3 bed boat ? is it possible

[crosser]

hi all, me and the wife are really looking into buying a narrowboat but we want a boat thats got 3 seperate bedrooms, 1 double and 2 single rooms... we really want it no longer than 58ft as we would like to cruise the whole system.... it will be a liveaboard so wondered if anyone here has any idea if its possible to get everything in ? ie. lounge,galley,bathroom and the 3 beds... is there any software to help design the boat ? if it helps we want semi-trad as this seems the best setup for maximum room ... any help would be great....

[bottle]

Hi Crosser

 

I do not know of any particular software to design a layout, but a piece of paper, a pencil, a ruler and most important an eraser will do.

 

You will actually have about 39' of cabin if you draw a box to scale and then try to fit it all in, good luck.

 

As a guide I was given the following lengths for each section.

 

Bow (cratch and front locker) 9'

 

Saloon 12'

 

Galley 8'

 

Bathroom 7'

 

Bedroom (with cross bed) 10'

 

Engine 7'

 

Counter (trad stern) 3'3''

 

Now if you add that together you get you get 56' (approx) so if you remove the Bow/engine and Counter that leaves 37' of cabin.

 

A 56' boat give about 37' of cabin so a 58' will give about 39'.

 

These guides were for a liveaboard for two people..

 

Happy planning

[John Orentas]

Hi Crosser.

 

It is possible but you may well end up with a very claustrophobic boat. Always a good thing to plan plenty of space you can always add partitions or whatever later, whatever you do leave reasonable deck sizes or you will regret it later.

 

Best way to get an initial design is to sneak around plenty of boats, find one you like and semi-copy that.

 

Originality of design does not work with boats.

Edited November 17, 2006 by John Orentas

[DHutch]

Im more than sure it could be done.

- The number of 58ft'ers with two bathrooms, or us with our 14ft enigne room.

- Im sure you could have three bedrooms instread of the if that what you wanted.

 

 

Daniel

[Bones]

it is a matter of design. Is it three bedrooms you want or three areas of privacy? One can easily make 3 zones - 2 singles and 1 double a private area.....

 

Oh dear... I had better go to the bar my glass is empty.

[crosser]

thanks for your comments.... we really need is 3 seperate bedrooms as we have a son and daughter so need there own space... and a fixed double berth... were maybe thinking going upto 65ft if need be.. just have to visit the smaller length lock areas in a few years when the kids have flown the nest....

[twoputtyrats]

You could alway look at the barge style narrowboats that ledgard bridge do - you loose the bow area but gain 5-6 more feet in cabin space....

 

The really nice thing is than the master bedroom has a longditudinal bed mounted up against the bow and is full size...

 

worth a look if you didn't want to go to that extra 8ft......

 

gary peacock (one of the owners is a regular on here)...

 

Simes.

Edited November 18, 2006 by twoputtyrats

[nb.hind]

It's certainly possible to have a three bedroom boat - we have one ourselves, albeit 70 foot

 

If you are thinking of liveaboard or extended cruising think carefully about why you should restrict yourself to 58 foot. The extra space for the children that our 70 feet has given us is greatly appreciated. With the constraints of getting the kids to school etc. we can't actually get anywhere that the boat won't fit in the time we have available in the holidays

 

You may live rather closer to some short locks than we do but there are still more than enough places you can get a longer boat, all you have to think about is can we turn it round and can we find a mooring that will take the length?

[crosser]

thats great... the only reason we didnt choose a 70ft boat is the lack of places to be able to turn around and harder to find a mooring .... do you have any pics of your boat or a rough diagram of a plan of layout? how big are there 2 other bedrooms? do you have enough storage space if used as a liveaboard? only if you dont mind ..... thanks... i really do think a 70ft boat will be a much better boat for using as a liveaboard.....where abouts cant you go with your boat? we will be mooring on the oxford canal....

[Yoda]

You really do need to talk to an expert. The hull dictates how to divide up the boat and a barge style will give you more room. Two bunked areas, seperated by bathroom and kittchen to the main bedroom will work and give adequate storage. Difficult but possible.

[bottle]

Hi Crosser

 

Go to this link for dimension of canals/locks British Waterways it is a pdf document

[crosser]

thanks bottle .... just had a look through that and i really think 70ft is going to be a bit tight and restrictive... im thinking maybe 60-65ft is looking like the best compromise.....

 

where in glos are you bottle? i was born in cheltenham and brought up in tewkesbury.... i really do miss tewkesbury but work etc means living near kidlington oxon......

[allybsc]

thanks for your comments.... we really need is 3 seperate bedrooms as we have a son and daughter so need there own space... and a fixed double berth... were maybe thinking going upto 65ft if need be.. just have to visit the smaller length lock areas in a few years when the kids have flown the nest....

 

Get a tug... boatmans cabin, fixed double in the midddle and under deck bed..voila! 3 bedrooms.

[crosser]

i would have a tug but her indoors would say otherwise...

[bottle]

PM on the way

[Edders]

thanks bottle .... just had a look through that and i really think 70ft is going to be a bit tight and restrictive... im thinking maybe 60-65ft is looking like the best compromise.....

 

where in glos are you bottle? i was born in cheltenham and brought up in tewkesbury.... i really do miss tewkesbury but work etc means living near kidlington oxon......

 

Had a similar dilemma when designing our boat. Started off at 58ft but the length crept up as time went on, ending up at 70ft. It hasn't proved a problem to date and a good bit of advice we were given was to plan the boat for our needs, not for the rare occaision when a different layout was required. We could always hire a boat for the canals we couldn't visit if we wanted too.

 

There is a surprising number of canals a 70ft boat can travel on and if you are considering 65ft, go the extra 5ft as I'm pretty sure that even with 65 ft you will still need a 70ft lock. We haven't regretted it.

 

Edders

[Denis R]

I've three 'bedrooms' in a 48ft tug and don't use under the front deck. Son has a single alongside the engine box at the back, I have a double in the middle and as we've a boatman's cabin at the front of the boat, the two girls have the cross bed and the side bed. Cosy but it works. You just can't tolerate clutter! However the tribe aren't with me 24/7. It would be too much of a squeeze if they lived on it full time with me.....

[Neil@CanalVoyagers]

Merlin Narrowboats Planner is a useful tool for this kind of thing.

[nb.hind]

As I've prepared pctures of the boat for Dave I thought I'd share them with everyone.

 

I'm not quite sure about the quailty of some as it was dark outside while I was taken them but hopefully you can see something. I didn't manage to get a plan into a digital form but to give you an idea of sizing here are the dimensions, starting at the back : engine room 4', parent's bedroom 11'6", walkthrough bathroom 6', child's bedroom 7'6", kitchen 9', dining area 6', lounge area 11'6" and finally another child's bedroom 7'6". The kichen/dining/lounge area is all one space really.

 

The front of Hind is actually enclosed which is why we have a bedroom there (see picture to explain). However, we could have fitted the room into a conventionally fronted boat by shrinking the rather generous bedroom and kitchen/dining/lounge bit.

 

Hind started as half of a hotel boat pair with 7 cabins and 2 bathrooms. The previous owner had taken the walls of 2 cabins to make seating areas and put kitchen equipment into what is now our bedroom. Starting with a second hand boat had advantages and disadvantages. On the plus side, we have a higher quality boat than we could have afforded new and a lot of what we have now was built by recycling what was already there. On the downside, the layout (of windows particularly) did restrict what we could do in places, it's all worked out in the end but there was occasional grumpiness!

 

Anyway, on with the pictures :- Photos

 

Have a nice day

 

Geoff

Edited December 1, 2006 by nb.hind