grendel

on the Ant, do you try and overtake on the short tack, or the shorter tack, I mean on that stretch of river, there is barely much more room behind than a boat width, so they will be turning fairly quickly after again.

I tend to prefer wild moorings or mudweighting, but have never failed to manage a mooring somewhere, for example if I see an empty mooring spot at horning staithe i will pop in and go do some shopping, then off somewhere else to moor up for the night (usually above wroxham bridge if i am in the area, viaduct moorings, bridge broad on the mudwight, or even wroxham village moorings (Malt Staithe)- this is after the big loop above Wroxham bridge and has room for 1 or 2 boats.

or replace a 3 blade prop for the same size and pitch 4 blade.

they do have the option of raising all their track and bridges as the alternative, i wonder which is more expensive.

as mentioned previously, the issues may not just be heat, to be fair its not yet at the sort of temperatures that have closed it in previous years due to heat, so my thoughts are that there are other issues (no doubt that are being looked at as part of the upgrades due next year) they mentioned upgrades to the bridge controls and to the cables. water misting at that location has the tricky issue that at least part of the time the water has salt content, which will induce rust on the track and bridge structure. I believe they did try painting the rails white the other year to reflect some of the heat. I think you will also find that the number of firms left in this country that can perform engineering work on the scale of these bridges is limited, so naturally they will be given the contract for the works, i dont believe there is any of the old boy network left in many industries nowadays, it all comes down to who can do the work at the cheapest price, they have to be seen to go out to tender and justify their acceptance of the contractor they choose, especially nowadays where public funding is involved. the penalties for doing other than this are just too great nowadays.

if you go for the condensed view then you dont get the preview that Griff speaks about

on the southern broads its not so easy to find wild moorings, but they are there if you want to look for them, some of my favorites are on the waveney, one is a short section of quay heading on the right bank just a bit above the waveney river centre, up at geldeston staithe (the leg that doesnt go to the locks) if you can get under beccles bridge, you can mudweight on surlingham broad, and there are a couple of sneaky spots for a small boat on the wide corners of the river chet (its a bit too narrow at other points) other than that a lot of the sections of mooring down south are generally quite remote from civilisation and are quite beautiful.

not while helming, its refreshing, only slightly alcoholic, and i like the flavour, also a lot easier to prepare in advance when I am solo helming, I cant just pop back and put the kettle on without mooring up first.

well yesterday didnt go as planned, woke up, decided maybe i didnt need to go to the boot fair, got a cup of coffee, looked outside it was such a nice day i changed my mind and went to the boot fair, only bought a lathe carriage and cross slide, then came home. Started mocking up the drive mount for my 13" lathe, i was doing this using meccano to get the geometry, but have some 1" angle iron to actually make the mount. I had started printing a 3d part for a friend before I went to the boot fair, and 4 hours later it was complete, o in a break after lunch I decided to run the part over to his house. about 2 roads from his house i went round a corner and went to change gear, nothing, the gear lever would just go forward and back, no side to side and i was stuck in first gear, well I decided I would take look when i got to his house, he wasnt in so I popped the part through his letter box, and had a quick look at the car, nothing visible, and of course the gear change mechanism at the gearbox end is buried deep in the engine bay under the air intake ducts and air filter box. resigned myself to driving home in first gear, but had a thought when i got a couple of roads away, so pulled up, wrestled the air intake duct from the air filter box and front grill, and though I still couldnt see, i could get a hand into the right area, feeling around revealed thatindeed one of the linkages had come off at the gearbox end, I wasnt sure if anything was missing as the pin seemed a lot smaller than the hole in the rubber bushing, I could feel a groove for a spring clip, but there wasnt one of those either. I figured i had nothing to lose, so just popped the oversized bush over the pin, expecting to have to stop and repeat when it came loose, by some small miracle i made the 15 miles home, minimising gear changes a much as possible. then I had to bend my thoughts to fixing it, all i needed was a new rubber bushing and the correct clip, but no, you needed to buy a complete cable set to get the bushing, and you couldnt buy the clips. I went back out and measured the two parts as best I could by feel, the pin was about 8mm and the hole through the bush 15mm. I reasoned I could turn up a bit of brass to do the job, but it would need a wider flange on top to stop the bushing just sliding off of it, so a quick half hour on my small lathe with a chunk of 1" brass, and I had my part, a 5 minute hunt for my box of assorted circlips, and I had my clip, as always if you take just one you think is right you will need a different size, so i took the whole tray and picked right the first time, pushed the brass part into the hole in the rubber bushing, perfect fit, with the flange wide enough to prevent it slipping off, put this assembly over the pin, my only concern was had i made the part short enough to get the circlip on, and yes i had, circlip fitted the car was now fixed, so it was time to reinstall the air intake ducting and the gaiter around the gearstick, that I had pulled apart to see what had broken, this too went remarkably easily, if anything, looking at what I could see of the other gearshift cable (that translates the side to side movement of the stick, I have made a better job than the OEM one as the only thing holding that in place is the spring clip, no flange to stop the cable end sliding off the rubber bushing

just call him hopalong

I suppose its a numbers game, how many people use that rail service, verses how many use the navigation, i suspect at different times in the year, you would get a swing towards the navigation, I always notice a few boats hanging around waiting for the bridge to open when I slip under, and then you have to remember that the broads authority dredgers need a bridge opening too, so there are still 'commercial' craft plying the navigation

there are no specific limits on the boats, but generally one person in the crew should be sober enough to helm the boat responsibly, i am not adverse to supping a crabbies ginger beer while helming, but thats generally over several hours.

some of us dont even need to wait for the tides

Best hop to it and make a visit then.

hickling broad (since its 3RR day and you are marshalling

I have temporarily locked this thread, due in part to the posts we have had to hide that came close to or broke the TOS when describing the person moored, it will remain locked unless someone has any pertinent facts to add, in which case message me and i will either reopen the thread or add the information for you. Just a reminder, we will not stand by and allow a trial by forum, all of the relevant authorities have now been informed, I suggest we leave it in their hands and hope for a successful outcome.

I have never yet been unable to get through potter heigham bridge when I wanted to, usually twice each holiday when I hired from Marthams, I have yet to take Water Rail through, as we need to ascertain what she needs to get under, we think its 6'1", but i will do a test with more clearance first and see how much there is to spare. Really its all a question of hiring the right boats, and by that I mean a marthams woodie.

and then of course the size and shape of the roof makes a difference too.

maybe it is some other mechanical issue rather than heat expansion?

looking at the repps data this morning, at low tide river levels were down to 0.21m, which is off the pdf chart, so extrapolating that would mean that at low tide this morning there was over 6 foot 11" at potter heigham, currently back to 0.25m and rising, but that is still nearly 6'10" which looks hopeful for anyone wanting to head under the bridge today.

that would be a welcome addition to available moorings, and they could add a time limit for how long you could stay if they made it an official mooring site is presumably being dealt with by the Broads Authority as per your letter from them. but yes I would expect any boat out on the river (or in adjacent waters) to have the relevant tolls, insurance and BSS certification.

of course we have no proof they are wrong doers, that is only our suspicion, probably better phrased a people who play the rules and people who play by the spirit of the rules. Very similar to those who quoted the rules dont say...... as opposed to the reason for the rules, during lockdown to justify doing what they wanted. the vast majority knew what the rules meant and stuck by that, the small minority interpreted the rules to allow them to do what they wanted.

the big issue here is that if the land owners take action, then from fairness they would have to act against everyone who moors on a wild mooring on that bank of the and from Johnny Crowes right up to Barton broad, as they own that whole section.

it was my understanding that the original agreement drawn up included a penalty clause for obstructing the navigation, in reality this probably hasnt been updated so a punitive fine back when the licence was drawn up is probably a mere pittance in todays terms, by what i see in other legal documents from that era a 5s fine per boat unable to navigate back in the early 1900's is a mere 25p nowadays (random made up figures as i dont know the details) but nowadays the cost to administer those payments would in itself present an expense, thus i was trying to ascertain to whom the Railway network are responsible to pay any such fines and the amount that can be claimed, would they pay the broads authority, or the boat owners affected. was there any such clause imposed on the railways, to my mind there must have been. As for the decision in court, you must remember the agreement was put in place when there was regular cargo traffic on those rivers, and a court would be required to study those agreements to maintain the navigation before making a judgement. i dont think its as cut and dried as rail service continuity, as there is also the navigation continuity to consider.

In reality that should make no difference as they will still legally be bound to maintain the navigation, what I was trying to ascertain was the conditions of the agreement that they are bound under to do this, and whether there was a penalty clause for failure to maintain said navigation by being unable to open the bridges in a timely manner.