grendel

20 miles at 50mph would be useless to me and dangerouse as I have a 60 mile journey all on motorway, and I am generally travelling at either 6am or after 5pm, outside the opening hours of most tyre firms, this is why I have a full size spare.

thursday am, car is hard to start (it was -4) but i also noticed the dashboard lights very dim, after getting to work I did some checking, this was when i found that all of the function on the main lighting switch no longer worked, fortunately being a volvo the headlights fail safe mode was dipped headlights, some quick diagnostics proved fuses ok, but nothing in the light switch module was functioning, so on to ebay, and an identical part number switch unit in the correct colour was located, so £30 later and after missing the delivery this morning (doorbell batteries flat) and its a quick walk round to the sorting office for 5pm, part picked up it was a 30 second job to remove the old switch and fit the replacement, good news all functioning once more. unfortunately since the car is canbus, there are only 3 wires out of the switch so none of the circuits could be jury rigged to get them functioning, all the joys of a 17 year old car.

I seem to recall that in a recent thread on this subject we found that historically river levels during the 70's and early 80's were lower than now, but that this was unusually lower than at previous times, so river levels have reverted to the higher side of normal during the present day, this is I believe why a lot of people say, well we could get through then, why cant we get through now (that and other causes such as the lack of dredging of the lower bure, which is also thought to have an effect on the water levels at the bridge)

they got up to at least 6 foot 7 earlier in the year.

dont forget you can get a forum discount at Brian Wards see their advert at the right of the page (quote NBN)

unfortunately unless you hire a yacht, boats that normally pass through Potter heigham are few and far between. generally you are required to use a bridge pilot, and they will let you know if there is clearance, there is only one boatyard that hires cruisers that normally pass through Potter heigham nowadays, and that is Martham Boats, all of their wooden cruisers normally pass through the bridge as they are based the other side of it. of course even their boats dont pass through occasionally (when the water is particularly high) but the bonus there is that you are stuck the hickling side of the bridge. Marthams only use their own staff to get boats through which they have a great deal of skill in doing . the other option is to hire a day boat to go through to hickling.

are you trying to entice the members to join you on the naughty step Jay, just remember some of the moderators have santas hotline number for reporting naughtyness.

would that be Animal Mike?

wheres a sigh emoji when you need one

its one wrapped in Holly

they have good boot fairs at Canterbury, on hard standing so not weather dependent (unless its tipping down) it only stops during the pre christmas shopping period when the car park is used sundays.

I have added the missing comma.

I was lucky last night to be able to pop out and assist a colleague at the local scout group, we were there as adstronomers to help them get their astronomy badges, as part of this we watched the ISS pass overhead, then we showed them the moon through our telescopes. while we were there I was testing my latest boot fair find, an 1100mm mirror lens, on the moon with some pretty good results

just one Question MM, is it contagious?

one last little update for now, i have now done the folding side at the rear of the cockpit,

the only problem will be that like the rest of the broads, once you have been there and had a look around, you will want to visit again and again.

everything, up to hickling, the pleasureboat, the side cut to catfield staithe, down meadow dyke to horsey and a visit to the tea room and wind pump, then further down the thurne from candle dyke to west somerton, so when you run out of time doing half of that lot, hire another dayboat to do the other half, there are nice moorings at deep go dyke , white slea and deep dyke, they are nice quiet spots, but not a lot of places to go from those moorings. when i hire from Marthams i usually try and spend one day above the bridge exploring, either at the start or end of the week.

Fred, thats ok, but we are supposed to be heading into the next ice age already, if anything its overdue, maybe global warming is real, but has been just staving off the next ice age as we speak. we will never stop climate change as that is just doing what comes naturally when it comes to planets, and nothing we can do with current technology will change that fact.

so next on to cutting the recesses for the hinges, if you have ever struggled to cut an accurate pocket to fit a hinge on a door, well imagine trying to do this for hinges 1/12 the size, well thats what i did, the pins provided have heads that protrude way to much, so after fitting he heads were filed down so they no longer interfere with each other, to make a good fit.

one issue i do have was the front side screen windows, they sit on an angled base, but they slide forward just slightly, so a solution was needed, so a small part was created to give a section of a lip to stop the side screens slipping forward, nothing much was needed, just something to catch the bottom of the frame, so using a scrap of teak, i created a part to make that lip.

with a bit of time on my hands this morning its some more woodwork, using another piece of the burmese teak, i have created a pattern in thin ply, then transferred to teak for the folding parts of the cockpit sides, i have pieses of the teak cut into various sizes and thicknesses, for the hinged pieces the sides are a bit thin, so i will be backing the hinges fixing points to thicken up the wood i can fix the hinges to. i have a selection of hinges, these are literally the smallest hinges you can buy, yet are still a bit big, but the smallest piano hinge available is huge in comparison (all shown in this picture).

the worst bit was that i made the edges of the roofs deeper than i needed to, so have had to notch out those sides for the window hoppers, getting it so the roof still fitted was fun (especially the front roof that slides forward into position), the front of the notches had to be angled to accept this, but all sorted now.

a quiet day today, so as i had a busy day yesterday i decided to potter on with the model, window hopper production line day, of course they are different sizes and even one frame is different one end to other, so a gauge was used to ensure the angle is the same.

John, considering he has found the seized big end bearing, i sort of assume the sump is already off (especially as it was needed on the replacement engine)

does that mean a new crankshaft is needed or can that one be reground to repair it?