Introducing our new boat!

[jetzi]

Hello everyone, Ivan and Alice here. You might remember us from such threads as opinions on some of the boats we were looking at, or how to physically buy a boat, or most controversially which manufacturers are reputable! This thread is just really to thank you all for all the excellent, sometimes contradictory, but always enlightening advice.

 

We're pleased to announce that after looking at scores of boats we settled on Butterfly, from whom I am currently writing this email! The name needs to change as it sounds like a 9 year old's kitten, but we have higher priorities - perhaps when we next take her out of the water ;). There are so many factors involved but we're really happy with the decision.

She's a 19 year old 65' cruiser stern Black Prince. Licensed, insured, BSCed. Needs love and attention but we paid 26K for her which leaves a little of our budget left over for said love and attention. We bought her in London and she's got the "London Whiteout" interior, which I know many of you don't like but it suits us well. There are several things wrong with her ranging from minor to cosmetic to quite urgent, I'm sure there are many forum members who will have helpful opinions on how to prioritise our list!

 

She ticks all of our boxes. We wanted a long boat with a spare room that we could use as an office / guest room at the stern, a walk-through bathroom which we really wanted to give us bathroom space, next a bedroom, then the galley and saloon.

 

She has a Beta Marine 38 / BV1505 engine which sounds and feels great. She didn't come with batteries or an inverter so we've installed a temporary Titanium XV110 110Ah Leisure Battery along with a split charge voltage-sensitive relay kit (140A) so we can operate our water pumps, a few lights and a phone charger. We testing out the fridge but I think that might be too much for the system at the moment. We run the engine for 45mins morning and evening to charge the batteries and get hot water from the calorifier. We plan to install a decent electrical system with solar and lots of battery capacity, but to be honest there isn't anything that we need 240V for, so we might even skip the inverter. Electricity is one of my weaker areas of knowledge so we're going to try to make do through the winter on the leisure battery and I'm going to be studying in the meantime.

 

For heat she has a Morsø Squirrel which we're getting serviced next week - in the meantime I've placed 3x CO alarms all over the boat and taking a chance because we're too cold to do without. There are two radiators as well - one in the bedroom and one in the bathroom - which I haven't figured out how to turn on yet (or whether they can be turned on). I'd suppose they need a pump to circulate water through the radiators. Hot water is a bit of a premium at the moment, anyway. She has an Eberspacher diesel water heater, which I also haven't had working yet. The calorifier works really, really well and we need to run the engine twice a day anyway to charge our battery. We're considering adding a gas boiler for our hot water once our electrics are such that we don't need to run the engine as often.

 

She needs blacking so when the warmer weather comes we'll have her out, surveyed and blacked. I had big dreams of having her shot blasted and epoxyed, but in reality it would probably be overcapitalising on an ex-hire boat. She definitely needs her paintwork tidied up, but her last survey mentions the peeling paint as a result of mill scale and that the only way to permanently fix this is to shot blast the whole boat to get rid of the scale - so I'll have to find a less invasive way (possibly more labour intensive) way to do this.

The next three high priority things are

1) replacing our fresh water pump (seal) which is currently wrapped up in nappies and staying off whenever we're not using it,

2) Installing a bilge pump. There is a drip tray under the engine with about an inch of water in it, and when it rains we do get a bit of water in the engine bilge. Otherwise the bilges are pretty dry.

3) getting the weed hatch open - it's stuck closed and very dirty due to an exhaust leak into the weed hatch "compartment". I want to sort that out while moored so if we need to get in there due to something getting caught while underway we are not doing it for the first time.

Here are a few pictures, mostly from the ad. I'll upload more as and when we make improvements!

 

[alan_fincher]

Congratulations.

Should be a solid choice once you have sorted the thins you clearly already know need sorting.

 

I don't think the "London Whiteout" interior is at all bad.  I'm currently sat in a 1936, and as we progress through it it is getting "whiter" all the time(!)

[Tumshie]

Congratulation, she is really lovely; I hope you both enjoy her and will tell us how things go.

It aways makes me so happy when people get new (to them) boats. ?

[Graham Davis]

Congratulations, she looks very neat. Black Prince boats always seem to be very well built.

I'm sure the experts will be along soon to comment, but I don't think running the eengne for just 45 minutes at a time will be doing the batteries much good. I suspect you might need to do it longer than that.

[Sea Dog]

14 minutes ago, ivan&alice said:

Installing a bilge pump. There is a drip tray under the engine with about an inch of water in it, and when it rains we do get a bit of water in the engine bilge. Otherwise the bilges are pretty dry.

Congratulations!

 

Just a quickie in case you weren't aware... The "drip tray under the engine" you refer to above is a bund for oily waste that shouldn't be pumped overboard.  The idea of the bunding is to keep that stuff separate from stern gland and rainwater ingress which your bilge pump is supposed to pump overboard.

 

I hope you and your new boat are very happy together.

 

[rusty69]

Well done both. Morso squirrel.....probably the best boat stove in the world (imo)

 

ETA. Your gonna need a ladder to get on that bed.

Edited November 2, 2018 by rusty69

[Alan de Enfield]

Well done - a good buy and once 'sorted' and looked after, will last you a lifetime.

 

Top tips :

 

Do not try and run a fridge and everything else on one small battery - you will kill it,

Do not just run the engines for 45 min night and morning you will soon kill the battery by undercharging (4 hours per day may be nearer the mark but will depend on your consumption)

 

 

 

 

[TheBiscuits]

Thanks for coming back to show off your new pride and joy.  That looks an excellent boat for the money - maybe that spreadsheet was a good idea after all

 

I'd say you certainly want more batteries - at least one more temporarily, as one battery is really going to struggle as it gets colder.

 

Post pics of the pipework from the stove - we should be able to tell you if you need to have the pump running while the stove is on or not just by looking at the pipes.  If there are no pipes to/from the stove, the rads will only be plumbed into the Eberspacher, so you don't need to be concerned.

 

[LadyG]

Looks very smart, well done.

[mrsmelly]

Spot on. Pleased to see you took advice and didnt buy one of those miniature 57 footers etc. Good stove. Good engine and nearly enough space. Hull by Johny Pinder probably so should last. Just one thing. You will not manage a winter methinks on one battery. Anyway, enjoy ?

[cuthound]

Congratulations and welcome to the wonderful world of boating.

 

90 minutes a day is not enough to charge batteries. Best to invest in a shunt based ammeter (to monitor battery tail current at 14+ volts and thus determine when to stop charging)  and a voltmter or Smart Gauge to measure battery state of charge (to determine when to start charging) if you want your batteries to last.

[Athy]

WELL DONE!

Some people on here thought you'd never find the right boat, and I have to admit that I sometimes wondered too. But you've persevered and found her, splendid.

[ditchcrawler]

34 minutes ago, cuthound said:

Congratulations and welcome to the wonderful world of boating.

 

90 minutes a day is not enough to charge batteries. Best to invest in a shunt based ammeter (to monitor battery tail current at 14+ volts and thus determine when to stop charging)  and a voltmter or Smart Gauge to measure battery state of charge (to determine when to start charging) if you want your batteries to last.

I have one of these https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/300A-wireless-DC-volt-AMP-power-meter-Battery-Monitor-capacity-Coulomb-counter/332647522021?hash=item4d73565ee5:g:mvcAAOSwJjZa9BbA:rk:7:pf:0

 

Edited November 2, 2018 by ditchcrawler

[Nick D]

Well done, looks like all your research paid off!  Happy cruising.

[Guest]

Tidy looking boat..

 

Enjoy.

[Nightwatch]

Well done. Typing this from a tiddly 55' boat. Plenty of room and we can do the northern Waterways as well. 

[MtB]

1 hour ago, ditchcrawler said:

I have one of these https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/300A-wireless-DC-volt-AMP-power-meter-Battery-Monitor-capacity-Coulomb-counter/332647522021?hash=item4d73565ee5:g:mvcAAOSwJjZa9BbA:rk:7:pf:0

 

 

 

That looks interesting. What does it do? 

 

Hold the door open? 

 

[WotEver]

4 hours ago, ivan&alice said:

We run the engine for 45mins morning and evening to charge the batteries...

Just one more warning to add to those above that your battery won’t last the winter with such a short charge. At least three times that is likely to be closer to your requirements. 

[adam1uk]

Congratulations!

 

As you have an Eberspacher, this probably does your hot water and the radiators.  It might be an idea to get that going before the weather gets really cold.

[matty40s]

47 minutes ago, WotEver said:

Just one more warning to add to those above that your battery won’t last the winter with such a short charge. At least three times that is likely to be closer to your requirements. 

get a decent 240-12V charger and hide it under your  desk at work. Take the battery with you every day and you will be laughing.

 

Matt's 'How To Live On A Boat In London' Hint number 127 

[Victor Vectis]

Well done that man!

 

As a word of advice, it might be an idea to get the weed hatch sorted sooner rather than later.

 

(Such as when you are blocking a bridge 'ole with two boats coming in the other direction, one of which has got stemmed up because you are in the way, with the engine stalled dead because you've got a carpet wrapped around the prop.)

 

You might wonder how I know this.

 

?

Edited November 2, 2018 by Victor Vectis

[doratheexplorer]

Lots of predictable comments about battery charging, which are largely right as general advice but I'll give an alternative view:

 

The OPs post indicates a very low power consumption. Pumps, lights (LED?), and phone charging.  If that's genuinely all the power usage, and there's only 1 battery, 2 x 45 minutes is probably ok.  The OP is getting to grips with things.  There's a fair chance that the battery will be a bit knackered by spring, but better that with one battery than an expensive big bank.  Getting 1 battery charged is going to be an easier and quicker job than a big battery bank too.  Look at it this way:  Assume the battery cost £90 and diesel is 70p a litre, and his engine uses a litre per hour (very rough estimate - bear with me).  If the OP runs his battery for an extra hour a day between now and the end of March to look after his battery a bit better.  By then he would have spent around £135 extra pounds on diesel, which is more than it would cost to buy a new battery.  (150 days x  £0.70p = £105) Not to mention the extra wear and tear on the engine.

 

Don't bother with the fridge if you can avoid it, get a good quality (Coleman or similar) unpowered cool box and keep it on your deck.  Milk etc will keep for a few days easily over winter.  Keep your electricity usage as low as you can.  Expect to bin the battery in the spring.  In the Spring look at what you've learned and consider getting a proper battery bank with some solar (300w or more) - this will happily run a fridge through the warmer months..  Happy days!

 

Note to add:

 

I like the name 'Butterfly'!  Don't change it or your boat will sink.

Edited November 3, 2018 by doratheexplorer

[Laurie Booth]

Great looking boat, well done, hope we meet up one day.

 

[MtB]

3 hours ago, doratheexplorer said:

Getting 1 battery charged is going to be an easier and quicker job than a big battery bank too.

 

Point of Order M'Lud...

 

This isn't strictly true. Provided an appropriately sized charger is being used, a big battery bank takes exactly the same time to charge that last 15% as a small bank takes.

[WotEver]

2 hours ago, Mike the Boilerman said:

Provided an appropriately sized charger is being used, a big battery bank takes exactly the same time to charge that last 15% as a small bank takes.

It doesn’t need to be a very big charger (or alternator) as the current for that last 15% is pretty low.