Vaughan

Excuse me old chap, but you have just had the benefit of this forum's experience and expertise, in several different technical fields, over the space of two days, in answer to your question. If we haven't answered it to your satisfaction you may wish to take it from here, to the BA direct?

Frankly, who cares after all these years? Let's look forward.

Well that seems to have had a unanimous vote, anyway!

All very good questions, which have been exercising the minds of hire boat operators ever since the last War. I would also point out that there are nowhere near enough boatyards left on the Broads to provide that sort of overnight infrastructure.

Very interesting reading, but I think I can add a bit, concerning the actual power needed by an electric boat. As long as 20 years ago I saw a very expensive experiment with electric hire cruisers on the Canal du Midi. 2 brand new 4 berth cruisers were fitted out by Haines in Norfolk for a private hire fleet business near Beziers. This had the full backing of the canal authority (VNF) who installed special charging points at 4 main locations on the canal, up as far as Castelnaudary. All done virtually regardless of expense with all the funding that comes with a UNESCO World Heritage Site classification. Also launched in a cloud of "green" press publicity. The experiment was a complete failure and only lasted one season, with the boats having to be towed home on several occasions. The boats were re-fitted with diesel engines and the company ceased trading not all that long afterwards. The power points are still there and soon became most useful for hotel barges to run their air conditioning! So, if you are sitting comfortably, I will tell you what went wrong, as there are several reasons : For a start, most electric boats are day launches, usually built on the lines of old-fashioned steam launches, being long narrow beam boats gliding through the water and needing very little power. Pushing the hull of a 6 berth cabin cruiser of 8 Tonnes displacement through the water with enough shaft horsepower to cross Breydon on the tide, is a rather different matter! The horsepower of diesel engines can also be expressed in kilowatts. A Nanni 4220 diesel at 2000 RPM is around 30 kilowatts and an electric motor would have to provide the same shaft horsepower to drive the same sort of boat. So 4 hours cruising a day will use around 120 Kilowatt/hours out of the batteries, which themselves will weigh several Tonnes. A modern 6 berth hire cruiser with all the goodies, but with gas cooking, is already using between 3.5 to 4 kilowatt/hours at 12 volts on the domestic supply. And that is without the microwave oven! This will now also need to be charged by shore power as the boat has no engine. Without going into detailed figures, this will require a shore power point of at least 75 amps rating and probably 100 amps, to have any hope of putting that charge back in 8 hours overnight. A realistic full charge would be more like 12 hours. I believe shore power on moorings is rated at 32 Amps. That's just twice the power of the socket where you boil your kettle in the kitchen. No wonder you can't plug 'em into the leccy point in Beccles without blowing all the fuses on the town quay! By the way, electric boat batteries are charged on DC current, not AC and most boatyard installations will charge their launches with DC direct from the quay. This backs up what Grendel has just explained, as to why houses have to be fitted with specific power installations to charge electric cars. You can't just run a plug lead out of the kitchen window. As to rapid charging, like they do in motorway services, I can tell you that the Tesla power points are charging at 210 amps at 410 volts DC for a 100% charge and even more than that for a 10 minute top up. Is this what we want to see on the lawn at Ranworth staithe in future? Or at How Hill? I rather doubt they would run it across the marshes to St Benets Abbey! Finally, there is a very important matter of logistical numbers. Supposing the BA installed 2 charging points at Ranworth, among other places. And then suppose that Richardsons (to make it viable) build 5 new electric hire cruisers. What happens if all five of them independently decide to spend the same night at Ranworth? Only two of them get charged up. The others probably get towed home to Stalham on Sunday morning. Believe me, I have seen it happen. It is also no good suggesting that the boat should have a generator for emergencies or you are defeating the whole object of the exercise!

Excuse me but I think that may be where your argument breaks down before it starts. No-one is hogging the posts. There simply may not be enough of them, and someone else got there first! You are comparing this with an electric powered car, which is not the same thing. There are no shore power points on moorings other than at boatyards, which are powerful enough to re- charge a boat with electric propulsion overnight. If you will excuse me I am a bit tired and I am off to bed. In the morning I will write something in a lot more detail, about electric boat propulsion and its charging requirements, which I hope may answer your question.

I've got webbed feet, if that's any help?

Better ask Boris. I have a feeling he doesn't know either.

I think that would be dangerous ground! Just because a boat is fitted for shore power doesn't mean it has to use it. In addition the provision of shore power is so paltry on the Broads compared to other waterways that the fact that you have it, on your boat does not really give you any advantage over others. Better to remain autonomous and ensure that your boat is so equipped that after around 4 hours day cruising, you can spend the night on any mooring that you choose. That is how I grew up, on the Broads!

If there were an electric marsh pump house at Hardley Mill, which I think there may be, then it might be possible to tap something off that supply. Actually I consider places like Hardley and Rockland Short Dyke as wild moorings. They may have a made up quay or a pontoon but they are out in the middle of the tranquil marshes of what Timbo would call the Great Estuary and I don't think one should - or could - expect services of shore power or fresh water out there in the meadows. As a hire boat operator I know that boats can be fitted for the supply of medical aids such as oxygen, without need of shore power, provided you give the boatyard prior warning of your special needs, before you arrive. I have done that many times for customers.

"Hi Ho, Hi Ho, it's HOME to work we go . . . "

I believe one should always try to see a funny side where possible and I read something in the papers this morning : If the panto season can be salvaged this winter, we shall have to look out for Snow White and the Five Dwarfs.

Thank you Poppy. It is a long article but very well worth reading.

So they weren't broken down then? I got the impression they were drifting beam on to the current with no engine. That's why I noticed how well the Broadsbeat launch nudged the bow of the casualty up into the current, before taking on the tow.

With even more difficulty - I think there's no doubt of that. I think it probably got generally political as the Broads probably won't specifically be affected any more than any other parts of the country's business economy.

Spread a bit of your biodegradable diesel on the water John. "That'll larn 'em", as they say in Norfolk!

If only the virus could be sanitised as easily as a thread on this forum! That's just me being flippant as I agree, we should keep off politics. Trouble is, government seems to have as much to do with our predicament, as the virus itself. I am really posting as I agree with Cheesey69. He has objective and reasoned views and also has the courage to say so. I didn't want him to be a lone voice.

Nice piece of boat handling by Broadsbeat. Their launch must have a powerful engine!

Thanks, Griff, I think that proves the point very nicely! We can also imagine how difficult it would be to keep steerage way when coming down with that current under you. I came up there on the full flood a couple of years ago, with 1300 revs on the engine I reckoned I must have been doing about 12MPH. Not making a ripple of wash, though!

Which is one of the reasons they were not successful in a military role!

I have just caught the "gist" of your post . . . That would certainly frighten the swans!

That is also true. The Army pilots were helicopter pilots from the Army Air Corps. They are flown very much like a helicopter, with a collective lever, a cyclic lever and two rudder pedals.

No - I was trying to find one myself! Admin, where are you when we need you?

My father knew Chris Cockerill and saw that model being demonstrated at Somerleyton. In fairness, it was just a biscuit tin, with a little propeller petrol engine for kids' model aeroplanes. But the principle was proved! Later development was, of course, done further away on the south coast. Whether a full size hovercraft ever flew on the Broads, I don't know. By the way, in COLREGS, they were classified as a seaplane. I imagine they still are.

Well, it seems it was the SRN5, from which the SRN6 was developed, after trials by my regiment. Please excuse me, it was more than 40 years ago.