Introducing our new boat!

[Robbo]

5 hours ago, doratheexplorer said:

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.  

If you still want the fridge, in winter you can take advantage of bottled water that’s left outside overnight and then transferred to the fridge.   It has the benefit of keep the fridge full as fridges work better full, whilst bringing a colder source so it doesn’t have to work as hard.   Only works if outside is colder than the fridge tho.

[Robbo]

22 hours ago, alan_fincher said:

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(!)

 Wood goes really nice with white tho, so I would be looking at using the same type of wood and finish as the kitchen worktop top and use some wide trim for the cabin top.

[MtB]

22 minutes ago, WotEver said:

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

 

I know. I was just closing off a possible avenue for quibbling! 

 

 

[jetzi]

Thank you all for all your kind words and support. Interacting with the boating community has really been our favourite part of the experience. Everyone is so helpful and well-meaning and living life at a slower pace that gives them time to show a stranger how to tie a knot, help guide you to a mooring, or spend time out of their day to answer questions on the internet!

 

Quite a few comments on the size of our leisure battery. We bought a Titanium XV110 from Battery Megastore, 70 quid including VAT and delivery. We know that it's not enough to be comfortable, but the electrical system is going to need a whole nother spreadsheet (!) and months of research, so this is really just so we have lights, water and a device charger. We have a digital voltmeter display in our electrical board. The information we got with the battery is to keep it above 50% charge which is 12.1V, so that's what we're doing. The fridge is a luxury but one we are quite enjoying - but the advice to keep bottles of water outside in the cold and transfer them to the fridge is just genius! I appreciate @doratheexplorer's calculation of the battery economics, I'm looking at this battery as a practice unit that we can kill while we figure out how not to kill the decent batteries I'll get with the summer solar system! I really like all your advice, this is pretty much what I had in mind.

10 hours ago, doratheexplorer said:

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

From what I understand about the tradition, boats need to be out of water in order to safely change the name We'll look at that when we get her blacked and perhaps sign-written. Her name is not displayed anywhere but our license disc at the moment.

 

On 02/11/2018 at 16:19, Sea Dog said:

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.

Thanks, I noticed that there was a bit of oil in the bund (am I using that word correctly?) and I wasn't sure if that was a bad sign. It makes sense that this should not be pumped overboard. But what to do with it? I guess we should get a manual bilge pump like this, pump the oily waste into a container and dispose of it as you would used engine oil?

 

The engine bilge itself has a little water in it (5mm) on the port side, as we're listing ever so slightly. I think (hope) this comes from rain - the engine compartment lid is not well sealed. It doesn't seem like enough that an electric pump would be able to suck it up. The pump would have to have a really low profile, and even then it doesn't seem like it would be long before it started sucking air. I took up some of the floorboards and it does seem like there is a little water on the port side in the cabin bilge as well. The only way I could see us clearing this is to take up floorboards and soak it up with a sponge?

 

On 02/11/2018 at 16:25, rusty69 said:

Your gonna need a ladder to get on that bed

At the moment it's a short run up and dive!! It's great for storage but not great for living. I am going to cut it down to a reasonable height under the gunwales so that we have a bit more comfort.

On 02/11/2018 at 16:33, TheBiscuits said:

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.

There are no pipes to the Morsø. There is a small insulated tank next to the engine, with two pairs of pipes leading through the engine bulkhead - one pair goes to the Eberspacher and the other to the engine. The outlet pipes go to the two radiators, the kitchen sink, the bathroom sink and the shower. We've tried turning on the radiators but even though there is hot water they don't get hot, so I think they might need a pump to circulate the water from the hot water tank through the radiators?

On 02/11/2018 at 16:46, mrsmelly said:

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 ?

Yes, we are also really happy that we managed to get a long boat. The nice thing for us about this boat is that there is a spare room which we can use as an office/guest bedroom/man cave. How do you know the hull is by Johny Pinder? Good to know his boats are well-regarded, though.

20 hours ago, matty40s said:

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 

This is great, although the thought of trekking a 20kg battery on the tube or bicycle every day is not really my idea of fun!
 

10 hours ago, doratheexplorer said:

diesel is 70p a litre, and his engine uses a litre per hour (very rough estimate - bear with me).

We paid 90p a litre to fill our tank from a fuel boat,  I guess we got ripped off there but the convenience of getting bags of coal, gas, fuel and elsan fluid delivered straight to our door was unbeatable!

Thanks to everyone else who commented to whom I didn't reply personally in this post!

 

 

 

[Movin' on]

Just to quickly add my "well done" as well

Edited November 3, 2018 by Halsey

[alan_fincher]

13 hours ago, ivan&alice said:

@doratheexplorerWe paid 90p a litre to fill our tank from a fuel boat,  I guess we got ripped off there but the convenience of getting bags of coal, gas, fuel and elsan fluid delivered straight to our door was unbeatable!

It would be highly unusual for any of the fuel boats to rip you off.

 

They are not always the absolute cheapest, but are usually at least competitive.  they are very honest brokers in my experience.

 

Comparing fuel prices (advertised or actuall paid) only has validity if you have the same percentages quoted for "propulsion" and "domestic".  Often the displayed price is the base "domestic only" price that assumes none will be used for proplusion.  But declare 60(propulsion)/40(domestic) and it will be roughly 30p higher.

 

So what declaration did you make when charged 90p per litre?

[cuthound]

On 03/11/2018 at 11:49, Mike the Boilerman said:

 

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.

 

Indeed,  many moons ago I used to charge a 15,050 Ah telecomms battery with a 2000 amp charger.

 

Rather than change the name, simply add  the word "Iron" in front of the existing name. ?

[ditchcrawler]

On ‎03‎/‎11‎/‎2018 at 18:35, ivan&alice said:

Thank you all for all your kind words and support. Interacting with the boating community has really been our favourite part of the experience. Everyone is so helpful and well-meaning and living life at a slower pace that gives them time to show a stranger how to tie a knot, help guide you to a mooring, or spend time out of their day to answer questions on the internet!

 

 
 

We paid 90p a litre to fill our tank from a fuel boat,  I guess we got ripped off there but the convenience of getting bags of coal, gas, fuel and elsan fluid delivered straight to our door was unbeatable!

Thanks to everyone else who commented to whom I didn't reply personally in this post!

 

 

 

I think you will be hard pushed to find diesel at 70p today The outlet nearest us is 77.99 the next two were 95p in one direction and 91p

[TheBiscuits]

8 hours ago, ditchcrawler said:

I think you will be hard pushed to find diesel at 70p today The outlet nearest us is 77.99 the next two were 95p in one direction and 91p

We paid 75p domestic last week at Barnoldswick, but @ivan&alice can't get to the summit of the L&L as they bought the wrong length of bote

 

 

[NickF]

I hired her for a week in 2001! We got a fishermans keep net on the prop ... I still remember that weed hatch, really awkward to get at! I may try and look some photos out for you...... they are not digital but in an album but I can scan them in.

 

I hope you enjoy owning her!

[MtB]

16 minutes ago, TheBiscuits said:

We paid 75p domestic last week at Barnoldswick

 

 

Ah but does this overlook as many boaters seem to, a big factor in the price of fuel? Did you collect the fuel from the retailer’s premises or did you have him bring it to your bote in his own bote? 

 

I suspect the former. Ivan and Alice did the latter. I think it is entirely reasonable to be paying an extra ten or twenty quid to have it delivered to ones bote rather than going and getting it from the retailer. 

 

 

Edited November 5, 2018 by Mike the Boilerman
Add a bit

[TheBiscuits]

3 minutes ago, Mike the Boilerman said:

 

Ah but does this overlook as many boaters seem to, a big factor in the price of fuel? Did you collect the fuel from the retailer’s premises or did you have him to bring it to your bote in his own bote? 

 

I suspect the former. Ivan and Alice did the latter. I think it is entirely reasonable to be paying an extra ten or twenty quid to have it delivered to ones bote rather than going and getting it from the retailer. 

 

 

I would deliver red diesel at £20.75 per litre if you think that is reasonable! 

 

Will you take coal at £30 a bag too? 

 

[rusty69]

2 minutes ago, TheBiscuits said:

I would deliver red diesel at £20.75 per litre if you think that is reasonable! 

 

Will you take coal at £30 a bag too? 

 

 

Ill take a 50kg bag, I'm in penzance at present 

Edited November 5, 2018 by rusty69

[TheBiscuits]

10 minutes ago, rusty69 said:

Ill take a 50kg bag, I'm in penzance at present 

Oi! You changed that to 50kg while I was booking your delivery. 

 

I want sixty quid now... 

[MtB]

I said £20 per delivery, not per litre. 

 

As you well know! 

[doratheexplorer]

15 hours ago, cuthound said:

 

 

 

Rather than change the name, simply add  the word "Iron" in front of the existing name. ?

Or "Sparkly"!

 

[jetzi]

On 04/11/2018 at 08:44, alan_fincher said:

So what declaration did you make when charged 90p per litre?

We did not. I have heard about declaring your consumption for tax purposes but they didn't ask, and I didn't think to say. They just told me it was 90p a litre, and given that they were right there I was more than happy for the convenience. I certainly didn't feel ripped off at the time and I expected to pay a little premium for the delivery, so I think we're all good there.

 

1 hour ago, TheBiscuits said:

We paid 75p domestic last week at Barnoldswick, but @ivan&alice can't get to the summit of the L&L as they bought the wrong length of bote

Given that it's around 300 miles, it wasn't so much the length of our boat that was keeping us from filling up at Barnoldswick as how much fuel we had left in our tank! We have many many long locks to explore in our 65 footer and when we run out, we'll have to "upgrade" to a 57' ?
 

56 minutes ago, NickF said:

I hired her for a week in 2001! We got a fishermans keep net on the prop ... I still remember that weed hatch, really awkward to get at! I may try and look some photos out for you...... they are not digital but in an album but I can scan them in.

 

I hope you enjoy owning her!

 

WOW @NickF that's amazing! I would LOVE to see some photos if you have any! Where did you hire her and where did you go?

The weed-hatch hatch (the cover that goes over the weed hatch compartment) is just a board at the moment, so it's not too hard to get at, but the actual T shaped screw (I think it's a screw) that holds down the horizontal bar that holds down the hatch is stuck firmly. I plan to get a stout piece of metal pipe and cut a slot for the cross of the T, which I hope will give me enough leverage to twist it off. Also, the exhaust leak into that compartment is 'orrible, black diesel soot coats the walls, the weed hatch and the stern gland greaser. So I'm sure that isn't helping my case.

 

 

16 hours ago, cuthound said:

Rather than change the name, simply add  the word "Iron" in front of the existing name. ?

That's... actually... a great name! Rock and/or roll! I'll put it on the list but it has to get past the missus

 

 

[doratheexplorer]

9 hours ago, ditchcrawler said:

I think you will be hard pushed to find diesel at 70p today The outlet nearest us is 77.99 the next two were 95p in one direction and 91p

I decided to go for a low price to err on the side of caution and to avoid forum know-it-alls arguing my point but saying they can get diesel cheaper.  At 90p a litre my point is even stronger.  Also many boats drink more than 1 litre an hour.

 

Basically, there's a lot of tosh talked on this forum about battery charging and the received wisdom seems to be to charge for 2-3 hours a day 6 days a week and then charge for about 6 hours on a sunday.  Even if you have solar for say 7 months of the year, that's about 20 hours a week for 20 weeks through the winter.  That's 400 hours of battery charging a year (assuming no summer equalisation charges etc).  At a guess I'd reckon about 200 of those hours aren't really to provide power as such, they're to keep your batteries healthy.  200 hours of battery charging is gonna cost (at 90p a litre and 1.2litres an hour) £216. 

 

So you could either spend £216 annually  to try and keep your batteries good (and enjoy lots of extra noise, fumes, vibration, engine wear etc.), or you could spend £240 on a set of 3 batteries and, if they last longer than a year, have a little party to celebrate your good sense.  Link: https://www.limekilnchandlers.co.uk/3-x-110amp-leisure-batteries-collect-only.html

 

I'm sure there's some sense in carefully cossetting your batteries if you've just spent £2000 on 2v traction cells.  But for the other 99%, it's probably a waste of money even trying.  And when the red diesel goes, even more so.

 

Now just let me nip out for some popcorn.

[TheBiscuits]

5 minutes ago, ivan&alice said:

Given that it's around 300 miles, it wasn't so much the length of our boat that was keeping us from filling up at Barnoldswick as how much fuel we had left in our tank! We have many many long locks to explore in our 65 footer and when we run out, we'll have to "upgrade" to a 57' ?

 

You need a touring boat as well as a living boat. 

[WotEver]

6 minutes ago, doratheexplorer said:

you could spend £240 on a set of 3 batteries and, if they last longer than a year, have a little party to celebrate your good sense. 

Absolutely. As advocated by Gibbo when he used to frequent these hallowed halls. You can stress about your batteries, cosset them and whisper sweet nothings to them every night or you can use them and abuse them and replace them yearly. 

 

The only caveat being that you need to understand the anount of abuse you’re giving them. Abuse them too much and they won’t last 3 months through the winter. OP’s 45 minutes being an extreme example of this. 

 

Of course, if you actually go cruising in your boat then the batteries get charged anyway. 

[Alan de Enfield]

8 minutes ago, doratheexplorer said:

Basically, there's a lot of tosh talked on this forum about battery charging and the received wisdom seems to be to charge for 2-3 hours a day 6 days a week and then charge for about 6 hours on a sunday.  Even if you have solar for say 7 months of the year, that's about 20 hours a week for 20 weeks through the winter.  That's 400 hours of battery charging a year (assuming no summer equalisation charges etc).  At a guess I'd reckon about 200 of those hours aren't really to provide power as such, they're to keep your batteries healthy.  200 hours of battery charging is gonna cost (at 90p a litre and 1.2litres an hour) £216. 

But the cost of 'charging the batteries' for 2 or 3 hours per day (or maybe 4-6 hours per two days) is (effectively) "Nil", "Nowt", "Nothing" as you will surely be cruising, - if you are not moving/cruising then what's the point of having a boat ?

 

Maybe we are not typical, but we cruise 6-8 hours (occasionally 12 hours+), we may then stop a couple of days, or we may do the same again the next day. We don't ever run the engine to charge the batteries.

[doratheexplorer]

5 minutes ago, Alan de Enfield said:

But the cost of 'charging the batteries' for 2 or 3 hours per day (or maybe 4-6 hours per two days) is (effectively) "Nil", "Nowt", "Nothing" as you will surely be cruising, - if you are not moving/cruising then what's the point of having a boat ?

 

Maybe we are not typical, but we cruise 6-8 hours (occasionally 12 hours+), we may then stop a couple of days, or we may do the same again the next day. We don't ever run the engine to charge the batteries.

You're very much not typical.

[doratheexplorer]

8 minutes ago, WotEver said:

 

 

The only caveat being that you need to understand the anount of abuse you’re giving them. Abuse them too much and they won’t last 3 months through the winter. OP’s 45 minutes being an extreme example of this. 

 

 

Not that extreme, a few lights, water pumps, phone charging.  That can't be taking more than 10ah from the batteries.  So 1.5 hours a day should be plenty to put that back in, unless he has the smallest alternator of all time.  Of course, if he runs his fridge than he's probably taking about 50ah a day in total so 1.5 hours a day wouldn't be enough. 

 

When I first had a boat, I had no idea at all what I was doing.  I had 3 leisure batteries and I had no idea how old they were.  I used to leave them until the inverter howled at me and then run my engine or genny for about 3-4 hours.  Then carry on for a few days and repeat.  I managed ok on those batteries for about 2 years.

 

Was I doing things 'right'?-  no.

Do I care? - no.

Was I enjoying my boat?  - yes.

Would I have enjoyed my boat more if I'd bought a smart meter and checked it every half hour? - no!

 

[jetzi]

2 hours ago, TheBiscuits said:

 

You need a touring boat as well as a living boat. 

I'll get the spreadsheet out ?

 

2 hours ago, WotEver said:

OP’s 45 minutes being an extreme example of this. 

I've upped this to an hour each morning and evening. We are also extremely conservative with our electricity. We only ever have one LED light on at a time - we have these: Biltema Art. 25-919 Interior Lighting LED 12/24V 0.2A which I work out to be 2.4W. I'd say we run two of these for 6 hours a day, so that's just under 30Wh. They're dimmable but I'm not sure if dimming them actually reduces power consumption for this type of light. Incidentally, these are really nice and I'm looking for more, if anyone knows where they come from!

 

We have a Shurflo Trail King 7 water pump, which says it is 4.5A max, which I work out to be 54W. I'm actually buying a replacement as we speak, because it's leaking from the diaphragm and we've been told that it's much the same price to simply replace the whole pump (around 60 quid) and it's sounding a little grind-y. We only turn the water on when we need to shower, wash dishes, etc - if we use this for an 45 min a day I'd guess that's an overestimate. So that's 40Wh.

 

We have a shower pump, which probably sees 10 minutes of use a day. I don't know what the wattage of that pump is, so I'll assume it's similar to the freshwater pump and call it 10Wh for those 10min

And the 12V phone/laptop charger we bought from Amazon, it's rated at 45W but that's output - not sure what the input will be, I am sure there is a bit of loss as the voltage is stepped up/down as required. Let's call it 50W and we use that for an hour a day, so 50Wh.

So that means we use about 130Wh per day. Let's call it 150Wh to be safe.

 

Next step is to see if I can work out what the alternator puts out, I don't know anything about it, but our engine is a Beta Marine 38 / BV1505. Has anyone got an average-ish figure for me to go on?

The voltmeter we have on the battery jumps up to about 14.4V with the engine running, and sits at around 12.6 to 13.2 when we're running off the battery. We ensure that we don't go under 12.1V (as per the manufacturer's recommendations) although one time we did drop the ball and saw it as low as 11.8 unfortunately. That's the only time it has been under 12.1V and we turned the engine on immediately afterwards. Yesterday something weird happened - we'd been cruising about 3 hours. Since then, the voltage appears not to be jumping up when we try to charge the battery. We don't know if this is something to be concerned about.

2 hours ago, Alan de Enfield said:

But the cost of 'charging the batteries' for 2 or 3 hours per day (or maybe 4-6 hours per two days) is (effectively) "Nil", "Nowt", "Nothing" as you will surely be cruising, - if you are not moving/cruising then what's the point of having a boat ?

 

Maybe we are not typical, but we cruise 6-8 hours (occasionally 12 hours+), we may then stop a couple of days, or we may do the same again the next day. We don't ever run the engine to charge the batteries.

We have full time day jobs, so we're weekend cruisers only, and we have other things to do as well so effectively that means a 4-5 hour cruise on a Sunday. Even if we install beeeeeg batteries and a bit of solar, clearly our cruising won't be sufficient to provide us with power.

 

Does sound like a wonderful life though @Alan de Enfield!
 

Edited November 5, 2018 by ivan&alice

[doratheexplorer]

Don't buy another Shurflo, they're crap.  Don't ask how I know this.  Get another make, like Jabsco.