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Passing of moored boats on the river


Matthew77

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So I'm aware of passing of moored boats on the canal 1-2 miles p/h but it seems on the river severn people seem to go alot quicker is this accepted in rivers as they are wider so less likely to cause so much disturbance or that the water is faster flowing so require that extra push or indeed people just not bothering to slow??. For now I've been following the 2mph rule just in case but if I'm missing somthing please let me know.

TA

Matt 

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On rivers no one slows down for moored boats, so expect to be violently thrown about when big cruisers go past. It does not matter how well you tie up, when they suck all the water out from under you, you just have to accept it, or stay on canals! If you are in a narrowboat then you will not even make any disturbance at the bank, so no one will know you have passed.  The only exception in lock cuts, if the river has them, I do slow down past moored boats then, but again the cruisers will not.  Been on the Thames for the last month and you just get used to it.

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13 minutes ago, F DRAYKE said:

I think you will find that the speed limit on the Seven is 6mph up and 8mph down. Yes it is a lot wider than canals and a lot deeper.

I posed the question as none of us not want to upset moored boat owners, but at the same time not going so slowly as to cause a nuisance to boats travelling behind if there are rule in place for acceptable speeds limits.

thanks all.

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You will cause yourself more problems going what you think is 2mph upstream as you will not be going anywhere, and doing it downstream will mean you have no steering ability whatsoever.

Smaller river such as the Stort/Soar upper stretches, Lark, Wey etc you need to think a bit, but the Severn/Trent/Thames in a narrowboat, just go for it most of the time.

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on rivers (I only really have experience on the thames) I just look at how much wash I am generating (or not)

if I am making a wash that I think will disturb anyone I slow down.

never had a complaint on the thames so far, although I did get shouted at on the GU for going too fast (before the person shouting realised I was moored and out of gear)

 

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There is generally no need to slow down so much when passing moored boats on a bigger river. 

 

You will find that most river boaters are used to boats passing quickly and moor accordingly. 

 

The people that complain you have rocked their G&T about are generally the same people that an hour or so earlier were storming past moored boats kicking up a huge wash!

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My observations about wash on rivers is that at the same speed narrow boats tend to crate far less bow wash than cruisers but sometimes the waves in the wake are larger but they tend to stay behind the boat. The "wedding cakes" with semi-planing or fully planing hulls kick up a far worse wash at displacement speed than a narrow boat ever could. I just go by how much the bow wash is  slapping the bank or moored boats.

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A good account of wash, bow waves and and all can be read in Arther Ransomes book ''Coot Club'', of how the Hullabaloo's enormous hire cruiser on the Norfolk Broads bombed along washing away the banks, washing Coots off their nests, upsetting dinghies and upsetting Toms frying pan which spilt hot fat all over the floorboards of his little boat Titmouse.

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14 hours ago, artleknock said:

Try mooring up youself, put a glass of wine on the table. You will soon find out what is too fast.

 

When I came off the Thames (where no-one slows down for anything) I was shocked at how prissy canal boaters can get about being moved (even slightly) by passing boats. 

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14 hours ago, Matthew77 said:

I posed the question as none of us not want to upset moored boat owners, but at the same time not going so slowly as to cause a nuisance to boats travelling behind if there are rule in place for acceptable speeds limits.

thanks all.

There is no hard and fast speed limit for passing moored boats on rivers, nor on canals either. It is all about how much you affect moored boats. Most of the time on the canals we pass moored boats at tickover but on occasion with wide deep stretches (eg Tixall wide) we go a bit faster. On rivers we slow down, but not as much as we would do on the canals. The simple technique is to observe how much the passage of your boat affects the moored boats you are passing. If they move slightly, that is OK. If they move a lot, it was too fast so next time pass more slowly. If they don’t really move at all, you could probably have gone faster without disturbing the moored boaters.

 

There are two types of effects that disturb moored boats, the “draw” ie the fact that the water displaced by your boat has to move around from the front to the back of your boat. This type of effect is generally predominant for a narrowboat on a canal. It results in the moored boat being pulled first one way then the other. A badly moored boat may thus break free and/or roll significantly and or jerk as loose lines pull tight, from this effect.

Then there is the wake - the ripples on the surface that reach the bank. More the domain of cruisers than narrowboats on canals. This tends to be predominant on rivers simply because the wider and deeper water means the displacement effect is insignificant by the time it reaches the bank. Moored boats tend to bounce up and down, pitching from the effect.

 

So just observe the effect you have on moored boats and adjust your technique accordingly.

Edited by nicknorman
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2 hours ago, Tony Brooks said:

My observations about wash on rivers is that at the same speed narrow boats tend to crate far less bow wash than cruisers but sometimes the waves in the wake are larger but they tend to stay behind the boat. The "wedding cakes" with semi-planing or fully planing hulls kick up a far worse wash at displacement speed than a narrow boat ever could. I just go by how much the bow wash is  slapping the bank or moored boats.

Fully displacement boats can also kick up a huge wash. These dutch steel cruisers make a hell of a wash and leave a big wake behind them.

 

17630064_10211918813542008_7890023619150

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I would word it as follows...

 

long thin boats (narrowboats) don't create much in the way of wash on rivers or wide / deep water

 

shorter or fatter boats (whether planing or displacement) will create more wash

Edited by Jess--
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Another point on rivers is that boats are rarely tied up except front and rear, and with cruisers, a spring on the rear. Many narrowboat owners feel compelled to use every rope they have, and you will find a tight centre rope as well as bow and stern. This tight centre rope converts the back and forward motion into a severe roll.

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3 hours ago, Naughty Cal said:

Fully displacement boats can also kick up a huge wash. These dutch steel cruisers make a hell of a wash and leave a big wake behind them.

 

17630064_10211918813542008_7890023619150

 

Wow, they have caused the RIB to jump right out of the water and washed a cyclist off the towpath! ?

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5 minutes ago, cuthound said:

 

Wow, they have caused the RIB to jump right out of the water and washed a cyclist off the towpath! ?

Orrible brute of a thing init, like an SUV of the water, with one little bloke in it.

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44 minutes ago, bizzard said:

Orrible brute of a thing init, like an SUV of the water, with one little bloke in it.

Wife, child and dog are inside in the warm :D

 

I don't think Kev has ever been described as small either!

1 hour ago, Ex Brummie said:

Another point on rivers is that boats are rarely tied up except front and rear, and with cruisers, a spring on the rear. Many narrowboat owners feel compelled to use every rope they have, and you will find a tight centre rope as well as bow and stern. This tight centre rope converts the back and forward motion into a severe roll.

Depends where we are moored but on larger and tidal rivers we often moor with all four ropes out. 

 

Trick is to know how to do this to reduce the movement not accentuate it, yet still allow for any water level difference.

 

Tight lines are not the way.

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I will never understand why folks go to the Boat Show, buy an over-powered wedding cake boat designed to race from one marina to another in the Med or the Caribbean, and then cruise it on the Thames.  There seems to be a shortage of imagination in the design of suitable river cruisers,

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3 hours ago, bizzard said:

Orrible brute of a thing init, like an SUV of the water, with one little bloke in it.

Well i like it, but I've always liked Dutch steel cruisers, but then I drive a Ford Kuga (an SUV! of all things) too.

 

There's no accounting for taste.

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48 minutes ago, Murflynn said:

I will never understand why folks go to the Boat Show, buy an over-powered wedding cake boat designed to race from one marina to another in the Med or the Caribbean, and then cruise it on the Thames.  There seems to be a shortage of imagination in the design of suitable river cruisers,

Agree totally, the Thames in particular seems to suffer this, but you do get some on the Trent as well.

 

7 hours ago, Naughty Cal said:

Fully displacement boats can also kick up a huge wash. These dutch steel cruisers make a hell of a wash and leave a big wake behind them.

 

17630064_10211918813542008_7890023619150

I must admit I rather like the steel Dutch cruisers, much nicer than the plastic wedding cakes.

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