Cornering

[Keeping Up]

Here's a good game you can try next time you're out cruising.

 

You have probably noticed that if you get the stern too close to the bank, with some power being applied to the prop, then the stern tends to suck itself in towards that bank. You can use this effect: as you approach a corner, let the boat ever-so-gently drift towards the outside of the bend (always a good thing to do anyway). If you get the timing right, just before you reach the corner the stern will move itself towards the bank and so the bows start to turn into the corner all by themselves. Keeping the tiller straight, you can let the boat complete the whole corner by itself, and if you've timed it absolutely perfectly the bows will be back in mid-canal when you are nearing the end of the corner so that the boat is now travelling slightly away from the bank again so that it stops turning and sets itself on a straight course along the next stretch of canal.

 

If you hit the outside bank you'd moved across too late. If you hit the inside bank you'd moved across too early. You can trim the direction a little, still without moving the tiller, by adjusting the throttle. It's fun to try it, and of course if it isn't working you just steer as normal to continue.

 

A really good boat can actually find the deep channel and stay in it all the way (my boat is quite good but tends to leave it too late and then over-compensate).

 

Allan

[BlueStringPudding]

I'd like to be able to corner like the Batmobile.

 

Failing that I find blind panic and crashing into the bank enables the boat to ricochet off and round the corner (via clobbering the opposite bank too). Works everytime but does spill your Cointreau.

[charles123]

I tried something like that in the junction of the Runcorn arm and the Bridgewater, no one about so I thought I would try ithe turn at speed, I tucked well into the bank on the inside of the turn and the bow would just not come round, I was heading for the outside of the turn with the bow, chickened and went hard astern and just stopped short of the bank with the bow. Took me a while to figure out what went wrong, in the end I figured the stern was pulled into the bank and even with the rudder hard over and plenty of power on it would not come away from the bank

 

Charles

[Mr Baites]

greyt gaym av dun it evri day unall

Edited November 26, 2007 by Mr Baites

[bristol & argo]

Here's a good game you can try next time you're out cruising.

 

You have probably noticed that if you get the stern too close to the bank, with some power being applied to the prop, then the stern tends to suck itself in towards that bank. You can use this effect: as you approach a corner, let the boat ever-so-gently drift towards the outside of the bend (always a good thing to do anyway). If you get the timing right, just before you reach the corner the stern will move itself towards the bank and so the bows start to turn into the corner all by themselves. Keeping the tiller straight, you can let the boat complete the whole corner by itself, and if you've timed it absolutely perfectly the bows will be back in mid-canal when you are nearing the end of the corner so that the boat is now travelling slightly away from the bank again so that it stops turning and sets itself on a straight course along the next stretch of canal.

We have enough trouble with that effect just going in a straight line! let alone encouraging it to happen.

 

A really good boat can actually find the deep channel and stay in it all the way (my boat is quite good but tends to leave it too late and then over-compensate).

 

Allan

I think my boat's really good, but there isn't a channel anymore in most places. In other places the comparatively short modern boats have taken short cuts around bends so the 'channel' is too close to the apex.

I remember on the K&A having port side bow and stern, and starboard midships all releasing bubbles from the mud at the same time on one tight bend.

 

Simon

[Chris Pink]

We have enough trouble with that effect just going in a straight line! let alone encouraging it to happen.

I think my boat's really good, but there isn't a channel anymore in most places. In other places the comparatively short modern boats have taken short cuts around bends so the 'channel' is too close to the apex.

I remember on the K&A having port side bow and stern, and starboard midships all releasing bubbles from the mud at the same time on one tight bend.

 

Simon

 

When Geoff and Jenny had Bristol and before the western K&A became a concrete channel, they had enormous fun getting serially stuck, their favourites being the outside of the turn at Avoncliff and a slab of rock at Claverton, that one took quite a few innocent bystanders to tug off. I have been stuck there too, gurt flat bit of rock, right on the obvious channel to the bridge hole, a moment of inattention is all it ever takes.

 

Despite this I always coveted Bristol, but she is one of the deepest narrow boats i know, very nice conversion, keeping a good line to her.

 

Bring her down her again, could do with a bit of channel carving, especially around Woolhampton

[bristol & argo]

When Geoff and Jenny had Bristol and before the western K&A became a concrete channel, they had enormous fun getting serially stuck, their favourites being the outside of the turn at Avoncliff and a slab of rock at Claverton, that one took quite a few innocent bystanders to tug off. I have been stuck there too, gurt flat bit of rock, right on the obvious channel to the bridge hole, a moment of inattention is all it ever takes.

 

Despite this I always coveted Bristol, but she is one of the deepest narrow boats i know, very nice conversion, keeping a good line to her.

 

Bring her down her again, could do with a bit of channel carving, especially around Woolhampton

 

She's not especially deep, it's just she is quite deep over the whole length.

 

We're not intending to come back unless they make it a broad canal again.... i.e. 14'1" x 71' at each end of a river bit would do.

Unfortunately a pair of Woolwiches breasted won't fit:

out of the bottom of Woolhampton lock where the piled cut is banana shaped (bowhauling down through the swingbridge!),

out of the bottom of Newbury lock stop plank channels protrude,

Hampstead lock thats about 14' wide at the bottom (the boats stopped 6" from the bottom),

the lock above Guyers where the gates don't quite open far enough,

and everywhere that a gate won't open fully, it's always the one onfront of the motor!

 

Simon.

[1066]

Failing that I find blind panic and crashing into the bank enables the boat to ricochet off and round the corner (via clobbering the opposite bank too). Works everytime but does spill your Cointreau.

 

That sounds like my method for going through tunnels. I'm trying to copyright it as the 'Ping Pong Effect.'

[BlueStringPudding]

That sounds like my method for going through tunnels. I'm trying to copyright it as the 'Ping Pong Effect.'

 

Excellent terminology.

[Chris Pink]

She's not especially deep, it's just she is quite deep over the whole length.

 

We're not intending to come back unless they make it a broad canal again.... i.e. 14'1" x 71' at each end of a river bit would do.

Unfortunately a pair of Woolwiches breasted won't fit:

out of the bottom of Woolhampton lock where the piled cut is banana shaped (bowhauling down through the swingbridge!),

out of the bottom of Newbury lock stop plank channels protrude,

Hampstead lock thats about 14' wide at the bottom (the boats stopped 6" from the bottom),

the lock above Guyers where the gates don't quite open far enough,

and everywhere that a gate won't open fully, it's always the one onfront of the motor!

 

Simon.

 

A while ago i took my pair down Bath flight, got stuck to varying degrees in every single lock (and i can get through the South Oxford with the chains tight), it took nearly 5 hours, normally takes 2, since then i single them out for all the K&A locks, much much quicker and easier.