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LoopyLou

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This is so exciting. I suppose I should ask the question. Do they build good boats? Bit late to ask now we have brought her :-)

 

The Waterways Guide with writing on http://www.flickr.com/photos/76958719@N04/8188665064/in/photostream

 

Do you think they keep history of their boat? Is it worth asking them?

 

It can't hurt to ask

 

Welcome to the ex-hire boat owners club.

 

Richard

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This is so exciting. I suppose I should ask the question. Do they build good boats? Bit late to ask now we have brought her :-)

 

The Waterways Guide with writing on http://www.flickr.com/photos/76958719@N04/8188665064/in/photostream

 

Do you think they keep history of their boat? Is it worth asking them?

 

If you mean Shire Cruisers - it could be worth contacting them to see if they have any history knowledge of the boat -

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.

 

The Manuel for the Lister LPW(s)3 which has been run under water and now terminally ill. If anyone knows where I can get one for her would love to hear from you.

The other is a West Yorkshire Waterways Guide with "Shire Cruisers Please Leave" written on the front

Forum member Chris-B is a professional Lister specialist and may be able to help you. (Other Lister specialists may be available but he's the one I know). I have never heard of a Lister being "terminally" ill. Did you say that it had been run under water? That says a lot about the durability of old Listers!

 

The "Shire Cruisers Please Leave" was stuck on the boat by a waterside dweller who did not like hire boats mooring outside his house. Perhaps.

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the link I put in post 22 took you to shire cruisers web site.

 

There's every possibility that they may know the boat and it's history

 

edit:

Postal address:

Shire Cruisers, The Wharf, Sowerby Bridge, West Yorkshire HX6 2AG, England

 

Telephone:

01422 832712

Overseas tel: + 44 1422 832712

fax: 01422 839565

Email:

info@shirecruisers.co.uk

 

Directors: Nigel Stevens MBA, Susan Stevens BA ARCO

Edited by Proper Job
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Is the boat builder register with british waterways (the trust) from new?

 

What engine do you think it originally had?

 

Boat builders don't register with the Trust but the boats they build are when they first get registered/licensed.

 

The engine question is out my sphere of knowledge but there will be folk on here who will know. :cheers:

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What engine do you think it originally had?

The almost universal engine of choice in hire boats in the 1970s was an air cooled Lister.

 

The SR series (SR2 2-cylinder, or SR3 3-cylinder) was still in production when tour boat was built, but by then so were the more powerful ST series (ST2 or ST3).

 

Any of those is possible, (I'd say 2-cylinder more likely than 3-cylinder in a boat that long), but if it once had an air cooled engine you might expect to either have holes in the upper hull sides where the air ducting went, or to have welded-up evidence of the same, if a water cooled engine was fitted as a replacement.

 

Of course a boat originally with an air-cooled engine would not have had a skin tank for a water cooled engine, so, (assuming yours is not raw water cooled), that would have had to be a hull modification.

 

Another possibility is that it was always water cooled, as the BMC 1500 engines were also widely used, (I think the BMC 1800 wasn't yet in use in 1975, but may be wrong).

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1975? I guess an earler Lister would be a strong possibility, perhaps an SR2 which was commonly fitted in hire boats of that era.

If you are lucky, Loopy, someone at Shire Cruisers will remember her - it depends if the company is still in the same family as it was back then. As Proper Job suggests, it's worth trying them. In an ideal world they'll have a file copy of a '70s brochure with a photo of the boat in her original condition.

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Is the boat builder register with british waterways (the trust) from new?

 

The other day buried under alot of rubbish we found a few books.

 

The Manuel for the Lister LPW(s)3 which has been run under water and now terminally ill. If anyone knows where I can get one for her would love to hear from you.

The other is a West Yorkshire Waterways Guide with "Shire Cruisers Please Leave" written on the front

 

I can email you a parts manual and an operators manual in pdf format for the LPWS3 if you like and want to pm me with your email.

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Her name is MEMETTE which we dont know where it originated and registration number 076364

British Waterways Board first issued index numbers in 1980 with index 76364 being issued in 1982, and at that time it was a standard pleasure boat licence rather than a hire a reward licence. Interestingly by 1985 it was licenced as a hire and reward. Oh yes, back then it was named TYKE.

 

From Jim Shead's site...

 

MEMETTE Built by SOWERBY - Length 13.72 metres (45 feet ) - Beam 2.07 metres (6 feet 9 inches ) - Draft 0.01 metres ( ) Metal hull, power of 29 BHP. Registered with British Waterways number 76364 as a Powered. Last registration recorded on 20-Apr-2012.

Jim Shead's website publishes information obtained directly from British Waterways Board under the Freedom of Information Act, and in future will presumably come from Canal and River Trust. This information is only what is supplied to British Waterways Boat by boat owners via their licence application, so is often incorrect and should be at least treated with suspicion with these older boats.

Edited by pete harrison
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Good stuff. It looks as if it had been taken over since they built your boat, hence the (1986) part of its name. It also suggests that Memette/ Tyke had a long career as a hire boat.

Edited by Athy
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More News..... History is coming together and thought I would share with all of you after all your help

 

Built - Canal & River Craft Ltd

 

Email Information from Shire Cruisers "It was intended to go as a sponsored boat to Adventure Cruisers at Catforth on the Lancaster Canal. I have no record of its intended name. It was largely finished apart from having no engine when Canal & River Craft failed in 1982.

It was then bought at auction by another company which was on this site at the time.

They sold it to the then landlord of a local pub, who called it Tyke after one of his brews, or the other way round. He fitted a secondhand BMC 1.5 engine, and lived on it for a bit, using plastic beer pipe for his gas system….

We then bought it from him in about 1983, finished it off and ran it in our fleet as Rutland. We changed the engine (new Lister LPWS3) in 1989.

We sold it in February 1992."

 

Neil is an amazing man to still have records. He is going to try and find me some photos :-)

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So your 1975 boat is in fact a 1982 boat, which can't be bad. What's more, it was built by a completely different company from the one you thought it was! Ain't history wonderful?

Full marks to the hire fleet operator for supplying the information.

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