Historic Boats for sale online

[Tonka]

47 minutes ago, Stilllearning said:

I agree it looks silly, but some people like them. I watched a very similar job being added to an otherwise really well-made replica motor several years ago and kept my mouth shut, each to their own?

Was that the Ian Kemp built boat which someone bought and added the steel at the front

[Paul Graves]

If it would help to clarify the question of the fore end of Hydrus; the originally planned interior layout dictated a cabin of a certain length. When drawn to scale, it became obvious that 11ft of clothed up area was more aesthetically pleasing than the 8ft available and so, the compromise was reached that by making the final 3ft cloth shaped, both of these criteria could be met.

As these boats were originally clothed up and not designed as tugs, it was considered that cloths were a more true representation than a tug deck.

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder and the new owner would of course be at liberty to change and adjust the boat to suit their own personal preferences.
 

[Stilllearning]

1 hour ago, Tonka said:

Was that the Ian Kemp built boat which someone bought and added the steel at the front

I suspect not, it depends on the boat name; I'm trying to be discreet 

 

[Graham_Robinson]

2 hours ago, Paul Graves said:

 

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder and the new owner would of course be at liberty to change and adjust the boat to suit their own personal preferences.
 

Beautifully put you little/small/tiny/laal beaut..

 

 

Edited September 1, 2023 by Graham_Robinson

[matty40s]

On 31/08/2023 at 15:37, Paul H said:

That’s my former boat Capricorn (which obviously I shouldn’t have sold!). 

No, you shouldnt have, now when passing Bugbrooke, we have to smile at the gaily painted floating shed.

[noddyboater]

9 hours ago, IanD said:

Agree that would look better, but good luck finding a shell fabricator who'll do that -- curved plates over curved frames... 😉

 

 

 

 

A BOATBUILDER capable of replicating the complex shape of an historic bow and stern would find it a doddle. 

A fabricator accustomed to pre-cut and folded steel would undoubtedly struggle. 

[merline]

Carina    https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=pfbid0sx15Q1XxHLCeWjgFiRYZKgkzVX7D5CsV53GAAeAFLtS877RRtu3EhwhUejAALUi1l&id=515680266

[magnetman]

I always thought the small Northwich butties were the best ones. Lovely candidate for electric elum conversion I think. 

 

How cool would that be a silent butty. 

 

 

[spud]

3 hours ago, magnetman said:

I always thought the small Northwich butties were the best ones. Lovely candidate for electric elum conversion I think. 

 

How cool would that be a silent butty. 

butties are all silent, and cease to be a butty when fitted with a propulsion unit

Edited September 2, 2023 by spud

[magnetman]

I was mostly pointing out that there is a major danger of the boat being cut.

 

They do still cut these despite most reasonable people realising this is unacceptable. 

 

Wasn't Hydrus a butty? Now a motor on market for 80 grand with nothing inside it. 

 

 

Motorising a butty using original elum is a way to potentially avoid the cutting. 

Towing it behind a motor is an even better way. 

 

I find it interesting that a seller would 'vet' a purchaser presumably to stop this sort if thing happening. 

 

Its a bit like someone selling a flat where the neighbour is a relative and saying 'no BTL landlords to buy the property'. 

 

Once you have bought it then you can do what you like with it. 

 

 

Its a nice boat one hopes it stays that way. 

 

 

Edited September 2, 2023 by magnetman

[noddyboater]

4 minutes ago, magnetman said:

I was mostly pointing out that there is a major danger of the boat being cut.

 

They do still cut these despite most reasonable people realising this is unacceptable. 

 

Wasn't Hydrus a butty? Now a motor on market for 80 grand with nothing inside it. 

 

 

Motorising a butty using original elum is a way to potentially avoid the cutting. 

Towing it behind a motor is an even better way. 

 

I find it interesting that a seller would 'vet' a purchaser presumably to stop this sort if thing happening. 

 

Its a bit like someone selling a flat where the neighbour is a relative and saying 'no BTL landlords to buy the property'. 

 

Once you have bought it then you can do what you like with it. 

 

 

Its a nice boat one hopes it stays that way. 

 

 

Unless I've got my boats wrong,  which is quite possible,  Hydrus was motorised many years ago with a Petter in the stern. 

It's probably spent more time with an engine than unpowered. 

[magnetman]

1 minute ago, noddyboater said:

Unless I've got my boats wrong,  which is quite possible,  Hydrus was motorised many years ago with a Petter in the stern. 

It's probably spent more time with an engine than unpowered. 

 

I didn't know that I thought it had been done recently. Maybe it has been re-done recently. That makes sense. 

 

I'm pretty sure Roger Farrington cut a butty not long ago at Braunston. 

 

Maybe it is no longer happening. If so then good. 

 

 

4 minutes ago, noddyboater said:

Unless I've got my boats wrong,  which is quite possible,  Hydrus was motorised many years ago with a Petter in the stern. 

It's probably spent more time with an engine than unpowered. 

 

According to the HNBOC the Hydrus is the boat which was previously motorised -as a butty- and I recall it being moored above Cassio bridge lock. 

 

https://hnbc.org.uk/boats/hydrus

 

So it does look like it was cut in the last 5 yars or so. 

 

 

 

At Roger Farrington's yard post 2016 (from hnboc website)

 

LP

 

 

May be a different Hydrus to the one in the historic boats for sale thread? 

 

 

(Hydrus advertised as a motor with a new riveted counter in keeping. It is no longer a butty. 

 

 

http://www.tollhouseboatsales.com/detail.phtml?id=711170

 

Looks a bit different these days 

 

 

 

[noddyboater]

I'm pretty sure I viewed it around 7 years ago in the arm at WFBC Stockton.  John owned it who also had Kenelm.  It had the engine beds in the stern and was composite, full length. 

It must have gone from there to Braunston when it sold.

[magnetman]

I much prefer to see a boat with the original stern still on it.

 

 

[dave moore]

I knew this boat in the 60s, then owned by the wife of a friend. I completely agree with Sarah about getting the “ right “ owner, hopefully someone has already reserved her.

[MtB]

4 hours ago, magnetman said:

I always thought the small Northwich butties were the best ones. Lovely candidate for electric elum conversion I think. 

 

How cool would that be a silent butty. 

 

 

 

Excellent idea, appeals to me too!

 

Underwater electric motors are probably quite expensive though, so an inboard motor running a conventional hydraulic elum might be necessary. 

 

How would you charge the batteries? A Honda E20i?

 

 

😂

[alan_fincher]

1 hour ago, magnetman said:

I was mostly pointing out that there is a major danger of the boat being cut.

 

They do still cut these despite most reasonable people realising this is unacceptable.

 

The problem, of course, being that these "reasonable people" may get hot under the collar about a butty not ending up as a butty, but very few of them (if any) will actually take on a butty, and carry on their travels with two boats.

 

If you are Roger Farrington and end up in possession of the several buttys that have passed through his hands there is a much better living to be made by producing 2 motor boats from one butty than there simply is in renovating the butty and trying to sell it as such.

 

I find it a shame when another butty is cut, but I really can't be angry t those doing it.  There really are more butties around than people who actually want to take one on.

 

Says he, who owns 2 Grand Union motors, but zero buttys.

 

 

[spud]

27 minutes ago, alan_fincher said:

I find it a shame when another butty is cut, but I really can't be angry t those doing it.  There really are more butties around than people who actually want to take one on.

if this were true there would be butties laying around without owners

 

i have read there are at least three under restoration as butties so there are people who take them on 

[MtB]

The only reason original butties are considered special is so many have already been lost. If there were loads about, no-one would be that bothered about them being cut and converted to motor boats! 

 

 

[alan_fincher]

36 minutes ago, spud said:

if this were true there would be butties laying around without owners

 

There are certainly buttys laying around under the ownership of people not actively restoring them, but trying to find someone who will buy them for restoration as  buttys.  In some cases these boats have been in limbo for several years.

 

In another case one survives as a kit of parts in a large barn.

 

On that basis, the bit of my text that you have highlighted I would suggest is actually true.

[koukouvagia]

15 hours ago, MtB said:

Excellent idea, appeals to me too!

Underwater electric motors are probably quite expensive though, so an inboard motor running a conventional hydraulic elum might be necessary. 

 

 

This is the route we took with our Braithwaite and Kirk butty.  Although we enjoyed using it as an unconverted butty paired with our motor, there was no realistic way of keeping an unconverted butty just for the occasional outing.

Just four of the original batch of 24 B&K butties retain their original appearance (Gosport, Ilford, Ilkeston and Kildare); some have been chopped in half, some have been turned into motors and some have been so radically changed that their origins have been completely lost.

When we decided to motorise and convert the butty we were very aware that we were dealing with an important piece of waterways history.  Any work we did on Hampton had (a) to preserve, as far as possible the original appearance of the boat and (b) it had to be easily reversible.

We went for an hydraulic motor in the ellum.  (This was before electric boats were beginning to make an appearance).  Any one wishing to return Hampton to a horse-drawn boat has simply to lift off the steel ellum and replace it with a wooden one. (I know where the original ellum is!). The shape of the hull has not been altered or cut into and the undercloth steel conversion could be removed without too much trouble.

We know that Hampton is a bit of an oddity and that the purists may decry what we have done.  However, the 112 year old boat is at least preserved for the next generation to enjoy and do with it whatever they like.

For the full story see www.buttyhampton.com

 

[magnetman]

That is what wants to happen with Carina. 

 

I'd put a delicious Karvin pod motor in a new elum. Do like the look of these !

 

 

Not shockingly expensive I was quoted about £6.5k for one of these.

 

Loads of batteries and a mooring with electric. 

 

I think there would be an option to have solar panels covering the under cloth section with cloths to go over them when not needed. 

 

Could make quite a nice boat if done right. 

 

I did own a motorised horse boat briefly (Full length with modified swim and an anti ventilation plate) for a short time. Absolutely lovely boat to steer but I think having the motor in the elum itself thereby allowing directional thrust would be even better. 

 

Nice way to get around. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[BWM]

On 01/09/2023 at 11:30, alan_fincher said:

 

Plenty of people actually put a bed space under the front deck on an historic narrow boa conversion.

 

That said, it works better on a "Town" conversion than on a "Star" like HYDRUS.  The deeper sides of a town gives around an extra 7" of internal height.

We have 80 1/2" headroom in the main cabin on Hawkesbury. 

[merline]

Why not have an electric motor driving the hydraulic motor? 

Still have the charging issue but same goes for any electric boat 

[agg221]

8 minutes ago, merline said:

Why not have an electric motor driving the hydraulic motor? 

Still have the charging issue but same goes for any electric boat 

You can - the standard hydraulic set up is a diesel engine driving a hydraulic pump which drives a hydraulic motor. You could replace the diesel engine with an electric motor. There are two main issues:

 

1. The efficiency loss from the hydraulic system is relatively high at around 15%. We run a 20hp engine into a hydraulic pump which gives us a calculated 17hp output. In practice, a conventional shaft drive would have energy losses from each bearing so we aren't losing that much, and we don't have an issue (I have never really run at full power) but if you are reliant on charging batteries then it would begin to significantly impact on range, particularly when you consider that having to drive the batteries harder would bring forward the point when you reached the drop-off point in discharge rate. Someone with more understanding than me would need to calculate it but I would anticipate losing 20% of full charge range, which either means capping range or adding more batteries.

 

2. Hydraulic pipes are relatively large and relatively stiff. Clearly this can be overcome (see Hampton) but it would be easier and less disruptive to run cables as they will be smaller and more flexible.

 

Alec

Edited September 3, 2023 by agg221