Do most people actually observe the speed limits on the canals?

[cuthound]

15 minutes ago, Machpoint005 said:

I have a very old satnav on the boat: it is so old that a speed indication is about all it can do. It tells me that my usual cruising speed is 2.6mph. If I'm in a hurry (why?) I can get up to 2.7mph.

 

 

 

Can't be that old or it would indicate speed in "leagues per hour"

[TheBiscuits]

2 hours ago, cuthound said:

 

Can't be that old or it would indicate speed in "leagues per hour"

Microfurlongs per fortnight is an old favourite.  Comes in handy, just not very often!

[nicknorman]

4 hours ago, Thomas C King said:

Well that answers that then. It seems like there isn't much speeding? I've just been bumped by another boat, which seems to happen a couple of times each week (at least) is this something you have all just learned to put up with? I don't know how they do it sometimes...

 

We're moored pretty sturdily, the boat doesn't bump around.

One does occasionally get bumped by another boat - after all, there is no “driving licence” and everyone has to learn sometime! First time hirers get pretty minimal training before being let loose. First time private owners get zero training, so are probably the worst.  I think the justification for this is that, whilst getting bumped is annoying, it is rarely dangerous or does actual damage, with the exception of those people who have a pan of boiling water on their hob 24/7.

But it can be more frequent or less frequent according to where you moor. Some people decide to moor such that it makes life difficult for passing boats. They are “sitting ducks” (whereas actual ducks tend to get out of the way). In that case, it can’t be too surprising that they get bumped. We always consider the surroundings before we moor and don’t moor somewhere where the probability of being bumped is greater than normal. Consequently the last time we got bumped was ... can’t remember, but a very long time ago.

 

I could be wrong but get the feeling that what we have here on this thread is a conflict between those who rarely if ever move their boats off their moorings and regard the canals as somewhere to live, vs people who regard the canals as a transport network, albeit a leisure one. The former group tend to resent anyone actually cruising a boat if it impinges on their home, floating on their personal bit of water, in the slightest way.

Edited July 14, 2020 by nicknorman

[Tracy D'arth]

7 minutes ago, nicknorman said:

One does occasionally get bumped by another boat - after all, there is no “driving licence” and everyone has to learn sometime! First time hirers get pretty minimal training before being let loose. First time private owners get zero training, so are probably the worst.  I think the justification for this is that, whilst getting bumped is annoying, it is rarely dangerous or does actual damage, with the exception of those people who have a pan of boiling water on their hob 24/7.

But it can be more frequent or less frequent according to where you moor. Some people decide to moor such that it makes life difficult for passing boats. They are “sitting ducks” (whereas actual ducks tend to get out of the way). In that case, it can’t be too surprising that they get bumped. We always consider the surroundings before we moor and don’t moor somewhere where the probability of being bumped is greater than normal. Consequently the last time we got bumped was ... can’t remember, but a very long time ago.

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I could be wrong but get the feeling that what we have here on this thread is a conflict between those who rarely if ever move their boats off their moorings and regard the canals as somewhere to live, vs people who regard the canals as a transport network, albeit a leisure one. The former group tend to resent anyone actually cruising a boat if it impinges on their home, floating on their personal bit of water, in the slightest way.

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Agreed, you are dead right but we haven't had much chance to move of late!

 

The only dent in my boat was caused by a hirer, 1 mile and 2 locks away from the base, stag party, and they were already drunk as alcoholic skunks.

 

They hit 4 out of 10 boats moored in a line.

 

Better of late, canal busy with considerate cheerful boaters, a pleasure to chat with them as they pass, another advantage to them going slowly, more time to exchange pleasantries.

TD'

[nicknorman]

5 minutes ago, Tracy D'arth said:

Agreed, you are dead right but we haven't had much chance to move of late!

 

The only dent in my boat was caused by a hirer, 1 mile and 2 locks away from the base, stag party, and they were already drunk as alcoholic skunks.

 

They hit 4 out of 10 boats moored in a line.

 

Better of late, canal busy with considerate cheerful boaters, a pleasure to chat with them as they pass, another advantage to them going slowly, more time to exchange pleasantries.

TD'

Yes I can sympathise about the drunken stag party boats. The S oxford seems the worst for that with Oxfordshire Narrowboats only interested in making money out of such groups, and completely uncaring about the nuisance and trouble they cause.

[Rose Narrowboats]

35 minutes ago, Tracy D'arth said:

Agreed, you are dead right but we haven't had much chance to move of late!

 

The only dent in my boat was caused by a hirer, 1 mile and 2 locks away from the base, stag party, and they were already drunk as alcoholic skunks.

 

They hit 4 out of 10 boats moored in a line.

 

Better of late, canal busy with considerate cheerful boaters, a pleasure to chat with them as they pass, another advantage to them going slowly, more time to exchange pleasantries.

TD'

For balance, the only dent in my favourite hireboat (built by Brinklow Boats, so she's not fragile) was caused by a private boat on a 2am jaunt back from the pub at Newbold. If there hadn't been other victims of said idiots, I probably wouldn't have believed my hirers to be honest, the dent is that bad.

 

We never did formally identify the other boat, although there was a boat in the area for a while which matched its description and had a freshly split open stem post.....

Edited July 14, 2020 by Rose Narrowboats

[Tracy D'arth]

1 minute ago, Rose Narrowboats said:

For balance, the only dent in my favourite hireboat (built by Brinklow Boats, so she's not fragile) was caused by a private boat on a 2am jaunt back from the pub at Newbold. If there hadn't been other victims of said idiots, I probably wouldn't have believed my hirers to be honest, the dent is that bad.

 

We never did formally identify the other boat, although there was a boat in the area for a while which matched it's description and had a freshly split open stem post.....

Wow! Never split a stem post.

I have had shells with a bit of a flat on the D bar but the force necessary to split the welds open is huge.

I have hit the gun powder house at Worsley with a 70' CTS  when it dipped its stern in the mud instead of steering round the bend, stick and wheel takes a while to get you out of trouble with 24 tons and a stupidly big engine sometimes. No fenders of course.

Sheared a lot of wood off the wall, on inspection it was hollow with rot! Boat was undamaged.

TD'

[Bewildered]

7 hours ago, Athy said:

We almost met the weekend before last - you were moored in the lone public space between the workboat and our boat. They do create a wake disproportionate to their size, those canoes (I hadn't realised that some were kayaks), but one gets used to them after a while, especially as they generally operate at roughly the same times of day each weekend. 

Had I realised it would have been nice to say hello but unfortunately I struggle to remember names, let alone tying a boat name to an individual. There are also several boats with the same names, just to make life confusing. On Saturday there were two boat moored behind me at Napton, both named Dragonfly. I half expected to wake up in the morning to find a baby dragonfly had arrived in the night.

We are slightly easier to spot as there is only one boat registered with the name Karieanna 

[Rob-M]

We got back to the marina on Sunday, a boat nearby was doing some repairs as they had been hit hard by another private boater and the impact had shifted their water tank to the point where a pipe was ripped off. They were filling with water when they noticed the tank damage as water started appearing in the boat.

[Ianws]

It doesn’t have to be more than 4mph to be a problem. We were going up locks last year sharing with a single handed boater who decided it was easier to use our boat to stop than come in slowly and come to a natural halt. I don’t mind a bit of mild contact but do mind being rammed unnecessarily, causing things to move inside. I got the impression he thought it was ok as they are all made of steel etc. He was invited to go in first at subsequent locks. 

[matty40s]

1 hour ago, nicknorman said:

Yes I can sympathise about the drunken stag party boats. The S oxford seems the worst for that with Oxfordshire Narrowboats only interested in making money out of such groups, and completely uncaring about the nuisance and trouble they cause.

I have to disagree a bit with that, they have been out more than once to remove keys and evict hirers from boats after complaints.

[nicknorman]

13 minutes ago, matty40s said:

I have to disagree a bit with that, they have been out more than once to remove keys and evict hirers from boats after complaints.

We moored at Jericho. Later joined by 2 ONB parties of yoofs. At 01:30 am they staggered back to their boats, put music on at full volume with all doors and windows open, and they engaged in lengthy pointless drunken conversation (which had to be shouted to be heard over the music). The boat behind us decided to set off to moor elsewhere at 01:45 in order to stand any chance of sleeping. I got dressed and walked onto one of the offending boats and into the cabin. The occupants were too drunk to even notice that a stranger had walked into their boat. I made my point forcefully and fortunately, 15 mins or so after I returned to our boat they shut up. I complained to ONB the next day but they weren’t in the least bit interested, quite off hand and not in the slightest bit apologetic. Presumably because the hirers weren’t damaging the boat. They are now on my hate list.

[ditchcrawler]

1 hour ago, Bewildered said:

Had I realised it would have been nice to say hello but unfortunately I struggle to remember names, let alone tying a boat name to an individual. There are also several boats with the same names, just to make life confusing. On Saturday there were two boat moored behind me at Napton, both named Dragonfly. I half expected to wake up in the morning to find a baby dragonfly had arrived in the night.

We are slightly easier to spot as there is only one boat registered with the name Karieanna 

I am the same, terrible memory for names

38 minutes ago, matty40s said:

I have to disagree a bit with that, they have been out more than once to remove keys and evict hirers from boats after complaints.

I have known Napton to do that

[rasputin]

There is a bit of generalisation in this thread

 

I have no problem maintaining 4mph on any canal I have been on, although just above 3.5mph Gps is better for fuel consumption.

 

No need for me to slow down going past moored boats, but I do.

 

Weighing less than a ton there is no way I am going to move a 20 ton boat to any degree

 

I always get shouted at, probably because I have an outboard,

 

I either laugh or quite often reverse to educate the blasphemer mostly falling on deaf ears.

 

I have never shouted at another boater to slow down.

 

People generally hate being overtaken on the canal

 

I have been run into several times, not good in a plastic boat.  

 

 

[matty40s]

1 hour ago, nicknorman said:

We moored at Jericho. Later joined by 2 ONB parties of yoofs. At 01:30 am they staggered back to their boats, put music on at full volume with all doors and windows open, and they engaged in lengthy pointless drunken conversation (which had to be shouted to be heard over the music). The boat behind us decided to set off to moor elsewhere at 01:45 in order to stand any chance of sleeping. I got dressed and walked onto one of the offending boats and into the cabin. The occupants were too drunk to even notice that a stranger had walked into their boat. I made my point forcefully and fortunately, 15 mins or so after I returned to our boat they shut up. I complained to ONB the next day but they weren’t in the least bit interested, quite off hand and not in the slightest bit apologetic. Presumably because the hirers weren’t damaging the boat. They are now on my hate list.

That would be a police or local EHO Council call, theres not a lot a hire company can do at that time in the morning unless they have an empiribuss wireless enabled system to shut the boat down at 30? Miles away.

You did your bit, they stopped, end of.

[Dharl]

Think it is rare to reach 4mph on the canal.    Importantly I keep an eye on the wake and if it looks like it’s building up to break I slow down.   Likewise as I enter bridge holes I slow down, this is for the effect of reducing my draft so less likely to pick up and any rubbish whilst passing moored boats I Slow down a couple of boat lengths before and go into tickover until clear before increasing speed.   
 

on mooring....as a deep sea sailor I am quite particular about how I moor up and if overnight tend to rig fore and aft springs as well as head and stern lines.    Was walking along the K&A this week and noticed a very nice boat that had 6 different mooring lines out ( including the centre line...) but they were all so slack the boat was nearly in the centre of the channel.      It also had a notice telling people to slow down as they were pulling his pins out......Mrs Dharl nearly had to restrain me from going and re-mooring it in a more effective way.....

[GUMPY]

If I used the wash or wake to judge my speed I would be traveling to fast most of the time. Hence I use a dedicated GPS speedometer which works well.

 

[ditchcrawler]

12 hours ago, Loddon said:

If I used the wash or wake to judge my speed I would be traveling to fast most of the time. Hence I use a dedicated GPS speedometer which works well.

 

OK on the S Oxford GU bit