Buying a new boat

[chubby]

3 minutes ago, peterboat said:

My ex hire boat had never been blacked!! Never assume like I did check with your eyes

in the section quoted i do not use the word " assume " regarding hull blacking . I also go on to state " if  the hull has been maintained " 

Wyvern have thier own dry dock i believe which is why i would " expect " it to be blacked regularly and maybe as often as once per year . Other hire firms i would also " expect " to black annually but i would not " assume " they do so & as you rightly say it would still require a thorough check anyway

cheers

.

[peterboat]

1 hour ago, chubby said:

in the section quoted i do not use the word " assume " regarding hull blacking . I also go on to state " if  the hull has been maintained " 

Wyvern have thier own dry dock i believe which is why i would " expect " it to be blacked regularly and maybe as often as once per year . Other hire firms i would also " expect " to black annually but i would not " assume " they do so & as you rightly say it would still require a thorough check anyway

cheers

.

I bought mine from evesham marine they could crane the boats out easily but never did, they also never put anodes on! what they used to do was black down to the waterline to hide the damage done by hirers. Mine was blacked for the first time when I bought it, as I was fairly green about these things I did nor realise until I docked it for the first time that only one coat of watered down blacking had been used on it!!

Fortunately the boat was an Avon boat so the river water was cleaner than the Stratford and the boat had survived not to badly corroded.

I to like you would have expected the company to have looked after their assets but it seems that profits are put before care and of course they have gone to the wall maybe due to their attitude

[chubby]

3 hours ago, peterboat said:

I bought mine from evesham marine they could crane the boats out easily but never did, they also never put anodes on! what they used to do was black down to the waterline to hide the damage done by hirers. Mine was blacked for the first time when I bought it, as I was fairly green about these things I did nor realise until I docked it for the first time that only one coat of watered down blacking had been used on it!!

Fortunately the boat was an Avon boat so the river water was cleaner than the Stratford and the boat had survived not to badly corroded.

I to like you would have expected the company to have looked after their assets but it seems that profits are put before care and of course they have gone to the wall maybe due to their attitude

Good grief - i find that astonishing ! Of course its never wise to make any assumptions but i wouldve been confident that a hire boat would ve been blacked more regularly than a privately owned boat because the hire fleet company have access to the facilities more easily . Thats just plain lazy not to black it . Dreadful . 

[matty40s]

Most narrowboat corrosion comes from boats being stuck in marinas for 8 months or more on landlines and not being adequately protected.

Most hire fleets are used for 8 months plus a year and never on landlines.

Virtually all hire boat hull thickness diminishing is down to abrasion and dents, not pitting or rusting.

[SadieF]

On 9/30/2017 at 22:12, matty40s said:

Most narrowboat corrosion comes from boats being stuck in marinas for 8 months or more on landlines and not being adequately protected.

Most hire fleets are used for 8 months plus a year and never on landlines.

Virtually all hire boat hull thickness diminishing is down to abrasion and dents, not pitting or rusting.

Hiya

just wondering what you mean by corrosion happening from not being protected adequately when sat in marina. Is this to do with shoreline hook ups. is that what you mean by landline? and what is adequate protection. cheers

 

[rusty69]

A boats hull / under water fittings should be protected by:-

Product from a tin, be it bitumen, antifoul, epoxy etc. 

Anodes, either zinc or magnesium, depending on type of water. 

Galvanic isolator / isolation transformers if connected to mains electricity. 

Fenders/rubbing strakes

Insurance 

A Prayer from above. 

Edited November 19, 2017 by rusty69

[SadieF]

2 minutes ago, rusty69 said:

A boats hull should be protected by:-

Product from a tin, be it bitumen, antifoul, epoxy etc. 

Anodes, either zinc or magnesium, depending on type of water. 

Galvanic isolator / isolation transformers if connected to mains electricity. 

Fenders

Insurance 

A Prayer from above. 

Thank you. I have not heard of galvanic isolators/isolation transformers - although i plan to cc and use solar panels with top ups from the engine or a generator. Good to know though if i end up being moored and using mains. useful info, cheers. 

[matty40s]

This is a good example of galvanic corrosion on a vicious scale. 

Even the underwater algae don't like growing as the heat is too much.

The deepest pits are in other areas.

[Rickent]

17 minutes ago, matty40s said:

This is a good example of galvanic corrosion on a vicious scale. 

Even the underwater algae don't like growing as the heat is too much.

The deepest pits are in other areas.

I hope mine doesn't look like that when it comes out next week.

[SadieF]

oooh there's some serious rusty patches on there. 

If there are any other newbies out there - i just found a really good article that explains it very well http://www.canalboat.co.uk/canal-boats/maintenance/why-do-i-need-a-galvanic-isolator-1-3930242

Just have a question - is it worth having a galvanic isolator fitted even if not in a marina? 

[matty40s]

If you never have a landline connection, the a GI is useless.

This does however include having a genny on the bank or having an online mooring with an onshore supply of some sort.

However, all the worst examples of this come from marinas on canals where there are many boats connected up all year round.

(This one was from Whilton)

[Rickent]

Is this issue not made worse when moored against  metal pilings in said marina with multiple boats all connected to shore line.

[matty40s]

4 minutes ago, Rickent said:

Is this issue not made worse when moored against  metal pilings in said marina with multiple boats all connected to shore line.

It seems to be endemic and getting worse on these conditions, boats which 10 years ago had no issues are now showing problems with no change of usage or marinas.

[dmr]

23 minutes ago, SadieF said:

oooh there's some serious rusty patches on there. 

If there are any other newbies out there - i just found a really good article that explains it very well http://www.canalboat.co.uk/canal-boats/maintenance/why-do-i-need-a-galvanic-isolator-1-3930242

Just have a question - is it worth having a galvanic isolator fitted even if not in a marina? 

Even if you are CCing you might visit a few places that have mains and so choose to plug in for a few days. Bristol and Liverpool spring to mind here. You might even want or need to spend a week or so in a marina once in a while. A GI would be good to have for these visits, though its hard to justify the cost of a transformer for infrequent use.

............Dave

[Rickent]

21 minutes ago, matty40s said:

It seems to be endemic and getting worse on these conditions, boats which 10 years ago had no issues are now showing problems with no change of usage or marinas.

I shall wait with interest when mine comes out next week but am not anticipating any major problems.

[Alan de Enfield]

4 minutes ago, Rickent said:

I shall wait with interest when mine comes out next week but am not anticipating any major problems.

No one ever does.

[Rickent]

5 minutes ago, Alan de Enfield said:

No one ever does.

Famous last words came to mind as soon as I posted that.

[SadieF]

42 minutes ago, dmr said:

Even if you are CCing you might visit a few places that have mains and so choose to plug in for a few days. Bristol and Liverpool spring to mind here. You might even want or need to spend a week or so in a marina once in a while. A GI would be good to have for these visits, though its hard to justify the cost of a transformer for infrequent use.

............Dave

Yeah that's what i was thinking. might do occaisonally. i will sometimes be in bristol actually. Are they expensive then ... these GI's. 

[Alan de Enfield]

1 minute ago, SadieF said:

Are they expensive then ... these GI's. 

Q - Is insurance cheaper than repairing your boat ?

A - Only if you need to make a claim, otherwise it is a waste of money.

[dmr]

3 minutes ago, SadieF said:

Yeah that's what i was thinking. might do occaisonally. i will sometimes be in bristol actually. Are they expensive then ... these GI's. 

About £100 plus fitting if you cant do this yourself. There is one with a plug and socket that simply fits into your shoreline cable.

...........Dave

[SadieF]

1 hour ago, dmr said:

About £100 plus fitting if you cant do this yourself. There is one with a plug and socket that simply fits into your shoreline cable.

...........Dave

Thanks for the info. doesn't seem too expensive really if it's going to provide protection for your hull in the long run. 

[MtB]

On 19/11/2017 at 23:33, SadieF said:

Thanks for the info. doesn't seem too expensive really if it's going to provide protection for your hull in the long run.

 

Unfortunately it isn't that cut and dried. There are plenty of boats out there with no GI and no corrosion, and vice versa. There is more to hull corrosion than anyone fully undertands. On another thread here someone mentions a stretched boat where the original boat has virtually no corrosion, but the ten feet of newly inserted hull is heavily corroded. That cannot be down to a missing GI or anodes.

[cuthound]

11 hours ago, matty40s said:

It seems to be endemic and getting worse on these conditions, boats which 10 years ago had no issues are now showing problems with no change of usage or marinas.

I wonder if this is because of the increased number of rechargeable devices in use these days (phone chargers, toothbrush chargers, small vacuum cleaners etc as well as the boats battery charger).

All of these use switched mode power supplies, which create harmonics when they chop the mains supply on and off to regulate and thus drive a small ripple current back to earth.

[ditchcrawler]

20 minutes ago, cuthound said:

I wonder if this is because of the increased number of rechargeable devices in use these days (phone chargers, toothbrush chargers, small vacuum cleaners etc as well as the boats battery charger).

All of these use switched mode power supplies, which create harmonics when they chop the mains supply on and off to regulate and thus drive a small ripple current back to earth.

I think that was one of Gibbo's theories as well making the GI conduct

 

[cuthound]

5 minutes ago, ditchcrawler said:

I think that was one of Gibbo's theories as well making the GI conduct

 

Well the GI will only conduct if the diodes have a high enough voltage across them to cause them to conduct, but in a crowded marina there must be hundreds of SMPS devices in use.

When I installed power at my end of garden mooring I put an earth spike in right next to the power bollard and canal to try and ensure the earths were at the same potential.