Shroppie Shelf

[dor]

One method is to approach the bank 30 degrees at full speed, at the last moment swing the tiller allowing the boat to broadside the bank which results in the boat sitting up on top of the shelf negating the need for any fenders or mooring lines

 

Been there, done that...

[Rebotco]

Been there, done that...

 

 

Bloody 'ooligans!!

 

Brian

[Masquerade]

Please do! And also explain how you and your fine crew get off the bloody shelf when you've had your fill of Jazz riffs and falling down water!

 

Jazz? Think you got the wrong pub for that, and no I'm not letting on other than I was demonstrating something I picked up from an old timer. It worked OK just didn't know about the shelf then and it's just at the right level to park your boat on the towpath side about 200m down from the jct heading toward Nantwich!

 

Suffice to say that some old codger came past us minus his skier in a boat with an exagerated bow and 27" draft. The resulting waves managed to free us

 

 

Been there, done that...

 

No problems with banging about, no mither with passing boats. It's obviously the Shroppie way to moor up

[Doorman]

Suffice to say that some old codger came past us minus his skier in a boat with an exagerated bow and 27" draft. The resulting waves managed to free us

 

 

 

I know the bloke in question. I've spotted him on numerous occasions.......when looking in the bloody mirror!

[Degobah Schooner]

We just moored up the other night in the dark, North of Nantwich just before the Llangollen Junction. Not in a sign posted mooring site ... thus we met the shelf!

Did a night with nothing special and we didn’t sink, did some reading as Storm Francis came in. (40+ mph gusts.)
The shelf is pretty obvious when you moor in the area (off of the marked mooring areas) as an underwater ledge that prevents you mooring snug against the towpath side. It bangs and grates your boat with the wind and wakes. Apparently the actual canal is shallow on the towpath side in these parts anyway, we have apretty standard liverpool boat draught..

In RECAP of the previous posts found here, the other entry I found on canalworld about the shelf and a quick fix we found worked, read on:

 

- Most folks, get prepped pre-Shropshire canal visit and get wheelbarrow wheels or go-kart wheels, hung from the boat, like fenders, but floating on the surface sideways, allowing the boat to clear the sill and bump against the nice soft rubber of the wheels instead.

 

- Some folks don't do anything about the shelf, moor up and weather the knocking sound in the night. I've seen a bunch of boats that haven't done anything special.

 

- I read an entry where on describing taking boats out and looking at the hull post shelf times and they noted it can damage the boat, at the least the blacking, worst it'll take a go at the metal. Which makes sense to me given your boats side is resting against largely old, uneven concrete mass, with the repetitive wind or wakes washing you up against it. Hence the horrible sounds. Also someone said they were unlucky and the shelf damaged their propeller.

 

Given this we erred on the side of caution - especially with the storm, so we went for a QUICK FIX:

 

See the pictures, but what we've gone for is taking some pieces of wood, little planks essentially,  the slats from a single bed and wedging them into the bottom of the canal between the boat and the ledge.

We used 3x for the bow, stern and middle, where you keep the fenders and pushed them into the canal bottom by hand then with sledge hammer to fix them at a 45 ish degree angle and then pulled the boat onto them, instead of the ledge.

 

The idea came from someone recommending using their poles to do this, ours were too big or a bad fit. Essentially you could use any wood or similar thing to wedge between you and the ledge. Old fence posts, windblow branches, sheets of wood etc..

 

IT WORKED ! I suspect this won’t work everywhere but it did manage to stop us banging, clanging and scraping even with the storm. Best of luck.
 

[Tracy D'arth]

You need a Nuneaton  Nudger.

 

 

 

 

 

A 3 seater settee.

[TheBiscuits]

29 minutes ago, Degobah Schooner said:

We used 3x for the bow, stern and middle, where you keep the fenders and pushed them into the canal bottom by hand then with sledge hammer to fix them at a 45 ish degree angle and then pulled the boat onto them, instead of the ledge.

 

Good thinking.  I strongly approve of people thinking how to solve a problem with what they have to hand, even if it's a bit unconventional.

 

A couple of "Shroppie Wheels" are much less effort though, especially if you intend to be on there regularly.  They come in handy in all sorts of places too, not just on the Shroppie.

 

@bizzard would probably have made a meccano jetty ...

[Tracy D'arth]

1 minute ago, TheBiscuits said:

 

Good thinking.  I strongly approve of people thinking how to solve a problem with what they have to hand, even if it's a bit unconventional.

 

A couple of "Shroppie Wheels" are much less effort though, especially if you intend to be on there regularly.  They come in handy in all sorts of places too, not just on the Shroppie.

 

@bizzard would probably have made a meccano jetty ...

Ally car wheels and tyres, lighter than steel, don't leave rust marks in the roof.

In some places the shelf is too wide even for wheels.

I have a pair of solid rubber long fenders that sink, put them on before mooring up and they keep the hull off the shelf.

[Bod]

Sinking rubber fenders is how we do it.  Just moor up tight.

 

Bod