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Trailable narrow boats?


DimitriOrlov

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I'd much rather have a trainable narrowboat (sorry).

Wilderness boats - whenever I see one of these I do think what great fun it would be to have one.  

The small Sea otters are (just) trailable. 

The old Springer Waterbug was designed to be trailable but was right on the weight limit.

Lots of narrow beam grp cruisers well under the weight limit.  

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Juno is a viking 23 and if you take your luggage and the outboard off weighs about 950kg - designed to be trailed but probably not by my 20 year old VW Golf 1.4. There are plenty of smaller vessels that offer sleeping accommodation and can be trailed too. I quite fancy a Norman Conquest, which somehow manages to squeeze a centre cockpit into it's 20 foot length...

 

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It depends if you're after a boat that's narrow (thus, is useable on narrow canals - fits through the locks and bridgeholes etc) or a narrowboat (which is a particular type/style of the aforementioned). If its narrowboat, then the choice is very limited. In either case, you'll not be getting the length of a more typical narrowboat (say 50' or more) and on a narrowboat,  the length partly makes up for the lack of space - because its, err, narrow.

Seriously evaluate the benefits of trailerable vs simply finding a mooring in your local area, yes there's a cost saving but one which might be wiped out if you needed to run a larger car or 4x4, or get someone else to tow/launch it. Also don't forget the viability and location of launch sites, and their costs if applicable. I imagine that whilst a large estate car would be fine towing a ~2000kg trailer, the extra control of a 4x4 (with low gears) or a tractor during launch and retrieval is really handy. Also tractors (obviously depends on the configuration, but plenty of them do have the facility) can adjust the height of the tow hitch if its on the tractor's 3 point hitch, or a front arm, which means they can do it in a more cramped area, or do it with a bigger boat, because it can put the hitch to the lowest position, flatten out the trailer angle and not need such a length of slipway to get the front end floating off the trailer. Obviously if its a slipway used for (normal length up to 70ft) narrowboats then the space issue isn't so important, but I am thinking of specific facilities - the two nearest to me are quite cramped and the slipway isn't parallel to the canal, for example.

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Also remember if you passed your driving test after 1st Jan 1997 then your licence does not allow you to drive a vehicle and trailer greater than 3500 kgs or a trailer exceeding 750 kgs unless you pass an additional test. Before that date you have grandfather rights which enables you to tow over the above weights ( up to 7500 kgs) 

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22 minutes ago, nebulae said:

Also remember that if you have "Grandfather rights" you lose them at age 70 unless you make a application to renew them and have a medical.

Oh, I didn't know that and I often tow.  Just looked at my licence and there is a picture of a car and caravan (classification BE)  with an expiry date the same as my licence looks like I am OK 

Phew 

Haggis 

 

Edited by haggis
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3 hours ago, haggis said:

Oh, I didn't know that and I often tow.  Just looked at my licence and there is a picture of a car and caravan (classification BE)  with an expiry date the same as my licence looks like I am OK 

Phew 

Haggis 

 

Mine is the same.

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16 hours ago, Paul C said:

It depends if you're after a boat that's narrow (thus, is useable on narrow canals - fits through the locks and bridgeholes etc) or a narrowboat (which is a particular type/style of the aforementioned). If its narrowboat, then the choice is very limited. In either case, you'll not be getting the length of a more typical narrowboat (say 50' or more) and on a narrowboat,  the length partly makes up for the lack of space - because its, err, narrow.

Seriously evaluate the benefits of trailerable vs simply finding a mooring in your local area, yes there's a cost saving but one which might be wiped out if you needed to run a larger car or 4x4, or get someone else to tow/launch it. Also don't forget the viability and location of launch sites, and their costs if applicable. I imagine that whilst a large estate car would be fine towing a ~2000kg trailer, the extra control of a 4x4 (with low gears) or a tractor during launch and retrieval is really handy. Also tractors (obviously depends on the configuration, but plenty of them do have the facility) can adjust the height of the tow hitch if its on the tractor's 3 point hitch, or a front arm, which means they can do it in a more cramped area, or do it with a bigger boat, because it can put the hitch to the lowest position, flatten out the trailer angle and not need such a length of slipway to get the front end floating off the trailer. Obviously if its a slipway used for (normal length up to 70ft) narrowboats then the space issue isn't so important, but I am thinking of specific facilities - the two nearest to me are quite cramped and the slipway isn't parallel to the canal, for example.

And a tractor can wade a lot deeper than even a proper 4x4.

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I have known people who opted to trail thus saving on mooring costs but they very quickly changed their minds and took moorings. Now at the end of a day boating all the have to do is lock the boat , get in the car and drive home, no faff hauling out etc etc 

Phil

Edited by Phil Ambrose
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I think the main attraction of a trailable boat would be the facility to be able to access waters outside the canal network, and I'm sure the owners of wilderness boats and sea otters had that as the main motivation when they chose their vessels.  How much of this actually happens in practice, I doubt.  It's the same reason I suspect the vast majority of touring caravans end up staying in one location.  

I'm trying to remember the last time I saw a "canal" boat on a trailer, I can't.  

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When we bought our trailable boat the lowland canals in Scotland we're just beong reopened and we were able to attend every opening event, often using slips which hadn't been used for years 

We used to trail her down to England and we attended several events on her 

Now that we have kelpie down south we no longer need to do that 

Trailable boats are fun 

Haggis 

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I am a grandfather and am available to drive your hugely heavy 4x4 plus narrowboat combination anywhere on the mainland UK.  Senior citizen rates apply.  Conditions of service include :

- no back seat driving - you are required to hand over your entire road train and expect it to arrive at its destination sometime or never,

- first class rail ticket or one way car hire will be charged for the return journey,

- overnight stops will be effected by sleeping on board - customer to ensure ample supplies of victuals - details of my preferences (compulsory) will be forwarded after signing the contract.

 

seriously, it isn't about a simple choice between mooring and trailing.  I had a lovely cruiser moored in Bristol, but soon found the return trip from Bristol to Bath and beyond became very samey.  I wasn't in a position to make extended trips, 3 or 4 nights away from home were the limit.  I then started towing and a whole new world opened up for me.   Neil2 has described it just about spot on.   

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About 25 years ago we bought a trailable boat with a gaff rig and outboard called a Winklebrig and towed it behind a motor caravan.   We only did one extended trip with her but stayed in marinas, paying just for the small boat mooring and living mainly in the motorhome parked nearby.   We visited Banyuls in southern France, Moraira and Torrevieja in Spain, starting from North Wales, but I found the driving too stressful to want to repeat it.

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1 hour ago, Neil2 said:

I think the main attraction of a trailable boat would be the facility to be able to access waters outside the canal network, and I'm sure the owners of wilderness boats and sea otters had that as the main motivation when they chose their vessels.  How much of this actually happens in practice, I doubt.  It's the same reason I suspect the vast majority of touring caravans end up staying in one location.  

I'm trying to remember the last time I saw a "canal" boat on a trailer, I can't.  

Exactly the same concept with buying a 57 foot boat to " Do the system " I know many that never go anywhere near parts of the system with shorter locks so might have well have bought more space.

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14 minutes ago, mrsmelly said:

Exactly the same concept with buying a 57 foot boat to " Do the system " I know many that never go anywhere near parts of the system with shorter locks so might have well have bought more space.

You can apply this principle to a lot of consumer goods I suppose, but the one that totally perplexes me in the modern age is the expensive motorhome.  I'm not talking about compact campervans but these leviathans costing upwards of £50,000 where the purchase can't possible be justified in any way by the vast majority of buyers.  

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After I got rid of my narrow boat, mainly because of the time it took to get anywhere, we bought a trailable 20 foot Shetland 4+2. Nice little boat and the idea was 1st to save money on mooring fees and 2nd to trail the boat where we wanted to be and put it in water and enjoy a week or two that way. It never happened. It was pain getting it in and out of the water especially out. It was an even bigger pain trailing it because out of the water and on the trailer it was huge. Storing it took up half my back garden. Also the amount of traffic these days was a bit daunting with something that size behind you and it was a horrible thing to pull. When we decided that C&RT were not doing very much for the huge amount of money we were giving them so we sold that as well never to go back on the water, well not for the time being anyway. We also considered a caravan. The mrs said "we are not trailing one of those stupid things around behind us" AND when we finally get to where we want to be pitching up in a muddy field and her having to do all the cooking,  washing etc. If we go anywhere in future we book into a hotel and get waited on.

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8 minutes ago, pete.i said:

After I got rid of my narrow boat, mainly because of the time it took to get anywhere, we bought a trailable 20 foot Shetland 4+2. Nice little boat and the idea was 1st to save money on mooring fees and 2nd to trail the boat where we wanted to be and put it in water and enjoy a week or two that way. It never happened. It was pain getting it in and out of the water especially out. It was an even bigger pain trailing it because out of the water and on the trailer it was huge. Storing it took up half my back garden. Also the amount of traffic these days was a bit daunting with something that size behind you and it was a horrible thing to pull. When we decided that C&RT were not doing very much for the huge amount of money we were giving them so we sold that as well never to go back on the water, well not for the time being anyway. We also considered a caravan. The mrs said "we are not trailing one of those stupid things around behind us" AND when we finally get to where we want to be pitching up in a muddy field and her having to do all the cooking,  washing etc. If we go anywhere in future we book into a hotel and get waited on.

I wish there were more posts like this...

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Wouldn't be much of a canal forum if most of the members were ex-boaters.

I prefer it as it is, a nice balance of newbies, current boaters and ex (particularly those who worked on the canals in the twilight years of commercial carrying) boaters. 

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It was the other way round for us, we had a boat for 10 years on the Lancaster which is a lovely canal, but being of working age you can only keep going up and down the same stretch. We have had our Caraboat for 11 years now and have been all over the place with it, meeting Haggis at a few places like the Scottish canals, it been fantastic, though it won't be for everyone though as to be trailable you have to compromise on boat size and be happy to tow and launch your boat which again isn't everybodies cup of tea, I know a lot of people with Wilderness boats and would say they are probably the easiest to launch and recover on a trailer due to there flat bottom design many of them have explored canals in France and Ireland by taking them over on the Ferry, not sure there is much of a cost saving though if you have to buy a 4x4 to tow though..

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