Boat at Mountsorrel

[sociable_hermit]

Thanks Carl.

 

"completely unrelated to your pictures"

 

Ah well... pity!

[carlt]

Thanks Carl.

 

"completely unrelated to your pictures"

 

Ah well... pity!

But...I have seen a few canal boats made from the plates of older boats and it isn't totally impossible that a boat with distinctly home brew looking pointy bits, but with professional, quality looking rivetting, in between, hasn't started life as something else.

[RLWP]

But...I have seen a few canal boats made from the plates of older boats and it isn't totally impossible that a boat with distinctly home brew looking pointy bits, but with professional, quality looking rivetting, in between, hasn't started life as something else.

 

Trouble is that the home brew pointy bits include a nice rivetted vertical lap down at the waterline, and a nice set of horizontal rivets at the top. I'd have thought a home builder would have reached for a welder

 

Richard

[pete harrison]

we are puzzled to know where the assumption has begun that this is infact a BCN vessel?

 

At post 20 I wrote

 

"I have not seen this boat close up but I am thinking either riveted iron B.C.N. day boat or riveted iron mud hopper. If it is a former B.C.N. boat then there is a possibility that it may retain one or both of its B.C.N. gauge plates."

 

This was based on SCORPIO appearing to be have originally been double sterned, added to which the word "riveted" instantly makes me think either a B.C.N. day boat or a maintenance craft of some sort. Having now seen this boat close up via your additional photographs I am inclined to think SCORPIO was unlikely to have been a B.C.N. day boat due to its style / pattern of riveting, but I am not ruling it out just yet as there were so many day boat variants.

[alan_fincher]

Different Harrises! The first is the boatbuilders at Bumblehole on the BCN who were building rivetted hulls until the 1960s including some built as pleasure boats, whereas the latter is a boatyard at Syston.

 

David

Yes,

 

I know that, and was fully aware that Harris who now have the boat are unlikely to be conected to the old outfit at Bumblehole. I was trying to suggest that Harris Brothers (Bumblehole) were both converting existing boats, and even doing riveted new builds into the 1960s, so the possibility of a boat built for leisure rather than work, but still using rivets, theoretically exists. However, I was also trying to suggest that a 1930s date would be inconsistent with that.

 

Sorry if that was not clear.

 

My own original Stewarts and Lloyds boat, (probably a Bantock) had been converted by Harris Bros in the 1960s, so I'm quite aware who they were, and the crudeness of their steel and iron work!

 

we are puzzled to know where the assumption has begun that this is infact a BCN vessel?

Well this doesn't possess the lines of a normal working motor boat or butty.

 

If you are considering 70 foot plus, 7 foot wide riveted boats built for canals, that don't resemble a motor boat or butty, then there aren't really a great deal of other options except short haul "day boats", and most of the survivors of these have BCN origins. (Or thinks like mud hoppers, usually looking quite unlike anything else).

 

The additional pictures you posted indicate a boat with lines not unlike many BCN boats, probably originally designed that a rudder could be hung either end, but what is troubling me is riveting and plate-work that is not in a typical day boat style, and would look more at home on a recognised narrow boat motor or butty.

 

I think it has spurred genuine interest, because even the experts, (which I am not!), have so far failed to look at it and say "Ah, I know what that is!"......

 

I think we would all like the mystery solved!

[Paul H]

 

If you are considering 70 foot plus, 7 foot wide riveted boats built for canals, that don't resemble a motor boat or butty, then there aren't really a great deal of other options except short haul "day boats", and most of the survivors of these have BCN origins. (Or thinks like mud hoppers, usually looking quite unlike anything else).

 

The additional pictures you posted indicate a boat with lines not unlike many BCN boats, probably originally designed that a rudder could be hung either end, but what is troubling me is riveting and plate-work that is not in a typical day boat style, and would look more at home on a recognised narrow boat motor or butty.

 

I think it has spurred genuine interest, because even the experts, (which I am not!), have so far failed to look at it and say "Ah, I know what that is!"......

 

I think we would all like the mystery solved!

 

I'm no expert either but my vote would go to the converted mud hopper theory. There used to be quite a few of these around on the Grand Union both wide and narrow and they were bluff rivetted craft flush-sided with a double skin - ie with a tank inside for dredgings which on this boat has been cut out. The Thames Conservancy curiously also had a number of narrow riveted hoppers which they sold off in the 1970s to canal enthusiasts. One of these was renamed Pumpkin and was initially used to carry cargoes of pumpkins to the USAF base at Upper Heyford from Clattercote Wharf but later was converted to a houseboat at Stockton. There is a pic in a very old Waterways World.

 

Paul

[Richard T]

Planning documents Here.

 

Site plan shows boats 'removed'.

 

I have now formally commented on this application on the Charnwood Planning website - as yet they are not visible the council will want to verify them before publishing.

The 'harbour' is only suitable for cruisers it is only 23m wide and 50m long. Is there a demand for cruiser moorings in the area?

[David Mack]

I was trying to suggest that Harris Brothers (Bumblehole) were both converting existing boats, and even doing riveted new builds into the 1960s, so the possibility of a boat built for leisure rather than work, but still using rivets, theoretically exists.

 

 

They certainly did. There was a feature in Waterways World a year or two ago about a new build rivetted pleasure boat hull, with wooden cabin, that Harris (Bumblehole) built in the 60s, and which I believe is still about somewhere.

 

David

[fuzzyduck]

The 'harbour' is only suitable for cruisers it is only 23m wide and 50m long. Is there a demand for cruiser moorings in the area?

 

Well, it is a river, so it does have a pretty large cruiser population.

[Speedwheel]

They certainly did. There was a feature in Waterways World a year or two ago about a new build rivetted pleasure boat hull, with wooden cabin, that Harris (Bumblehole) built in the 60s, and which I believe is still about somewhere.

 

David

 

They did one called the Tasmania Talisman. Still about I believe.

 

This would have been built about mid 60's. I should be able to get the exact date.

 

Not sure if they did put the cabin on.I have a picture of Malcolm Braine towing it away cabinless, so he or someone else may have put it on.

Edited February 15, 2011 by Speedwheel

[Speedwheel]

and the crudeness of their steel and iron work!

Talisman has flush rivitted butt joints but only appears to have a single row of rivets in each plate.

[alan_fincher]

Talisman has flush rivitted butt joints but only appears to have a single row of rivets in each plate.

My boat from years back was a very inelegant Harris Bros shortening of a BCN boat.

 

The platework on the back here is hard to see, but I was always told early 60s by Harris. The plates are overlapped, not butted, but perhaps they are just following the style of the original boat.

 

Sorry not very easy to see, I suspect......

 

 

On the other hand a Previous thread about "Typhoon" established it as a 1940s build by Harris Brothers.

 

Look at the pics in there..... Certainly at the front, it has butted plates.

 

So certainly some boats built for the BCN do have "neater" platework.

 

Not sure any of this is too relevant to the Mountsorrel boat, though!

[pete harrison]

They certainly did. There was a feature in Waterways World a year or two ago about a new build rivetted pleasure boat hull, with wooden cabin, that Harris (Bumblehole) built in the 60s, and which I believe is still about somewhere.

 

David

 

Although these fall outside of my field of interest I can confirm that William Harris & Son, Bumble Hole, Netherton built six purpose built riveted pleasure boat hulls in 1960 / 61. At that time they were also regularly employed in the conversion of redundant carrying boat hulls into pleasure boats.

[benfordboy]

 

Resurrecting a old thread this boat had the old wood top removed so only the hull remained & she sat for ages , then a 'new' owner appeared , built a short wood cabin on the back, started the motor & sailed off towards Wales (Llangollen we presume)

 

Anyone know what has become of her ????

[carlt]

 

Anyone know what has become of her ????

Wedged fast in a narrow Welsh lock?

[benfordboy]

Wedged fast in a narrow Welsh lock?

 

Possibly

[matty40s]

Yes, he was on the shroppie a couple of weeks ago, cheshire rose and myself posted pics of the boat up. The new owner has looked into the history with not much success but has been told it may have been a tanker vessel on the bcn at some point.