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I am thrilled to say that as of today I am the very proud owner (next custodian really) of Tycho! A boat that I have very fond memories of from the late 80s and 90s. The first boatman's cabin i ever stayed in aged 10 and then lucky enough to do bits of towing wirh her as a teenager. More to come... but so as to allay any fears or rumours, the ram stays, as do the blue tops, certainly for now. And of course the reinstatement of the back cabin. Bear with me, I've not had a boat with rivets for 16 years! Thank you @Derek R. for your recent help in filling in the gaps of the last 20 years.

Certainly history if not heritage - it's easy enough to look up what the restrictions were in 1976 if you have an old set of Waterways World or similar, and also to debate how the whole set up was different then compared to now, but I though I'd offer some memories of our family holiday at Whit 76 and perhaps encourage others to do the same. I was ten that summer, so I'd be nine at Whit and @1st ade was thirteen. Mum and dad had booked a week from Fenny Compton in a 30 foot 4 berth called Curlew (remember when four berth hire boats were 30 foot long?). IIRC correctly dad's original plan had been to head south but as restrictions tightened he changed the plan to head for Snarestone and Coventry. Napton locks were open 12noon til 3pm, meaning be clear of the flight by 3pm. We got as far as Napton on the first (Saturday) night and joined the queue. I recall a boat going past us at about 10am the next day and various people pointing out that this was the queue - I think they were genuinely surprised. Anyway, our turn came and we shared with a GRP boat, the picture in my memory says it was a Dawncraft - they were ahead of us but the lock keeper put us in first as is best practice, and we made our way down the locks. We then got to Hillmorton that day, and waited for the rather more generous opening hours to go down on the Monday - after that, Hawkesbury didn't have restrictions, and we didn't need to share it! It also became the first lock I worked without assistance... Then proceeded a lock-free couple of days as we went to Snarestone, where we'd been when hiring from Alan Tingay at Shackerstone, and Coventry, where we'd never been. I don't remember much about these previous cruises, I was too young. Memories of this one are the Ashby being so quiet that one day we didn't tie up for lunch, we just drifted, and we must have been at the start of the decline of the village shop as mum couldn't get milk. Then the plan was up Hillmorton Thursday afternoon to be ready to go up Napton Friday lunchtime - but (And this is where the memories come in rather than just the historical record) we got to Hillmorton to find them already closed for the day, the hours had been reduced. Nowadays internet and mobile phones would have told us this. Dad arranged for use to get to the head of the queue, finding a Natwest boat we could fit in with, and we did our best to do Hillmorton and Napton in one day, but it was too much - we got to Napton just about 3 from memory. and were due back at Fenny Compton the next morning. Dad recalled how the hire company had complained, as we picked Curlew up, about another hirer getting stuck at Nell Bridge and the boat being late back - I think he was imagining the scene as we would arrive late... What happened next is what sticks in the mind and won't otherwise be documented. Dad spoke to the lock keeper, who said something like he didn't know the hours had changed at Hillmorton, and "they shouldn't do that, they're supposed to give notice" (or words to that effect) - however he couldn't just let us through. With a colleague he went to the lock house next to the bottom lock, reached through the window for a phone and made a big show of ringing "head office" - sometime later they rang back, he took the padlocks off and we had our own chaperoned ascent. That really does stick in my mind, on a holiday where locks had been hustle and bustle, boats sharing and following through, Dad and Adrian steered whilst me, mum and the lock keeper worked the deserted lock flight in the early evening sun - such peace.... We were, of course, back at the yard bang on time thanks to this. I've told this tale because, 9 years old then, I've just celebrated my 59th birthday - 49 years on, the grown ups involved, probably including the BW staff and the other adult boaters, are probably all dead, and you won't find tales like this in the history books. Comments and other stories from 1976 restrictions most welcome!

I remember trying to get down the arm to Aylesbury before the locks shut for the day to be greeted at the last lock by the lock keeper laughing as he put the padlock on stopping me above the lock, there was no love lost between the lock keeper his son and ACS. This meant I had to leave my little marine ply cruiser tied to the towpath whilst I went away to work for a couple of weeks, I took the outboard and boat contents home with me. Sometime in that period my mother had a call from the police asking my whereabouts as the boat was sunk and they were concerned I might be inside. She assured them I was OK and the boat remained where it was for the time being. A while later duly returned with the boat trailer ( I said it was small at 14ft) put the trailer half in the canal, there was no hard edging, tied the trailer to a tree, winched the boat onto the trailer, then winched the trailer out of the canal and assed the damage. There was a spark plug sized hole neatly drilled in the bottom of the boat so I screwed a spark plug in there and relaunched the boat and took it down to the basin. Over the following weeks I discovered through the grapevine that it was the lock keepers son who had drilled the hole and I worked out a way if getting my own back. He had a motorcycle that he used to leave on the road and one night I filled his fuel tank, there were no locks on tanks in those days, with cement. Took him ages to work out why it wouldn't go and to correct it. I was 24 at the time and a bit of a rebel🤔

Clearly not you, given your self-professed target of 100 hours a year, or your disbelief that someone might have done 25 hours over 4 days on a canal. Indeed, given your rather unremarkable sailing CV, you clearly never have been an active boater. You appear to have picked up just enough knowledge to sound authentic to a non-sailor, but when you start talking about "Travel Hoists", and one of the top 4 highlights of your sailing career is getting the masthead wet, your true experience (or lack of) is clear for all to see. The thing is, there's nothing wrong with being inexperienced. There's nothing wrong with not knowing much. Almost the only important thing in life is to try to be nice to other people. No-one cares if you don't know much about something, you just need enough humility not to pretend otherwise. If you can find a way to wind things back a little, stop insulting people, stop telling people they're wrong, and only offer opinions where you have experience, you might not get wound up quite so much; you might also stop winding up other contributors. Have a bit of courage to post some details on your new boat, share some of the issues (we all have boat issues, don't pretend you're different), some of your boating screw-ups (again, we all have them), and people might see you as a fellow boater rather than just a ranty forum poster on the Internet. Edit: I also agree with you on the sketchy implementation of that pontoon, but as Francis alluded you can make a point without being unkind.

I'll just leave this here for a bit...... this is so exciting!!!! also the top bends have been templated so hopefully will be on soon. also fore end guards on one side and a bit more painting!

I would normally stick a plastic bag over a boat prop going back into the water. Not only will this keep it clean, it will also allow you to practice your weed hatch moves for when you finally cruise your boat to its brokerage for sale.

Being pedantic, we (The Mods) didn't block your first post. Every new member of the forum automatically has their first few posts placed in a queue requiring approval, once you've posted a few times the situation reverses - posts are posted and require hiding (if appropriate) if they have been reported to us. Usually, first posts are approved pretty quickly, but there are some instances where The Mods confer behind the scenes whether to approve or not. Your first post was one. There are not that many Mods, we are unpaid volunteers who squeeze moderating around Day Jobs, family, sleeping, eating etc. Sometimes it takes longer than we would like to reach a consensus decision. We do the best we can, honest! Best Wishes (on behalf of the Moderation Team)

The surveyor is booked. No idea if he's any good, but its not the marinas recommendation. I am really looking forward to actually getting to see the boat out of the water myself and actually feeling the depth of pits etc. I must have watched hundreds of youtube videos, which is all very well but I don't really trust all that info on there. The reason being that when I watch youtube videos about subjects that I do know a lot about, the info is very misleading and often just wrong. I did just have a look at Tony Brooks's training site which I'm sure is very authoritative, I will definitely be digging into that a lot more.. what a decent bloke making all that useful info available. As is all who have took their time to comment and try to help a bewildered and bemused newb like myself. I will of course hopefully, in many years to come, pass on the same learnings to some lucky person putting their life savings into a canal.. and if nothing else, make them feel like they are entering a decent community of helpful people.

Thank you to the lovely couple that just towed me to hawksbury canal folk are the best of people

I can't believe its 8 years ago today since we acquired the ironwork to Norway from the Ashton Packet Boat company after conversations with @billh.... 8 years on, we got one side two packed up to the middle of the hold, and glosswork on both cabin sides. hopefully today, a 2nd coat on the port side and further welding on the starboard, weather dependent!

Here's my 'work in progress'. 1989 Viking 26 Centre Cockpit with a Honda 15hp Outboard. Originally was going to be on hardstanding for a few weeks whilst I 'fettled' it. That's before I saw the atrocious electrics and decided to rip out the mouldy bathroom, as well as having to fix all the leaking saloon windows and deal with some minor osmotic blistering. The engine was also filled with scale from years of being neglected and needed a full service. 11 months later and I've realised I'm in no rush, if it takes another 6 months to get her how I want her, it's not a big deal. I bought it as a little project and I've enjoyed doing the old gal up. Will almost seem a shame to go boating when I've finished! 😃

It would be interesting to hear viable suggestions on how to do things better, within current income streams. In my observations, CaRT engineering teams are trying quite hard to make the best use of the tight budgets. This means doing some things differently - eg the newer procedures at the gate makers, and also re-evaluating what they need to do eg gradual phasing out of laundry facilities when a substantial proportion of boaters responded that they had on board facilities. In addition, there are many examples of changing how things are done that reflect the change in the relative cost of labour. It may have been OK, in the past, to have people on hand just in case but not now. There are more opportunities to use specialist skills in roles that in the past were done by general purpose personnel, allowing better investment in time saving equipment. It is also best to be sure that you know how locks work before claiming evidence of incompetence. For example, some locks were designed to re-fill after emptying - various means were tried including what looks like unmaintained leakage. You also have to remember that a canal needs a constant flow downhill so that intermediate pounds do not run dry and also that operating so that both sets of gates contribute to retention of water, hence asking boaters always to close all gates and paddles (alas too often ignored by those who know better with sometimes significant consequences) I would encourage everyone to take any opportunity to chat with CaRT staff on the ground - it is rare that I never learn something new and/or interesting when I do so. Remember also that a failure to try to introduce new ways of doing things, as some advocate avoiding, is itself a sign of incompetence. Of course not everyone makes the best choices every time but it is also good to check the reasons before criticising.

I'm sorry you feel that way. I don't agree that the forum is a tiny irrelevance. We travelled widely over our 4 years of boat ownership and met many people I recognised from the forum - normally by their boat names. Had lots of lovely chats and felt that the link with the forum added to the sense of community. Whether you like it or not, you will come across lots of people from the forum and how much nicer for you if meetings are convivial rather than combative. I wish you could be a bit more self-aware about how you are coming across on here. No doubt you are a smashing chap in real life and you are simply not doing yourself any favours. Wishing you well.

That sounds serious! Something like the boat in the recent Wallace and Gromit film?

I think that's very much a minority view. Most say that you can overcoat old epoxy with new epoxy providing you abrade the surface first to provide a mechanical key.

I do not understand why anyone would wish to destroy a piece of waterways history by chopping off the ice breaking ram. It's been there for 63 [corrected] 83 years. A magnificent beast. - And, NO, it doesn't get you bridge'ole precedence. Few see the blade until it's on top of them. Once seen - never forgotten.

The past week has been a spin. Well two weeks. The crane had issues so we had to reschedule the surveyor. He was okay about it. Apparently it’s a boating mindset where everyone takes everything on their stride. Being at Stanstead Abbots for a few days I rather fell in love with the lifeboats they have there. My great grandad being a coastguard who died at sea. So after a volume of calls juggling, no phone charger. We got everything in order tucked away in a little spot where narrow boats hide between Abbots and Roydon Managed to get a berth at Roydon marina and a van on Sunday to move in. Im not planning to take her out much if not at all. This is going to be, hopefully, home for me. Photos later. Thank you to everyone who gave me advice.

Indeed, imagine the Commissions' recommendations if the Great & Good of this forum were running the Commission. From what I have read here in the past 6 months the findings would be: All CRT bins will be removed to discourage liveaboards and because the CRT is clearly too incompetent to implement new recycling legislation. Operation of the canal network should be handed over to local bodies who could then realize the full potential of the canals by filling them in for building land. Cruiser Stern boats should pay a 10% licence premium for the aesthetic distress they cause to trad stern boat owners. The minimum speed on the network will be 3.9 mph and 4.5 mph when passing CMers. The CRT CC annual license should be set to meet the principal that all renters in the UK must pay £12,000 per year for their accommodation with a small reduction to reflect the square footage of a narrow boat is smaller than a 1 bed flat. The maximum mooring duration should be 48 hours everywhere on the network to encourage proper high velocity cruising. CMer boats should be promptly crushed, preferably with their occupants entombed inside. Reform voters are clearly mentally deranged and should not be allowed on the network. London wood burning regulations should be applied to the whole network to make life more difficult for liveaboards. CCers should be banned from London because they are all freeloading skanky people who believe in laylines, crystals, paint rainbows on their boats and do not have proper painted tincan flower pots on their roofs. The National Bargee Travellers Association should be categorized as a proscribed terrorist organization because men or women who wear dungarees terrify Boomers. The wife of the CEO of the CRT should be kidnapped and held to ransom to ensure the CRT implement the above.

FUD is using either misinformation or selective quoting to induce negative views of something -- for example selecting the tiny number of (often discredited) articles which claim that climate change is not anthropogenic, or suggesting that LFP batteries are dangerous "because lithium batteries catch fire and are impossible to put out". Not all "professional websites" are truly impartial. The CPD website uses data from Greenectra, whose business is providing courses about "lithium-ion" batteries with a focus on safety precautions -- meaning, mainly for the most popular/dangerous chemistries like NMC, like this (because LFPs don't really suffer from thermal runaway etc, see below): "BattXcel Secure: A dedicated course addressing safety-critical aspects of Li-ion batteries. Learn about thermal runaway prevention, hazard identification, risk assessment, risk management in battery systems." If you were being cynical, you might think that it was in their interest to tell everyone how dangerous these batteries are, to maximise takeup of their (paid-for) courses...😉 If you look across scientific papers and the whole industry, the overwhelming opinion is that LFP batteries are many times safer than NMC and similar ones with free-oxygen chemistries -- which are the culprits in (pretty much?) all the "lithium battery fires" that are identified as a safety hazard, rightfully so for NMC but not for LFP. And when comparisons have been made the conclusion is usually that LFP are safer than LA, so there's no real justification for saying "We should stick with LA because it's safer". More familiar, yes, Safer, no. What is really needed is proper education about this, for both insurance companies and CWDF posters... 🙂 https://pv-magazine-usa.com/2023/09/26/not-all-lithium-ion-batteries-are-dangerous/

We spent five weeks on the Llangollen, leaving mid June. It's always busy as there's so many hire firms. However we travel slowly and walk lots, so the queues don't really affect us. The one bad queue was at New Marton locks as we came back down, as there was an obstruction on a gate holding everyone up. We just moored, went for a walk, and went down early evening when the place was deserted. I don't think anyone should be put off the Llangollen ... there's lots of hire and share boats, but they're all happy, smiling, and in holiday mood ... it makes for a lot of fun. Rog

And you sound like another one with a large mouth if I'm being honest. There's no more a "typical wide beam attitude" than a typical narrow boat attitude. That's just a figment of your own prejudice and bigotry. So you intentionally insulted someone because you didn't like their boat and then you got offended when they returned the favour? Can you spot the hypocrisy? There are plenty of instances of conflict and insults thrown around between owners of lots of different types of boats including narrow boat vs narrow boat. But if you really want to try to negatively characterise people on the basis of the boats they own it really says much more about you than it does about them.

In the last ten minutes I've found this in a box of books that I've collected from dad's house - it's not very long so once I've read it I'll post a summary!

Some years ago, when we lived in very rural Wales, the nearby village seemed to be a target for developers, there always seemed to be planning applications being submitted - these came to a halt when it turned out that there had been Otter footprints seen alongside the brook. An otter expert was called in and it turned out that the Otter appeared to have only one leg/foot, (the right fore leg). Further investigation led to a local who had carved an otter foot and was using it to make tracks wherever a planning application was being submitted. Unfortunately he only made the one-foot.

I always wondered when I first got onto Boats what would happen if public opinion swayed from 'oh what a nice alternative lifestyle' to 'what a load of filthy squatters'. Some of the Elmbridge land is in a terrible state and will be very expensive to clear up. Add to this the fact that at least half a dozen vessels (I heard it was closer to ten) went onto or through Sunbury weir in the January 2024 major floods and this problem needs to be dealt with. It is not just moored and sunk Boats there is also junk and rubbish on the land alongside the River. It really is quite bad in some bits. Also there is a flood management question if weirs are getting blocked. Public opinion may now be moving towards viewing those living on Boats as a problem which is very sad. It's no use pissing off the locals because they will always win if you get into a fight. There are a lot more of them and they have a vested interest in their neighbourhood... It is obvious. NBTA is an anti establishment political group. Nothing to do with Boats it's just that one can live on them then try to claim rights which don't exist then when the rights get clarified one can moan against the draconian authorities. Persecution complex.

However, to add some balance I'd point out almost every boat advert put up here for analysis gets ripped to bits just like this one has. Ultimately if the OP likes it and can afford it, I suggest they just buy it if none of the negs pointed out bothers them unduly. One can waste half a lifetime searching for the perfect boat and turning down boat after boat which are actually good enough. Sometimes its best to just buy any broadly suitable boat and get boating, instead of seeing a whole summer or two slip by visiting brokers every weekend, searching for the perfect boat that might not even exist.