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Hi, just thought we would add to this post.  We have a 1973 47ft Mindon by the name of Ptarmigan reg 69966.  She was bought last year and we have been slowly doing her up inside and bringing her up to modern standards.  A Lister SR3 powers her which is a joy to hear when we are cruising along.   Would love to know more about Mindon if anyone has any news....

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3 hours ago, Martinb said:

Hi, just thought we would add to this post.  We have a 1973 47ft Mindon by the name of Ptarmigan reg 69966.  She was bought last year and we have been slowly doing her up inside and bringing her up to modern standards.  A Lister SR3 powers her which is a joy to hear when we are cruising along.   Would love to know more about Mindon if anyone has any news....

My mother and her partner had regular cruises on your boat back in the mid / late 1980's, it being owned by a friend of theirs. I do remember seeing it on occasions and I am pretty sure it tied somewhere around Fradley Junction. My mother had no particular interest in boats or canals even though three of her children went on to be either narrow boat owners or extensive hirers :captain:

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On 15/10/2013 at 20:35, pete harrison said:

When Brummagem Boats started in the hire business their boats came from several sources, including one or two that were privately owned. From those I remember of this period BEAUTY was built by Teddesley ?, BUTTON and BUCKLE were built by Colecraft, KLEIO (spelling ?) was built by Doug Greaves, KNOT was built by Hancock and Lane, LAD and LADY were built by Rugby Boatbuilders, LINDA was built by Teddesley, RIDGEWAY was built by Mindon Marine.

 

Most of these boats were replaced throughout the early to mid 1980's by more modern craft, mostly beginning with the letter "B" and supplemented by a couple of Brum Tugs, and were built by either Colecraft at Long Itchington or Malcolm Pearson at Sherborne Street Wharf.

 

I have never heard of the boat builder "Canal and RiverCraft", but that does not mean they did not exist.

Bobcat and Beaver? Two 32ft boats.

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  • 1 year later...
On 15/06/2018 at 22:49, Laurie.Booth said:

Bobcat and Beaver? Two 32ft boats.

Beaver was certainly a BrumTug, I assume that at 32ft Bobcat would also have been a tug...

Here's an article about Beaver from 1986..... (with apologies to Mike Stevens and the original author who is unknown!):

[Edit: I have now found the original website - owned by Brian Clarke - from where I filched the article below.  See:
http://nbrumpus.cut-net.co.uk/index.html
http://nbrumpus.cut-net.co.uk/brumtug.html
End edit]

Beaver1.jpg

Beaver2.jpg

Beaver3.jpg

Edited by rovingrom
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7 minutes ago, rovingrom said:

Beaver was certainly a BrumTug, I assume that at 32ft Bobcat would also have been a tug...

Here's an article about Beaver from 1986..... (with apologies to Mike Stevens and the original author who is unknown!):

Beaver1.jpg

Beaver2.jpg

Beaver3.jpg

Thanks for this information.

Beaver is the boat we hired about 20 years ago and is the reason I bought my own boat. I tried to buy Beaver but it was sold the day I rang up to buy her :)

 

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1 hour ago, Laurie.Booth said:

Thanks for this information.

Beaver is the boat we hired about 20 years ago and is the reason I bought my own boat. I tried to buy Beaver but it was sold the day I rang up to buy her :)

Laurie - interesting photos thank you!
I have now edited my post having found the owner of the original article (Brian Clarke).  In my edit I have added links to Brian's respective pages.  If you look closely at those pages you will find further links to 2 most interesting documents, namely:
- BrumTug Original Sales Brochure:  http://nbrumpus.cut-net.co.uk/brumtug1.html

- BrumTug Priced Specification:  http://nbrumpus.cut-net.co.uk/brumtug2.html
The Specification is fascinating, although the reproduction is quite poor and it's hard to read in places!  Notice especially:

- The Engine Installation (Item 2) with remote drive to stern tube via belts and pulleys and 5 gallons of diesel included, all for a mere £2249.

- The Electrical Installation (Item 3) with just 1 x 90 Ah battery (2nd battery available as extra).

- Optional Extras list, Items 9 onwards.

I am taking the liberty of posting the Sales Brochure here (with thanks now to Brian Clarke).  However the links above lead to higher resolution versions that are easier to read.
 

BrumTug Brochure 2.jpg

BrumTug Brochure 1.jpg

BrumTug Brochure 3.jpg

BrumTug Brochure 4.jpg

BrumTug Brochure 5.jpg

BrumTug Brochure 6.jpg

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On 15/10/2013 at 22:09, pete harrison said:

You could well be correct, it was a long time ago captain.gif

Hope nobody minds me reviving this fascinating thread?  I worked a summer season at Brummagem Boats in (I think) 1976, helping at weekends with hire fleet turn rounds and from time to time with the 2 trip boats.  This was at the time Alan Green was a director, along with Barry Stanton(??).  Alan was senior lecturer in Town Planning at the City of Birmingham Poly (Planning Dept. located in a prefab right next to Aston Junction) and I failed my first year(!!) so Alan offered me the job.

I recall the 3 main hire boats were LAD, LASS and LADY and I'm pretty sure all 3 were Rugby Boats build with that unmistakable wide top "plank" bow.  All three were 42 foot, 4-berth, cruiser sterns I believe, and were painted in Brum Boats scarlet with (I think) green and yellow lining.  KLEIO (I think you got that spelling right Pete Harrison) was owned privately, possibly by Barry Stanton, and was a trad stern painted in plain maroon or crimson lake, unlined.  I think she was also slightly longer - 45ft?  She was kept more in reserve for busy periods - being a trad she was my favourite but the company was more protective of her so I never got a chance to do more than clean her!  LINDA was the Teddesley build, shorter in length (32 ft, maybe 35ft?), with a square hull at the stern, very short read deck (almost trad) and fibreglass top painted in a mustard yellow or beige.  2 berth or maybe 3 maximum.  Like KLEIO, LINDA was privately owned and used less than the 3 Rugby boats.

 

Sherborne Street Wharf was fairly derelict at that time but still with the original covered loading dock in situ.  I had a bit of a shock when I took my current boat round the loop in April this year - one or two changes are in evidence!!  Back in 1976 the business was run out of a fairly scruffy caravan parked on the hard-standing.


As I recall, the trip boats ran from Gas Street Basin as a start and finish point - maybe even on the Worcester side of the "Worcester Bar" - a far more convenient point to load punters than at Sherborne Street.  They were the BRUMMAGEM FLY, an ex-GUCCC(??) working boat that had been converted to a trip boat on the Regents Canal (again I'm dredging through the deep recesses of my mind - much deeper than most of the BCN at that time - and maybe wrong here!).  The 2nd trip boat was the EUPHRATES PACKET, but not the current one - I'm led to believe that Brummagem Boats have used that name on at least 3 trip boats??  The PACKET's steerer was Malcolm Wigley(?) at that time, who I believe was Graham Wigley's brother (of Gas Street Basin and the rival trip boat fleet).  I'm told Malcolm later emigrated to New Zealand.  The PACKET was a purpose-built trip boat, possibly on a Teddesley hull?

My main job on the trip boats was to run the bar on the PACKET, although a couple of times I was sent to run the bar on the FLY.  On occasions though Malcolm asked me to relieve him at the tiller and I had a sneaking suspicion he wanted to eye up the ladies in the cabin.....  With the strict pub licencing hours of the period, the theory was that alcohol could be served at any time of day provided the bar was afloat.  However it was a moot point - at pretty much every bridge hole the silt and rubbish in the cut lifted the stern by 6 inches or more, before dropping back in as we left the bridge (even more so the FLY with its deeper draught)!!  So how much of the time we were actually "floating" was debatable!!  Trips were usually down the Worcester & Birmingham to Selly Oak and back, with occasionally a longer trip to Wast Hill Tunnel.

With the small hire fleet I was invited to take one of the 3 Rugby boats out for a couple of days if they were not all booked out to hirers, although I was told not to take them through locks if single-handed.  Still, from Sherborne Street Wharf there's a fair bit of lock-free pound available.  My favourite route was out along the Main Line, including some of the old loops if time allowed, then down through Netherton Tunnel, left through Gosty Hill to Coombeswood Basin and back - a trip I did on several occasions.

I have a number of photos of Gas Street, Farmers Bridge and Netherton Tunnel from this period (let me know if you want to see them) and somewhere I should have some colour slides of the Brummagem Boats fleet but they will take some finding!!

Any additions or corrections to the above would be much appreciated! :)

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7 hours ago, rovingrom said:

Laurie - interesting photos thank you!
I have now edited my post having found the owner of the original article (Brian Clarke).  In my edit I have added links to Brian's respective pages.  If you look closely at those pages you will find further links to 2 most interesting documents, namely:

Great information, thanks !!

:)

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My first trip on a canalboat was a holiday out of Brummagen boats in 1982. A brummie friend of mine used to help out with their show outs as a Saturday morning job so we used to get really cheap off season deals. Sadly I went to his funeral this week. One thing I remember from that first holiday was walking down Sherborne Street to get to the yard thinking what kind of place was I being taken to, it was a bit rough in those days!

100 SVR Crowd Gas Street 5th Nov 1982.jpg

132 SVR Crowd BCN Sherbourne Wharf 11th Nov1982.jpg

146 SVR Crowd BCN Engine Arm Aqueduct 12th Nov1982.jpg

Edited by Tim Lewis
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3 hours ago, Tim Lewis said:

My first trip on a canalboat was a holiday out of Brummagen boats in 1982. A brummie friend of mine used to help out with their show outs as a Saturday morning job so we used to get really cheap off season deals. Sadly I went to his funeral this week. One thing I remember from that first holiday was walking down Sherborne Street to get to the yard thinking what kind of place was I being taken to, it was a bit rough in those days!

 

132 SVR Crowd BCN Sherbourne Wharf 11th Nov1982.jpg

 

This photograph certainly brings back memories as at this time I was living on a pair of boats under the warehouse canopy. The footbridge would have been pretty new in 1982, and I can quite easily remember when the offside towpath was open to the public, it getting blocked off by a brick wall at the St Vincent Street end of the Loop just before the footbridge was built - and ended at Sheepcote Street bridge :captain:

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33 minutes ago, pete harrison said:

This photograph certainly brings back memories as at this time I was living on a pair of boats under the warehouse canopy. The footbridge would have been pretty new in 1982, and I can quite easily remember when the offside towpath was open to the public, it getting blocked off by a brick wall at the St Vincent Street end of the Loop just before the footbridge was built - and ended at Sheepcote Street bridge :captain:

 

Yes, I can remember walking around the loop as far as Sheepcote Street when Brum Boats were still based in Gas Street Basin.

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Good stuff! Twas a Brumtug which got us into narrow boating too when we hired "Quercus" from Brummagem 30-odd years ago. She didn't have canvas forward, but a continuation of the steel cabin to form a saloon. Looking at the link, these were for wimps(!) but in our defence our daughter was only 3 months old at the time so perhaps we can be excused.  Lovely little boats in their day. 

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I remember Quercus well, I wrote it around then. All of the notice boards at the yard had it spelt Querqus and that was how I laid it out. Director Alan Green dropped into the paint dock and queried my spelling, before I put paint on so disaster was avoided. I wasn’t always so lucky......when Brum Boats were taken over by Alvechurch, many boats changed names. One such, with a small name panel was rechristened “ Lichfield Cathedral”. One side worked out fine, if somewhat cramped. On the other side she turned into an Irish boat “ Lichfield Catedral “. Of course, I didn’t spot the omission until the shading was almost complete. Bugger. Out with the rag and white spirit and off I went again......

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12 hours ago, Ray T said:

Don't know where it is now but wasn't ANJOU an ex Saisons boat a Brum Tug?

 

anjou-from-side.jpg

 

Anjou has spent the last 3 years frustrating local enforcement officers by doing the Weedon semi circle as its cruising ring looking more like a mobile tip than a boat.

It has finally been given a (70 foot) mooring on the A5 online moorings......which will no doubt please the other moorers as the bank fills up with junk as well.

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From memory, it was operated as a day-hire or short-trip boat by the couple who ran the chandlery at Whilton Marina circa 1999.  We moored at Whilton back then, I remember it arriving, and I complimented them on how smart and pretty it looked.

So, it's no longer a hire boat and no longer as pretty? That is a shame.

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8 minutes ago, Athy said:

From memory, it was operated as a day-hire or short-trip boat by the couple who ran the chandlery at Whilton Marina circa 1999.  We moored at Whilton back then, I remember it arriving, and I complimented them on how smart and pretty it looked.

So, it's no longer a hire boat and no longer as pretty? That is a shame.

Future compliments will have to be exchanged via an HMP address ............

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