What might be in Tadworth's hold?

[dave moore]

Hi all

 

I looked at Tadworth's photo earlier, as posted by Laurence and was surprised to see her so low in the water with so much visible hold, whatever it is must be fairly dense. Laurence is intrigued too - would any knowledgeable members care to suggest what might be in there?

 

Cheers

 

Dave

[Mike Tee]

Where's the photo you refer to, please?

found it

Edited January 27, 2015 by Mike Tee

[Tonka]

gold

[archie57]

Steel, covered with a top cloth

Note also the Ricky-boat pigeon box with oval portholes

[Speedwheel]

What about the copper blocks/ingots (not sure what the correct term is).

 

ETA I have a picture of copper blocks being loaded onto a pair. They are approx 3ft x 2ft x 4 inch. I don't suppose too many were required to load a boat down.

Edited January 27, 2015 by Speedwheel

[junior]

Any chance of the photo in this thread, or a pointer to where said photo can be found?

 

I've a bit of a 'thing' for Tadworth having looked it over a few times on passing. My personal opinion is that I like to see these old boats looking 'used' rather than bling'ed up and shiny and Tadworth certainly fits the 'used' category at the moment.

 

Having recently sold Albion, for the first time I actually have enough money in the bank to buy Tadworth at the moment. Sadly i couldn't afford to then have the work done and it would probably end up on the bottom sooner rather than later. If only i could weld!....

Edited January 27, 2015 by junior

[jake_crew]

I beleive some metal ores (Mn, Mo ?) are very dense (say 15 to 20) so a full load is a few heaps in the bottom of the hold.

 

I have certainly seen this in Humber Keels on the S&SY.

[archie57]

Picture I believe is one taken by Will King

[stagedamager]

Railway line?

[alan_fincher]

What about the copper blocks/ingots (not sure what the correct term is).

 

ETA I have a picture of copper blocks being loaded onto a pair. They are approx 3ft x 2ft x 4 inch. I don't suppose too many were required to load a boat down.

So each block about 2 cubic feet = 56,634 cubic cms

 

Density of copper 8.95 gms per cubic cm, so each block 56,634 x 9.95 gms = 506,874 grams or 507 Kg.

 

So just over half a metric tonne per "lump"? (Or roughly the same as one of those GUCCo gauging weights being used as ballast in Arcas?)

 

So maybe 40 "lumps" on the motor, and 60 "lumps" on the butty, assuming each are "proper" boats?

 

Any chance of the photo in this thread, or a pointer to where said photo can be found?

Laurence put this in the other thread......

 

Edited January 27, 2015 by alan_fincher

[ChimneyChain]

Any idea where the photo has been taken??

 

Darren

[archie57]

Bascote

[David Mack]

Railway line?

Lead ingots?

 

or

 

Depleted uranium?

[furnessvale]

 

So each block about 2 cubic feet = 56,634 cubic cms

 

Density of copper 8.95 gms per cubic cm, so each block 56,634 x 9.95 gms = 506,874 grams or 507 Kg.

 

So just over half a metric tonne per "lump"? (Or roughly the same as one of those GUCCo gauging weights being used as ballast in Arcas?)

 

So maybe 40 "lumps" on the motor, and 60 "lumps" on the butty, assuming each are "proper" boats?

 

Boats have been loaded with copper sludge in the past which I would assume to be quite dense, but also would conform more to the appearance of this load.

 

George ex nb Alton retired

[Machpoint005]

 

So each block about 2 cubic feet = 56,634 cubic cms

 

Density of copper 8.95 gms per cubic cm, so each block 56,634 x 9.95 gms = 506,874 grams or 507 Kg.

 

So just over half a metric tonne per "lump"? (Or roughly the same as one of those GUCCo gauging weights being used as ballast in Arcas?)

 

So maybe 40 "lumps" on the motor, and 60 "lumps" on the butty, assuming each are "proper" boats?

 

 

 

Bl00dy 'ell Alan, that's a right cocktail of units!

If you deal only in kg and metres it's a great deal easier to crunch the numbers!

[MtB]

What about the copper blocks/ingots (not sure what the correct term is).

 

 

I think the term for a large block of refined metal for use as as raw manufacturing material is 'billet'.

 

MtB

[Laurence Hogg]

Any chance of the photo in this thread, or a pointer to where said photo can be found?

 

I've a bit of a 'thing' for Tadworth having looked it over a few times on passing. My personal opinion is that I like to see these old boats looking 'used' rather than bling'ed up and shiny and Tadworth certainly fits the 'used' category at the moment.

 

Having recently sold Albion, for the first time I actually have enough money in the bank to buy Tadworth at the moment. Sadly i couldn't afford to then have the work done and it would probably end up on the bottom sooner rather than later. If only i could weld!....

The photo came from a private family collection and is not from the Will King collection, a large number of pictures from this album appear in our you tube video "The System in Blue".

[the barnacle]

What about the copper blocks/ingots (not sure what the correct term is).

 

ETA I have a picture of copper blocks being loaded onto a pair. They are approx 3ft x 2ft x 4 inch. I don't suppose too many were required to load a boat down.

 

the house we used to live in my dad says was owned before by a chap that worked on the canals, in the garden was a dry stone wall, while messing around with my metal detector i found behind a stone an ingot made of gun metal - we always said the chap must of had it from a boat while working and hid it.

[Tam & Di]

If it was ingots or something of that ilk I'd have wanted to spread the load a bit rather than putting it all in one place, as that is putting a lot of strain on the boat. She looks to be slightly down by the head as is though, which is perfect, but you'd not want it much more than that. Maybe some piece of machinery that obviously could not be broken down. It's difficult to judge but it must be 22+ tons though, so it's quite a heavy lump whatever it is.

 

Tam

[Tony Dunkley]

The only thing I've known to put a big boat down that much for so little volume is blue (puddle) clay.

Obviously steel would too, but that looks like loose bulk material.

Edited January 28, 2015 by Tony Dunkley

[X Alan W]

Felspar for the Potteries used to pull the boats down but that was usually in 3 heaps fore ,middle, & aft,also wouldn't have expected to see it in that part of the country. Memory from dim distant past comes up with a short term run of clay from one of the London Brick Co's clay pits to somewhere in the Coventry/ Nuneaton area

[John Brightley]

Felspar for the Potteries used to pull the boats down but that was usually in 3 heaps fore ,middle, & aft,also wouldn't have expected to see it in that part of the country. Memory from dim distant past comes up with a short term run of clay from one of the London Brick Co's clay pits to somewhere in the Coventry/ Nuneaton area

This is the first I've heard of London Brick clay traffic to the Nuneaton/ Coventry area (it's a little surprising as there is lots of clay in the ground in the Nuneaton area), but there were several brickworks at Nuneaton which were connected by railway to the basin at Bermuda at the end of the Griff Arm. (see http://www.irsociety.co.uk/Archives/47/Griff.htm )

Maybe they were experimenting with different types of clay and it could have been a useful return load for boats loading at Griff with coal for the London area.

The last traffic on the Griff arm is believed to have been in 1961 when the last colliery here closed. If anybody has more details of dates/ boats along the arm I'd be very interested to see them.

As an aside, LBC did have a brick distribution depot at Marston Hall, Marston Jabbett, near bridge 3 on the Ashby Canal. LBC lorries took bricks there from Bedfordshire until 1975. There's no evidence that it ever recieved loads by water though.

Edited January 28, 2015 by John Brightley

[Tony Dunkley]

Another possibility may be roadstone. There was a wharf with a boat loading chute at Mancetter, in the Atherstone pound.