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BSS survey fees rip off


Stevenet

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7 minutes ago, MartynG said:

That's a ridiculous statement too.

 

You seemed to be criticising co detectors for false alarms due to battery gas  which is why I thought you meant they were a nuisance.  

I'm not so sure. MOT has the same effect - it's there to force basic safety maintenance once a year. In between times many people assume their vehicle must be safe but it's not the case or none would ever fail. Both MOT and BSC are good in that they force this basic safety check, but bad in that people do rely on them as "proof" that all is well when the fact is that both are only good on the day of the inspections.

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9 minutes ago, MartynG said:

Then how do you otherwise detect carbon monoxide which is invisible and has no odour?

 

 

 

I think the argument goes... do what we always did over past decades, centuries even. Install and maintain your fossil fuel-burning appliances properly and there won't be CO floating about in the first place.

 

But the thing is, people just don't. Hence the perceived need for schemes like BSS. Like the CORGI/GSR scheme though, I suspect the BSS has just turned into a self-feeding frenzy of new risks being dreamed up that 'need' guarding against, with CO alarms simply being the latest.  I think we need to get back to basics and examine the statistics underpinning the BSS

 

A good starting point would be how many deaths per year were happening on inland leisure boats before BSS was introduced, and how many per year are there now? That would be quite an illuminating comparison to make.

 

And in a few years perhaps we'll be able to make a comparison between CO deaths before and after CO monitors became mandatory. My gut feeling is no difference will turn out the be the answer but I'll be delighted to be shown wrong. 

 

 

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Forgot to add, it is human nature to take risk, and humans tend to 'like' a certain level of risk. There is that seat belt research that shows that when seat belts became mandatory, people responded by driving faster because they felt safer. Same might happen with CO alarms. I've already been told several times by customers they no longer have their boilers serviced because they don't need to, pointing to the £15 CO monitor they fitted and rely on instead. Is that an improvement in safety or an unforeseen reduction? Answers on a postcard please....

 

 

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I quite enjoyed our BSS exam. As a newbie who had only been on the boat for a few months, the examiner took the time to explain what he was checking and why, so I learnt a good deal.

 

I can understand that someone with years of skill and experience could be frustrated when they feel they are competent to DIY check it, but I suspect those who are genuinely competent are in the minority (I reckon this forum probably has a disproportionately high average competence compared to the general boat-owning population).

 

There's probably no cheaper way to verify an owner's competence (and that they have then carried out sufficient checks) so I think the BSS is generally a good idea... but I have heard that it's a lottery as to whether your examiner is sensible and competent or just comes up with their own questionable standards.

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22 minutes ago, Ewan123 said:

but I have heard that it's a lottery as to whether your examiner is sensible and competent or just comes up with their own questionable standards.

 

At least you do have a chance of 'winning' with the lottery, whilst with a BSS examiner ...................................

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I had my first bss inspection back in May. The geezer was very thorough and informative. If one owns and uses a boat on our waterways, one must expect to pay for the privilege. I paid 180 quid for about 5-6 hours of a qualified chap's time and expertise. A bargain I thought

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3 hours ago, MartynG said:

That's a ridiculous statement too.

 

You seemed to be criticising co detectors for false alarms due to battery gas  which is why I thought you meant they were a nuisance.  

Far from being ridiculous, some people are happy to occupy a boat the safety of which is unknown to them, doing so in the blind trust that a BSS inspector has performed a good job. Far better to read the requirements, understand your own boat and ensure yourself that it is maintained to a safe level.

 

A nuisance alarm is a siren sounding that happens when, in this case, CO is not detected. If a CO alarm keeps going off erroneously it is 'crying wolfe' and may not be believed when CO is actually at a dangerous level. Hydrogen from battery gassing can be a culprit. This doesn't meant that the CO detector is itself a nuisance, but simply that the nuisance alarm soundings are. I apologise to everyone who didn't need this explanation.

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I had one with a smoke detector in the galley last trip. It went off every morning while Diana was having a shower, no other time, so it had to go. I couldn't just bin it, it has a fixed battery, can you imagine it sounding in the back of the bin lorry also the battery is Lithium, so I had to rip it to bits, bin the detector and dispose of the battery in a proper manor

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18 minutes ago, ditchcrawler said:

I had one with a smoke detector in the galley last trip. It went off every morning while Diana was having a shower, no other time, so it had to go. I couldn't just bin it, it has a fixed battery, can you imagine it sounding in the back of the bin lorry also the battery is Lithium, so I had to rip it to bits, bin the detector and dispose of the battery in a proper manor

Seems expensive solution, why not cover it with a shower cap when showering. Anyway, I would say that is faulty.

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20 minutes ago, ditchcrawler said:

 and dispose of the battery in a proper manor

Was it one of the Russian owned stately homes? Never thought of that as a solution. Fill them up with our old lithium batteries. 

 

 

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1 hour ago, Bargebuilder said:

A nuisance alarm is a siren sounding that happens when, in this case, CO is not detected. If a CO alarm keeps going off erroneously it is 'crying wolfe' and may not be believed when CO is actually at a dangerous level. Hydrogen from battery gassing can be a culprit.

 

Hydrogen Sulphide gas is one you really want to be alerted to.  When it hits damp surfaces - such as your mucous membranes - it turns into sulphuric acid, which isn't great in your nose and lungs.

 

It's also a peculiar gas, because if you ignore the rotten egg smell your nose tunes it out after a while - you simply can't smell it at toxic dose levels.

 

I'm very glad that common CO detectors will trigger on it at fairly low levels.  It's not a nuisance alarm, it's something that needs attending to early.

 

@Alan de Enfield avoided a probable exploding battery when his CO alarm triggered - he's mentioned it on here a few times.

Edited by TheBiscuits
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10 minutes ago, TheBiscuits said:

@Alan de Enfield avoided a probable exploding battery when his CO alarm triggered - he's mentioned it on here a few times.

 

Twice in fact :

 

1st time was a couple of years ago when one battery was 'untouchably hot' and the alarm woke us in the middle of the night.

2nd time was a month ago when another battery in the bank developed an 'internal short circuit', and sent the CO alarm crazy.

 

When I got the batteries out, the 1st one had 4 volts, and this latter one was 1.8 volts - no wonder the battery charger fan was running continuously.

 

(I have a battery bank of 6x 230Ah batteries)

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1 hour ago, LadyG said:

Seems expensive solution, why not cover it with a shower cap when showering. Anyway, I would say that is faulty.

If she goes in the galley and cover the smoke detector with her shower cap what's she going to wear when she goes in the shower? I can't think of a cheaper soulution for a faulty smoke detector and I even had a spare on onboard.

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7 hours ago, MartynG said:

Then how do you otherwise detect carbon monoxide which is invisible and has no odour?

 

I don't particularly want to, as I don't see the need, because I keep my boat safe and well ventilated. I don't try to detect radioactivity, methane, ghosts, dragons or unicorns either.

I suppose if I was an idiot with a filthy boat, an unsafe stove and dangerous appliances they might be of some use. Alarms, I mean, not unicorns.

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There again, I haven't tried to turn my boat into a floating bungalow with all mod cons. I suppose if you've got fifteen batteries, microwaves, washing machines, freezers, central heating with diesel burners, computers, double glazing etc etc, you need to think of them same as you do a house and install a stack of safety devices. So ok, I'll grant that some people need them. I still think it's ridiculous being compulsory, as well as being against the original rationale of the check.

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22 hours ago, Bargebuilder said:

Any idea how many accidents on each, that would indicate if the BSS made a difference, or is it more gravy train than a safety scheme?

Given that both sets of regulations have been going for a while, it is a Catch-22 you posit. If they are working and preventing accidents etc then there will be no stats to count them. The longer they exist the harder it is to use stats to 'prove' their worth. This is where something between common sense and professional judgement come in - do we really think that a return to a wholly unregulated free for all would be a good thing?

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4 minutes ago, Mike Todd said:

Given that both sets of regulations have been going for a while, it is a Catch-22 you posit. If they are working and preventing accidents etc then there will be no stats to count them. The longer they exist the harder it is to use stats to 'prove' their worth. This is where something between common sense and professional judgement come in - do we really think that a return to a wholly unregulated free for all would be a good thing?

But we have more boats that are not BSS certified in the form of coastal vessels than we do inland waterways certified craft, so a comparison would be simple and accurate.

 

A much simplified test wouldn't be a bad thing, but ever adding more and more regulations, in my opinion is unnecessary and unproductive.

 

All the time the C&RT and the EA make money from running training courses and high administration charges, why would they change things.

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Internet makes a difference in all this as well. 

 

20 years ago some random geyser could have died on a boat due to a dodgy diesel heater in some obscure part of Englandland. Probably CO poisoning but I would never have heard about it. 

 

These days anything like this happens and it gets through to people. 

 

In theory this could be a Good Thing as it may result in people taking more care of their surroundings and personal safety but ...

 

It doesn't. It just causes more regulations and BS type things to happen. 

 

 

I always think of the pool keeper in these sorts of situations 

 

https://youtu.be/0WJIfykRoWo

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A couple of months ago I was chatting to a recently qualified BSS inspector and he told me that all in, the training process had cost him nearly £9,000. 

 

The whole gravy train is self perpetuating: more staff dreaming up more rules, the need for ever longer training courses, better qualified trainers, higher salary bills, more expensive courses, examiners that need to recover the higher training costs, needing to spend longer over examinations resulting in the need to charge ever higher prices. 

 

Everyone has their hand out and it's the good old boater who pays.

 

If coastal vessels, yachts, motorboats etc don't suffer from any more fires or explosions than inland vessels, then there is a very strong case for BSS reform, to only include a handful of safety crucial items. 

 

In my experience, some examiners have already done this, only checking the gas system for leaks, the fuel system, fire extinguishers, ventilation and a few other bits taking less than an hour, but still charging for 3 hours work.

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12 minutes ago, Bargebuilder said:

..........ventilation and a few other bits

 

Seems prettty pointless wasting valuable time looking at ventilation as it is not even a requirement for the BSS - you could have a hermetically sealed boat and it could not be failed. The BSS exaniner can only give 'advice' that "it may be better to have a bit more ventilation".

 

UNLESS the examiner declares UDI and makes up his own rules (which is not unknown)

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7 minutes ago, Alan de Enfield said:

 

Seems prettty pointless wasting valuable time looking at ventilation as it is not even a requirement for the BSS - you could have a hermetically sealed boat and it could not be failed. The BSS exaniner can only give 'advice' that "it may be better to have a bit more ventilation".

 

UNLESS the examiner declares UDI and makes up his own rules (which is not unknown)

You are quite right of course, but it's odd that they won't fail you with ventilation so inadequate that you are very likely to die of CO poisoning if your alarm runs out of battery.

 

I was failed for having an aft cabin separate from the main accomodation because it didn't have its own CO detector/alarm, even though it didn't contain any form of heater or cooking appliance or engine or anything that could produce CO. 

 

No ventilation, risk of death = pass

 

No detector but no CO producing equipment so CO poisoning vanishingly unlikely = fail.

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6 minutes ago, Bargebuilder said:

 

I was failed for having an aft cabin separate from the main accomodation because it didn't have its own CO detector/alarm, even though it didn't contain any form of heater or cooking appliance or engine or anything that could produce CO. 

 

I think he may have been wrong

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4 minutes ago, ditchcrawler said:

I think he may have been wrong

I thought so and quoted the section from the manual, but he stood his ground and refused to issue a certificate until I could prove I had bought a second CO alarm. Not just any alarm either, he took the back off to check that it didn't have a symbol of a sailing boat with a slash through it, indicating that it wasn't suitable for use on boats.

 

I assume that boat carbon monoxide is different from caravan carbon monoxide🥴 He didn't know the difference, but insisted anyway.

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14 minutes ago, Bargebuilder said:

I thought so and quoted the section from the manual, but he stood his ground and refused to issue a certificate until I could prove I had bought a second CO alarm. Not just any alarm either, he took the back off to check that it didn't have a symbol of a sailing boat with a slash through it, indicating that it wasn't suitable for use on boats.

 

I assume that boat carbon monoxide is different from caravan carbon monoxide🥴 He didn't know the difference, but insisted anyway.

I hope you fed that back to BSS management

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