Help - I cant shift the damn thing!

[Jak]

If I had RCR membership I definitely would have called them.  I don’t. Time to look into it again. So far I’ve managed to fix anything myself 😀

Very grateful to Wyvern, who have always been helpful and friendly. And probably could have charged me much more than they did!  Recovery, dry-dock, repair…

 

Edited May 27, 2023 by Jak

[sueb]

11 hours ago, Jak said:

Its too late for that now. But seriously. You think if I had called CRT they would have taken responsibility and come out to sort it?  Noticed no one else suggested that?

I did!!!

[dmr]

11 hours ago, Jak said:

Its too late for that now. But seriously. You think if I had called CRT they would have taken responsibility and come out to sort it?  Noticed no one else suggested that?

 

I was told recently that something similar happened on the Rochdale Manchester section and CRT did turn up, get the waders on and sort it out.

[Jak]

26 minutes ago, sueb said:

I did!!!

Yeh. True. Sorry about that!  Honestly not sure if it would have helped. But sounds like it might. We discussed this at Wyvern and did wonder. The matress definatley was not interfering with the navigation as was stuffed right up the back of my boat!

 

Edited May 27, 2023 by Jak

[cuthound]

Years ago, on our first shareboat I narrowly avoided getting a mattress around the prop.

 

Heading for Birmingham, we had just moored outside Brandwood Tunnel, simply because I didn't know if we would find good moorings on the other side. I had just finished tying up when a hire boat went past and collected the mattress as he entered the tunnel.

 

We tried to remove the mattress, without success and in the end he had to call the hire company out to remove it. It took them a couple of hours to remove it using bolt cutters. Since then I have always carried bolt cutters and a serrated pruning knife to deal with prop fouls.

[ditchcrawler]

These were recommended to me after a boat picked a mattress up on the Walsall. Thankfully I have not had to use them yet.

 

[haggis]

We had a double  interior sprung mattress round the orop many years ago on our way back to Chester from Ellesmere port. Iain struggled with the tools on board and I walked/ ran back to the port to see if someone could help or they could lend us tools. The museum was shut! On my way back to the boat I passed a couple of boats moored on the offside and when they heard of our problem they threw over a knife thing to see if it would work. They said to leave it under the mattress if we got it out. By using the knife and tying a rope between the fence and the mattress Iain eventually got it off. It had taken hours and he had the multi scratched arms to show for it. I think the cutting equipment on the (shared)  boat was improved after that. 

Edited May 28, 2023 by haggis

[jacob]

Worst we had was a small tyre that slipped itself quite neatly round the whole prop

[zenataomm]

6 minutes ago, jacob said:

Worst we had was a small tyre that slipped itself quite neatly round the whole prop

I bet that cavitated as if the prop had fallen off.

[Cheshire cat]

Going back to the days of shared ownership I remember CRT being called upon to accept responsiblity for the navigability of the channel. They removed the mattress.

[GUMPY]

Had similar years ago at Stoke Bruene, the boat was pulled into the top lock, the stern tied to the top gates and the lock slowly emptied until the prop was exposed. I then got down on the cill and cut the rubbish off with bolt cutters. Lock was refilled and I was on my way.  Luckily there were a couple of people who had done it before on hand to show me how it's done.

 

[Stroudwater1]

How really unfortunate for you. Glad it’s been sorted. Happened twice with us, worst one I had was a keepnet from angling though tbh. 
 

The trouble with bolt croppers is the wide ness of the handles when the cropper opens make it difficult to make some of the cuts needed as weed hatches are usually narrow bow to stern So except for a side cut 90 degrees from the propshaft access is usually hard. The  spring wires are at different angles. Also each cut takes a while to get to find with hefty croppers  and you need to ideally guide the croppers in to get at each  wire you’ve  found.

 The ones @ditchcrawler has posted are brilliant, maybe tie a piece of elastic round the handle and a loop round your wrist to stop them being dropped whilst cutting. 

Mattresses often have a thick surround wire top and bottom that seem to  need hacksawing off first. Try to clear fabric off where possible, breadknife can be handy for that. We found pulling the mattress by hand away from the stern with a rope round  a part not wrapped round the prop puts tension on areas to concentrate on cutting and as each important wire comes off the next one needing cutting becomes apparent . Try tension from different angles as that seems to make a difference. Aim for the most tense smaller wire from the springs as that’s usually the ones most likely to be twisted round. Don’t despair and keep cutting. Many cuts  will make no difference. Try also to pull the wires over the prop blades and concentrate cutting ones that won’t go over 

 

NB watch out for fevers up to a few days after these sort of prolonged hand or body in water situation’s Weils disease is easy to overlook and you need to raise  that a clear possibility with a Doctor ASAP if you get fevers up to a few days afterwards. The Doctor needs to be aware if it too, they shouldn’t mind you pointing it out. Easy to treat sadly can be fatal if left too late 

[MrsM]

3 hours ago, Stroudwater1 said:

How really unfortunate for you. Glad it’s been sorted. Happened twice with us, worst one I had was a keepnet from angling though tbh. 
 

The trouble with bolt croppers is the wide ness of the handles when the cropper opens make it difficult to make some of the cuts needed as weed hatches are usually narrow bow to stern So except for a side cut 90 degrees from the propshaft access is usually hard. The  spring wires are at different angles. Also each cut takes a while to get to find with hefty croppers  and you need to ideally guide the croppers in to get at each  wire you’ve  found.

 The ones @ditchcrawler has posted are brilliant, maybe tie a piece of elastic round the handle and a loop round your wrist to stop them being dropped whilst cutting. 

Mattresses often have a thick surround wire top and bottom that seem to  need hacksawing off first. Try to clear fabric off where possible, breadknife can be handy for that. We found pulling the mattress by hand away from the stern with a rope round  a part not wrapped round the prop puts tension on areas to concentrate on cutting and as each important wire comes off the next one needing cutting becomes apparent . Try tension from different angles as that seems to make a difference. Aim for the most tense smaller wire from the springs as that’s usually the ones most likely to be twisted round. Don’t despair and keep cutting. Many cuts  will make no difference. Try also to pull the wires over the prop blades and concentrate cutting ones that won’t go over 

 

NB watch out for fevers up to a few days after these sort of prolonged hand or body in water situation’s Weils disease is easy to overlook and you need to raise  that a clear possibility with a Doctor ASAP if you get fevers up to a few days afterwards. The Doctor needs to be aware if it too, they shouldn’t mind you pointing it out. Easy to treat sadly can be fatal if left too late 

What an extremely useful post for those of us fortunate enough not to have experienced this. Thank you!

[Oddjob]

Had under wired bra stuck once hell off job getting it off, wife laughing saying I had lost my touch. Lol

 

 

 

[Guest]

Our two worst prop fouls were two bags of old clothes, one on the Erewash after just leaving the basin and the other while dropping down into Leeds. Complete pain but not as difficult to remove as a matress.

 

You do wonder about the cerebral capacity of people that chuck things in a canal.

 

We heald up a film crew filiming a dance group at the lock we ground to a halt to outside Leeds whilst I wrestled with idiots tracksuits they couldnt be bothered to upcycle or dispose of properly.

3 minutes ago, M_JG said:

Our two worst prop fouls were two bags of old clothes, one on the Erewash after just leaving the basin and the other while dropping down into Leeds. Complete pain but not as difficult to remove as a matress.

 

You do wonder about the cerebral capacity of people that chuck things in a canal.

 

We heald up a film crew filiming a dance group at the lock we ground to a halt to outside Leeds whilst I wrestled with an idiots tracksuits that they couldnt be bothered to upcycle or dispose of properly.

 

 

No idea why that posted twice.

 

Nor why I cant delete the double post.

[ditchcrawler]

2 hours ago, M_JG said:

 

No idea why that posted twice.

 

Nor why I cant delete the double post.

It does that

[Guest]

3 minutes ago, ditchcrawler said:

It does that

 

Its wierd because when I try to edit the post to remove the duplicate post it only shows a single post.

[LadyG]

On 29/05/2023 at 17:30, Oddjob said:

Had under wired bra stuck once hell off job getting it off, wife laughing saying I had lost my touch. Lol

 

 

 

Was it DD?

[jonathanA]

On 29/05/2023 at 17:30, Oddjob said:

Had under wired bra stuck once hell off job getting it off, wife laughing saying I had lost my touch. Lol

 

 

 

a little while ago our washing machine was making a horrendous noise, fearing the worst I called out our tame washing machine man who  listened to the noise nodded wisely in the way they do....  then dived in to the drum with a pair of pliers and came out holding one of SWMBOs bra under wire things that had got stuck in one of the holes in the drum....    pesky things...