?

Lower? 🙂

Found it! I hadn't realised that I'd had it done about six weeks before the due date (and the examiner didn't post date it to the due date as he should have done 😠)

Sounds like a possibility. I was sure that I'd looked it up online shortly after it was done but blowed if I can find anywhere to do it!

That's the other problem... I used a new examiner last time after my customary one retired, and I can't remember who he was! (Also, I thought it was due this year but looking at my records it's next year).

Hi all, I can't find my paperwork for my BSC. I think it's possible to find it on the interwibbly somewhere, but the boat safety scheme page seems useless. Any pointers? (I'm not a CART customer). Martin/

Not true. I've unicycled over it. Worth every billion. See profile picture.

Having a straight flue I use a boat hook or a piece of wood. The baffle plate is the important bit to keep clean. Trouble is, if it sits on the fire bricks, corrosion builds up behind them and it can be a bugger to take out (thinking boatman stove here).

Curtains take up room. Spring loaded roller blinds secured when down with a cleat hook is the way to go.

Those blue clips that hold the push-fit connector in place are very fragile. Be careful with it, and think about buying a few spares if you are going to play with the pipework much.

With a boat called Seaquest it might not be a NB.

Are they too large to break with a couple of sets of mole grips?

Nope, it would be hard to notice against the convection currents from the cold front deck given the layout of the wooden lining to the front.

It took me well over 20 years to realise that they are dummy vents. I don't see why an inspector should notice!

None of the four or five examiners who have done our BSC over the years have noticed that the brass louvres on the front bulkhead are fixed to solid sheet steel. They've passed on the basis of the size of the slots in the louvres.

Yes. Had a burst pipe in the feed to a shower (buried right in the middle of the boat where it was in a less exposed location, before I realised that the NRVs had stopped it draining) and a probable knackering of a thermostatic shower (which was dismantled, reassembled with some bits left out that I couldn't understand the location of, and continued working).