Cost of emptying a holding tank

[ditchcrawler]

2 hours ago, dmr said:

Prices are creeping up but £18 to £20 looks to be the going rate though there are still a few really cheap ones about. Some go into the main sewer, some into a septic tank so the costs for the supplier are variable There is also the cost of stripping the pump to remove blockages when boaters to silly things.

 

A big factor is value for money, some pumpouts do a good job, some are terrible. I much prefer the ones where I go do the job myself.

Assuming a once per month cycle then the cost is about £25 per year which is not a big part of the total cost of boating.

 

I believe CRT are looking at the future at their pumpout machines. A good alernative would be to provide a standard BSP fitting to the sewer so that boaters can do an easy and clean (and I assume free) self pumpout.

 

and tell smelly that a Pumpout is a Proper bog, anything else is pooing into a plastic "boaters briefcase"

 

.................Dave

£16-50 at Fazeley Mill this week and when I was up the Mac at Bollington it was £15

[mrsmelly]

18 minutes ago, bizzard said:

If your embarrassed about carrying the cassette along to the sanny I wouldn't be. Its really only boaters and campers that know what they are.  As you say just pretend its a briefcase and your off to work at the office with your lunch in it, in a way it has.

I have years ago carried a full one on a bus inside a bin liner lol.

[jddevel]

7 minutes ago, mrsmelly said:

I have years ago carried a full one on a bus inside a bin liner lol

Like farmers with the multi use of bale twine I`m continually amazed at the resourcefulness of those on the canals? 

[system 4-50]

27 minutes ago, mrsmelly said:

I have years ago carried a full one on a bus inside a bin liner lol.

You have forgotten that you left it on the bus!  London Transport's Lost Property Office has kept it for you, all these years, and you can reclaim it by simply proving the poo in it is yours!

[BlueStringPudding]

Prices went up recently from £16 to £20 to have the tank pumped out locally to me. It needs doing 4 times a year (massive tank) and requires no expensive chemicals or spare tanks or repeatedly lugging heavy and stinking and splashing buckets of disgusting stench every week. I don't even have to get anywhere near it, I pay a nice boat yard man for the trouble. 

Frankly, I consider it an excellent investment. 

[restlessnomad]

9 minutes ago, BlueStringPudding said:

Prices went up recently from £16 to £20 to have the tank pumped out locally to me. It needs doing 4 times a year (massive tank) and requires no expensive chemicals or spare tanks or repeatedly lugging heavy and stinking and splashing buckets of disgusting stench every week. I don't even have to get anywhere near it, I pay a nice boat yard man for the trouble. 

Frankly, I consider it an excellent investment. 

can you add a tank to a boat or it has to be built by the boat builder?

[ditchcrawler]

30 minutes ago, restlessnomad said:

can you add a tank to a boat or it has to be built by the boat builder?

You can add one but you have to make space for it and it may cost lots of money

 

[The Dreamer]

5 hours ago, mrsmelly said:

havnt taken the daft macerator out as its a pain in the arse

Clearly you are using it wrong, mine works perfectly well without an hurt to the tooche ?

[Athy]

2 hours ago, bizzard said:

If your embarrassed about carrying the cassette along to the sanny I wouldn't be. Its really only boaters and campers that know what they are.  

...except when passing a family group on the towpath: one of the children invariably, with that shrill clarity of tone which children can turn on at inappropriate times, asks its parents "Mummy, what's in there"? I tend to feign deafness and slightly increase my walking pace at such moments.

[jddevel]

1 hour ago, ditchcrawler said:

You can add one but you have to make space for it and it may cost lots of money

Mines located under the "lounge" seating which doubles as a double berth. Monitored by an exterior fitted ultra sonic level indicator with 4 levels showing by coloured lights in the bathroom. Easily accessable but vented by two filters to avoid odour allowing air flow to accelerate the work of  the microbes. If needed I could change it for a new tank within a morning. But then it was a sailaway and I designed its layout so happy with its result.

[Guest]

See, I'd tend to think that an amount of 'funding' of elsan points is kind of fine - I'm grateful, in a similar way, for the provision of council bins becasue the alternatives (where wd ppl empty?!?) are horrid. I'm privileged to be willing and able to afford the luxury of pumpouts (which are going to cost more to maintain and operate than elsans - why should ppl only really using a slightly glorified hole fund my fancy electric suction?).

 

However as a dog owner I'm now a much more regular (and revolting) user of council bins than I used to be... So, thanks all you cat ppl!

 

Re: embarrassment... Any dog (or other non-cat pet) owner / parent / carer for an elderly parent / ... basically anyone who LIVES has to deal with sh1t. Anyone walking (being carried in their sedan chair?!?) along the towpath who has never had to deal with such realities is welcome to an education :-)

[system 4-50]

2 minutes ago, jddevel said:

Mines located under the "lounge" seating which doubles as a double berth. Monitored by an exterior fitted ultra sonic level indicator with 4 levels showing by coloured lights in the bathroom. Easily accessable but vented by two filters to avoid odour allowing air flow to accelerate the work of  the microbes. If needed I could change it for a new tank within a morning. But then it was a sailaway and I designed its layout so happy with its result.

Does filling it change your "list"?

[Guest]

Just now, system 4-50 said:

Does filling it change your "list"?

On some boats that is what counts as a 'gauge'!

[jddevel]

12 minutes ago, system 4-50 said:

Does filling it change your "list"?

Not noticably as its athwartship and virtually amidship.-assuming it was a sensible question.

[Mike Todd]

7 hours ago, David Mack said:

No. Boatyard facilities are nothing to do with CRT. Boatyards will either be paying the appropriate commercial drainage charges for mains drainage, or paying a contractor to take the effluent away if on a tank system. 

Not many boatyards will allow you to use their elsan point for free unless you are either one of their moorers or are spending money on other things with them.

I think there are one or two marinas where the elsan is provided on behalf of CaRT - likewise on the Bridgewater.

[nbfiresprite]

3 hours ago, Athy said:

...except when passing a family group on the towpath: one of the children invariably, with that shrill clarity of tone which children can turn on at inappropriate times, asks its parents "Mummy, what's in there"? I tend to feign deafness and slightly increase my walking pace at such moments.

Or the commet from the childern on a hot day "Mummy that man smells of Poo"

Edited December 7, 2019 by nbfiresprite

[bizzard]

6 hours ago, mrsmelly said:

I have years ago carried a full one on a bus inside a bin liner lol.

Nice and handy though if you were taken short. 

[ditchcrawler]

I was thinking of a bag snatcher on a moped

[peterboat]

Thank the heavens for compsting loos so much easier and cheaper it would seem ?

Popcorn anybody? ?

[Guest]

Yep, as long as one can afford a garden property to continuously moor along side / have no smaller ppl aboard ones boat / can work out which hole to pop menstrual blood down that'd be dead handy.

Actually - real question... Blood in the fluids bit or the solids bit? And how does one limbo that (whilst one has one foot balanced on top of the smaller compost loo with holes the right distance apart for kids and the other cosily snuggled against the nice bin bag pile one hasn't yet popped onto the garden for n months?

[peterboat]

1 minute ago, TheMenagerieAfloat said:

Yep, as long as one can afford a garden property to continuously moor along side / have no smaller ppl aboard ones boat / can work out which hole to pop menstrual blood down that'd be dead handy.

It's emptied once every 3 month and the rest does down the hole in the front! It's really that easy! Have you ever seen one? Never mind use one?

[Guest]

Yep - have both seen and used and held a baby over whilst potty training. You can't expect a little kid on an adult sized seat to segregate liquids/solids... they are just too small.

 

And those were a land-based ones with (100s of) acres of land for the poop to go on. It isn't going to be compost by 3 months and for those without a garden it likely never will be... Plus, you still have to get rid of the liquids. By which point we're back to the elsan debate (assuming no garden etc)...

 

Oh, AND I've now read (seemed like it was worth a quick google) that a recommended 'menstruating with compost loo' technique is to use one of those moon cup things and empty it straight into plant pots avoiding the 'which hole does it go in' question all together. So, I'm now never visiting a narrowboat with one. ?

[peterboat]

15 minutes ago, TheMenagerieAfloat said:

Yep - have both seen and used and held a baby over whilst potty training. You can't expect a little kid on an adult sized seat to segregate liquids/solids... they are just too small.

 

And those were a land-based ones with (100s of) acres of land for the poop to go on. It isn't going to be compost by 3 months and for those without a garden it likely never will be... Plus, you still have to get rid of the liquids. By which point we're back to the elsan debate (assuming no garden etc)...

 

Oh, AND I've now read (seemed like it was worth a quick google) that a recommended 'menstruating with compost loo' technique is to use one of those moon cup things and empty it straight into plant pots avoiding the 'which hole does it go in' question all together. So, I'm now never visiting a narrowboat with one. ?

How have I managed with mine for the last 10 years? You stick with your method and I will stick with my nice easy composting loo

[Guest]

5 minutes ago, peterboat said:

How have I managed with mine for the last 10 years?

I don't know - I was genuinely asking which hole menstrual blood should go down? Can't find the info on manufacturers' sites... regarding kids the only answer I've found is 'fine once they can use an adult sized seat'...

 

Out of interest does your compost actually get used for horticulture?

Edited December 7, 2019 by TheMenagerieAfloat
wobbly punctuation

[mrsmelly]

2 minutes ago, TheMenagerieAfloat said:

I don't know - I was genuinely asking which hole menstrual blood should go down? Can't find the info on manufacturers' sites... regarding kids the only answer I've found is 'fine once they can use an adult sized seat'...

 

Out of interest does your compost actually get used for horticulture?

With a composting bog you have to mess around with two disposal sites. the solids you keep for months in buckets or as with most put it straight into a bin liner and throw it in the bin. The urine then has to be dealt with and taken elsewhere or chucked in the hedge bottom. I am going to patent a new idea, I am going to call it an " Elsan " disposal point. My idea is to utilise the already available sewer system and have one container that you simply poo and wee into, no need to segregate and very easily emptied into some disposal point. I doubt though it will catch on, when I moved aboard thirty years ago the odd one or two people extoled the virtues of composting bogs, its plain to see that today nearly all boats have them fitted and no one much has toilets called cassette or pumpout. Just look in boat brokers adverts and see how many have each type. End of.