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Midnight

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19 minutes ago, Captain Pegg said:

I'm tempted to try the Pennine canals next year. I'll try my hardest to scuff the cabin handrails on the sides of Standedge Tunnel.

 

You will find it very easy.

Been through 5 times and never got away unscathed yet but Midnight is quite high. Once when the water level was down the handrails survived but I dinked one of the fender rails. Still have the scars.

Edited by Midnight
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Just now, dmr said:

 

There are a few sticky out rocky bits but otherwise I suspect its a whole lot easier than Harecastle (cant be sure as I went thru on a friends boat with CRT driving). It is a most spectacular tunnel.

 

Been a lot of years since I went through there but I don't recall it being massively awkward. Isn't it about 9' wide?

1 minute ago, Midnight said:

 

You will find it very easy.

Been through 5 times and never got away unscathed yet but Midnight is quite high. Once when the water level was down the handrails survived but I dinked one of the fender rails. Still have the scars.

 

Sounds to me like you're willing to wager that pint I mentioned.

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1 hour ago, David Mack said:

It's not that simple. Apart from other considerations, both the Huddersfield and the Rochdale were restored with substantial financial contribtributions from Millennium lottery funding. As a condition of that funding BW (as was) and the Waterways Trust (as was), both of whose responsibilities have now been transferred to CRT, agreed to maintain both canals and keep them open for navigation. CRT therefore don't have the legal right to close them.

And the transpennine section of the L&L was designated Cruiseway under the 1968 Transport Act, and CRT are therefore obliged to maintain it (in theory in the condition it was at the date of the passing of the Act).

Any attempt at closing any of the three would therefore involve CRT in a lengthy and protracted legal process with significant opposition, substantial cost, uncertain outcome and a potential PR disaster for the organisation. Frankly not an appealing option for Mr. Parry and co.

 

 

I'm sure there are legal obligations but mothballing for a limited time isn't closure. It would mean the L&L could have a bit more spent on it in the meanwhile.  

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2 minutes ago, Captain Pegg said:

 

Been a lot of years since I went through there but I don't recall it being massively awkward. Isn't it about 9' wide?

 

Sounds to me like you're willing to wager that pint I mentioned.

 

Its subsided (sank) so its very low in the middle, the handrails do get quite close to the arched top. There are numerous profile changes with internal arches and all have big chunks taken out of them.

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9 minutes ago, Captain Pegg said:

 

Been a lot of years since I went through there but I don't recall it being massively awkward. Isn't it about 9' wide?

 

Sounds to me like you're willing to wager that pint I mentioned.

 

It varies quite a lot and is high in places it's the sticky out rocks that bite you. One outcrop knocked a chaperone clean of the back of a boat. He was warning me about it on one particular transit when I caught my elbow on the same bit a was spun round luckily the chaperone grabbed me. Some boats with low air draughts do get through unscathed but lots leave paint marks.

I don't mind standing you a pint anyway unscathed or not.

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7 minutes ago, Midnight said:

 

It varies quite a lot and is high in places it's the sticky out rocks that bite you. One outcrop knocked a chaperone clean of the back of a boat. He was warning me about it on one particular transit when I caught my elbow on the same bit a was spun round luckily the chaperone grabbed me. Some boats with low air draughts do get through unscathed but lots leave paint marks.

I don't mind standing you a pint anyway unscathed or not.

 

If there are other boats that have made it through unscathed then I'd think it almost certain that I could. Just checked the height vs width dimensions and I barely register on the scale. Still have to avoid those sticky out bits though. I'll let the Chief Officer steer. My concentration span is very short.

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1 hour ago, Midnight said:

 

I'm sure there are legal obligations but mothballing for a limited time isn't closure.

That rather depends on what the obligations that go with the funding actually require CRT to do. If they require the canals to be maintained for navigation with provision only for such short term closures as are reasonably necessary for maintenance and repair, then 'mothballing' would be in breach of those obligations.

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8 hours ago, David Mack said:

That rather depends on what the obligations that go with the funding actually require CRT to do. If they require the canals to be maintained for navigation with provision only for such short term closures as are reasonably necessary for maintenance and repair, then 'mothballing' would be in breach of those obligations.

Punchbowl bridge!

 

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11 hours ago, David Mack said:

Up from Manchester was split over at least 2 days. For the return journey, some boats got through Lock 69 (I think), before it failed, others were forced to wait, some at the Irk Aqueduct and some at Littleborough, until the lock reopened, and a couple of shorter boats decided to escape via the C&H instead.

According to the plans 7 ft 1/2 inch, but I have never measured it. I suppose while the boat is out of the water I should either build some oversize calipers or do some clever stuff with string lines.

 

I've tried to do the clever stuff with plumb bobs several times since my boat was slimmed down a bit. Even on what seems to be a dead calm day it seems impossible. I found there are still slight breaths of wind which prevent the strings from settling and hanging dead vertically so every attempt resulted in a different measurement. I gave up trying and concluded that it needs to be done with the boat inside a shed. 

 

Afterwards though it fitted through Napton and Awbridge but not the first lock on the Llangollen, where I got spectacularly stuck. 

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5 minutes ago, MtB said:

 

Before.

Point of order though, it was only a "full rebuild" of half of it! 

 

I do hope they rebuilt the narrow side, knowing CRT and their contractors they may well have rebuilt the wide side.

 

 

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Just now, dmr said:

 

I do hope they rebuilt the narrow side, knowing CRT and their contractors they may well have rebuilt the wide side.

 

 

 

From memory it is the towpath side they rebuilt. The offside still looks 200 years old. 

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3 minutes ago, MtB said:

 

From memory it is the towpath side they rebuilt. The offside still looks 200 years old. 

 

I started writing that post as a silly joke but then remembered that it was a bulge in the towpath side wall that got us stuck.

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28 minutes ago, MtB said:

 

Afterwards though it fitted through Napton and Awbridge but not the first lock on the Llangollen, where I got spectacularly stuck. 

 

7 minutes ago, TheBiscuits said:

 

Watch the timelapse video.  They dug out the towpath so far I joked they were converting the canal so widebeams could use it!

 

 

The video refers to Hurleston Lock 4. Is that the bottom lock? Canalplan seems a bit confused.

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3 minutes ago, David Mack said:

 

The video refers to Hurleston Lock 4. Is that the bottom lock? Canalplan seems a bit confused.

 

Yes, it's the bottom lock.  I think the top lock always used to be lock 1 on a flight before they decided to number all the locks on a canal.

 

Wigan Flight top lock is/was lock 1 despite it having 65 on the beams and signs

 

Hurleston top lock is lock number 4 on the canal, but lock number 1 on Hurleston flight.  

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32 minutes ago, TheBiscuits said:

 

Yes, it's the bottom lock.  I think the top lock always used to be lock 1 on a flight before they decided to number all the locks on a canal.

 

Wigan Flight top lock is/was lock 1 despite it having 65 on the beams and signs

 

Hurleston top lock is lock number 4 on the canal, but lock number 1 on Hurleston flight.  

 

CRT assets show  the following - running from Hurleston Junction - so bottom lock is lock 4 on the flight but lock 1 on the canal and top lock is Lock 1 on the flight but lock 4 on the canal

 

image.png.ca362ff380ab0737822315aa11ca67db.png

 

So Canalplan shows

 

image.png.bd0bc73a4953bd7f572a4fe9b387b5ff.png

 

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On 29/09/2021 at 21:13, mrsmelly said:

I think Mike was tongue in cheek but the costs have always been too cheap for what boaters get, I always said it was a bargain. It costs more to be members of some poxy golf clubs than having a boat including 365 days useage, sewage disposal, rubbish disposal, potable water and a couple of thousand miles of waterways to use.

I’d like to endorse  that but can’t afford to.

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7 hours ago, MtB said:

 

I've tried to do the clever stuff with plumb bobs several times since my boat was slimmed down a bit. Even on what seems to be a dead calm day it seems impossible. I found there are still slight breaths of wind which prevent the strings from settling and hanging dead vertically so every attempt resulted in a different measurement. I gave up trying and concluded that it needs to be done with the boat inside a shed. 

 

Afterwards though it fitted through Napton and Awbridge but not the first lock on the Llangollen, where I got spectacularly stuck. 

Unless you are happy to kid yourself, to get even the simple width (i.e. maximum width between two vertical, parallel planes) within 1/2" would require some modern technology such as a Total Station( of the non-fuel kind https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Total_station)

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22 hours ago, David Mack said:

That rather depends on what the obligations that go with the funding actually require CRT to do. If they require the canals to be maintained for navigation with provision only for such short term closures as are reasonably necessary for maintenance and repair, then 'mothballing' would be in breach of those obligations.

Didn't they get the wrong side of them with the Standedge Tunnel visitor centre a few years back

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Doesn't get any better does it. Only two Rochdale stoppages today!

Stuck in Castlefield waiting for the Nine to reopen and then there's a tree down below Todmorden. To be fair the CRT lady did ask the lads on the ground about the tree which apparently is a big one so going to take awhile to shift. Anyone local got any further info?

Bad Karma or just unlucky?

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