marmaduke

Ah brilliant, thank you all for the advice. What would the gasket look like and where can I locate it? Would it be something visible to the eye?

I should also say, the steam (when running) all tends to come from one of two tubes that empty into some jars. I guess these are overflow from oil and water? Why would it be steaming from one of them?

Sorry, should have said, it's a BMC 1.5

Hi all, I was moving the boat this afternoon and the engine cut out following a lot of steam emanating from the bilge. It stopped as if it had run out of fuel and wouldn't start again for about 20 minutes. There's plenty of diesel so I don't think it's a fuel problem. She's running (stationary) fine now but I think she might have overheated. I hadn't been cruising long, maybe 1km. Any ideas what might have caused this and what I should check for? Cheers, M

Great, thanks Steve, I'll do as you suggest. M

Hi all, I'm about to change a faulty water pump and am looking at my current setup wondering if all of it is needed. See the picture below. I've been looking at trusted diagrams, and they all seem to say strainer > pump > accumulator > heater. I seem have some strange grey box attached between the pump and accumulator which has the electrical connections going through it. I'm guessing it is some kind of sensor for water pressure? The pump in use is not the original one. The original pump did not have a pressure switch, so perhaps this had something to do with it? I don't recall it doing anything noticeable though, before I changed it for the pressure switch water pump (that I am about to replace). Can I take it out do you think? I'm also wondering if I should change the accumulator for a new one, as this is from 1979. Any recommendations on what to get? The new pump will be a shurflo 30psi pressure switch pump. Any comments are greatly received. M

By the way, I cut a hole in the floorboards and removed the ballast...there was some more I could take out after all. She is now listing no more! Hurrah. Thanks all for the advice

It is probably 34 years old, so maybe it is worth getting a new one. Thanks all for the confirmation. M

It's the horn that gives off smoke

The horn of my narrowboat has stopped working. When keeping the horn switch engaged, it seems to give off smoke like it's overheating. Any ideas what it could be? The connections all seem sound to me and I can't see anything particularly suspect. Though I've not dissected a boat horn before, so what do I know. Here's a pic of it. Any ideas?

Thank you all for a thorough run through of the solutions. I'm pulling up the floor as I type...

Gas locker vents are still high above the water, as are the drain holes. Looks like I'll be taking up the floor then...

Unless I filled them with helium... Damn. The answer is not the answer I was hoping for. Such is boating life. Cheers

When I bought my 36ft narrowboat, the surveyor recommended a brand new steel base plate to be welded to the bottom. This was because of the sample readings of the hull thickness he'd taken. If I remember correctly the thinnest reading was about 4mm. At the time I was new to boating and trusted the surveyor without question. In hindsight I realise that perhaps it wasn't such a necessity to have a brand new baseplate welded to the bottom of the hull. The surveyor was new to the job too and was probably being over cautious. As most will know too, in order to get insurance, you have to satisfy the surveyor's Essential Points in their report. So I didn't have a lot of choice even if I had wanted to forgo this steel plate. 4 years on, I'm now dealing with a very heavy boat due to this extra thickness of hull, along with personal effects and a fit out. The water tank is at the front of the boat under the front deck. When the water tank is full, the drainage holes on the front deck now come right down to the waterline. When the water tank is empty, the weight is all at the back, and my weed hatch starts leaking from the pressure. Not ideal...especially if I need to use that weed hatch when I have run out of water. I'm fairly in tune with my vessel and know through instinct what state she is in, and keep the weight balanced to avert potential disaster. However, it would be nice to come up with a more satisfying solution to this problem. I've removed as much ballast and personal things as I can get away with. A solution I've been pondering recently is some sort of buoyancy aid. I was thinking I could put some empty large water bottles with their caps tightened firmly in the watertank. As the roof of the water tank is the floor of the front deck, which is at the waterline, I believe this should raise the bow. Obviously it will leave me with less volume in the water tank too. My questions are then as follows: - is this a reasonable solution? - will it make much of a difference? - if empty water bottles in the water tank will raise the bow, how can I apply this to the stern? - any other ideas? Any comments are much appreciated. M

Hi all, thanks for your help. I worked out what the problem was finally. Instead of actually looking at every element in the chain, I decided to replace every bit I could see. a complete waste of time...a lesson learnt there! So in this instance I had to jigsaw away a bit of floorboard to see properly what was happening when the feeder pipe was coming in. Once I could see that, it turned out that there was an ancient filter/strainer attached to the mains valve which was dripping. I suspected from there that this was the source of the air getting in. I removed it, tarted it up down there and switched everything on. Would you believe it, a quiet pump, constant temperature in the shower, and a pressure I've never before witnessed in the 3 years living on this boat! Feeling simultaneously heroic and imbecilic. If anyone else has this sort of problem in the future, check for leaks between the feeder pipe and the pump before doing anything else. Thanks again all. M

Thanks both. Further info: it's a shurflo strainer, SHURFLO FILTER / STRAINER 1/2" - TWIST ON - IN-LINE. It's between the main water on off and the pump. The accumulator has no switches or anything that I can change. Only says it's pressure tested to 200psi. The pump is 20psi. The water tank is full, though it looks like there are air bubbles coming up into the pump (it's a clear hose connecting so I can see). No idea what's going on. One thing that has changed for the better however is the pump no longer sounds like a machine gun as it used to. Now nice and quiet as it should be.

I've had water pressure issues for ages now, the system has been temperamental for a long time, sometimes working fine for months, then this stuttering flow from the taps when you turn them on. I just bought a water filter for the first time, as I'd never had one and thought it might have something to do with that essential missing element. However, I've just installed it and the whole system appears to have gotten worse. See the video below: http://youtu.be/Bpt6lJXnLL0 Here's how it's connected: Under the kitchen sink plumbing. The feeder pipe from the water tank is connected to the water filter which connects to the shurflo 20psi water pump, which connects to the air accumulator, then gets split into hot and cold and out to the rest of the system. The rest of the system is the kitchen sink, the bathroom basin and shower mixer at the back of the boat. I'm wondering if perhaps it's air in the system that I can't get rid of. I have turned on all the taps though and this hasn't done anything. Although when I did do this, there wasn't enough pressure from the pump for all taps to flow. One other point, the air accumulator is from 1977, although it does appear to be fine from the outside. Any ideas on what I should do? M

I don't think it's to do with having the water cap on too tightly as I've unscrewed it to make it loose, and the same machine gun noise happens. Also, I had checked the feeder pipe and there's no rust there. Still flummoxed.

Hi all, I've been having issues with my shurflo 20 psi pressure switch water pump for the last 2 years. Basically the flow seemed to get less and less powerful which meant it wouldn't ignite the gas boiler when turning the hot tap on. It was also very noisy. When I went to investigate it, nothing appeared to be wrong, there was no gunk in any of the pipes. I concluded that it must be a faulty pump, so ordered a new one, this time 30psi. As I went to change out the pump for the new one, there was a bit of faffing around, and for reasons I won't go into, I ended up just trying the "faulty" pump one last time, without trying the new 30psi pump. When I turned it all back on, the pump was not only near silent, but the flow was back to expected and would give me hot water again. I concluded this time that it was the electrical connections that must have vibrated out. However, after a few weeks, the pump returned to it's noisy state again (like a warzone in a cupboard under the sink), and despite me redoing the electrical connections again, it made no difference. The flow appears to be slackening off ever so slightly, but certainly not like the crunch time before. I now no longer have the newer 30 psi pump. I'm at a complete loss as to what is going on with this system. Does anyone have an idea? Cheers, Marmaduke

Thanks all for your input, I'm probably going to go for the air pump idea in the end, seems like the least hassle. We shall see!

Hi all, I'm thinking of ways that I can spread the heat from a small multifuel stove to other areas of the boat. I have an eco fan, but that doesn't get around corners. It also doesn't do much from what I can tell, but that's a different thread! What I've been thinking is somehow to run the hot water pipes for shower/basins, past the multifuel stove in some way to pick up heat, then through a radiator in a distant cold part of the boat, then out to the shower/basins. So a few questions: - is it possible to buy some sort of back boiler that can be retro fitted to a small stove? Perhaps some sort of tank with an in and out that sits on the plate? - i was also thinking of getting some copper tubing and wrapping that around the stove pipe to pick up heat, but that could well be expensive? Copper tubing being stolen from just about everywhere these days. Not to mention difficult to bend in a small space. Water is currently heated by a gas boiler, so perhaps that might scupper any of these plans. Alternatively to piping water around, I had thought of this instead: - have a plastic pipe and a 12v computer fan to suck warm air from the back of the stove and pump it to other areas of the boat. I'm guessing this would have to be switched on constantly though. If anyone has any comments on this, I would love to hear them. Thanks in advance, Marmaduke

Hi all, I did it about 2 months ago now, when there was still some sunshine and relative good weather. The chandlers I bought the water tank black paint from said that cool air was better for it to dry, and to not stick any hot fan down there. It's hard to remember exactly now, but I'm pretty sure I left it for a good 5 days with the top off. To make sure though, if I drained it again and left it to air over Christmas, do you think it would dry out and be in better shape? Or is this something that should just be done again? (Please god don't tell me the latter) M

Hi all, Thanks for the advice so far. It was potable water tank black, yes. Still makes me wonder how on earth a paint that is harmful to marine life could possibly be used to hold drinking water. M

I had been living with a rusty water tank for the last two years, and this summer, under the advice of most, I decided that it was time to get in there and paint it. I drained it, dried it out, vactanned it, then painted 3 coats of Water Tank Black on it, with at least a good day for each coat to dry, sometimes more. I then filled the tank up, left it for a over a week, then drained it completely again to rid the tank of any oily residue. I then filled it up with a fresh new load of water, and thought everything was fine and started getting back to normal again. However, opening the lid on the water tank after this second fill of fresh water, revealed an oily film on the surface. I was under the impression that would have gone by now. Another recent issue appears to be the lack of pressure in the water system, which means I can't get enough water into the boiler in order to get hot water. It does this half-flame boiling thing and produces very luke warm water. Before there was no problem. I wonder if maybe the feeder pipe down in the tank where I was painting is blocked with something...slightly smaller diameter hole from a rust bubble, or water tank slug, or something or other. So really I'm asking advice from anyone with experience in these things, whether 1. that oilyness will go away pretty soon? Next tank refill? 2. any ideas around pressure? I've got to say, and please correct me if I'm talking nonsense here, but what's worse...a rusty water tank, with a bit of iron in your drinking water, or plasticy water tank with some nasty chemical in your drinking water? I was particularly perturbed when applying the Water Tank Black, to see the warning label on the side of the tin, which showed dead fish and broken trees...i.e. harmful to marine life! What on earth that means for human life?! Any advice on this is much appreciated. Thanks, M

Well, Willawaw, yes that is probably the answer I should be giving, alas here's what's really going on: I have a 1500kw inverter, hooked up to 3 leisure batteries, not using shore power ever. It's currently not earthed to the hull, and i've had no problems (that I know of) except one. My one problem is, that I'm running a record player on the inverter and I am getting earth hum, which is making music quite unlistenable. I have tried 3 different record players and they are all giving earth hum. So I'm concluding, blindly perhaps, that if I earth the inverter, the hum will disappear. Either way, is there any reason why I shouldn't be earthing the inverter to the hull? Am I to damage anything if I do? The case of the inverter has a point on which you can attach the earthing cable. Of course, I'm sure someone will pipe up with 12 volt solutions for my record playing, for which I would also be grateful. Just at the moment, this is the equipment I have, and I intend on using it until I get around to replacing with 12v versions (or 9v plus adaptor). M M