Vaughan

Interesting, this. A large amount of Broads boats were planked in deal and a lot of others in mahogany. Teak, in my experience, was used more for cabin sides and interiors, mainly because of price. On the other hand, if it was "Archangel Red" deal, that looks very much like teak and is said to last as long. Only trouble with that is that the supply dried up in 1939, for obvious reasons and I don't think it has been imported to this country since. So Powles would have had to have stock left over from before the War. Quite a lot of yards did, but perhaps not right up until the mid 60s. Anyway, Griff owns the boat and he is there when they replace the planking, so he ought to know!

It is indeed a lovely view. One of the best places to watch the 3 rivers race, as you can see almost all of the course! On a clear day from there, you can see Beccles.

Here it is, photo taken in 2017, just in front of St Benets Level Mill, between Thurne Mouth and Thurne Dyke. This was the holiday home of the Rt. Rev. Aubrey Aitken, Bishop of Lynn, whose tomb can be seen in Norwich Cathedral. In the 60's and 70's he was well known for his sermons in churches all over the Broads. He was a genuine Broadsman, whose Bishop's crook was fashioned as a boat-hook, with the bottom end as the "bott" of a quant pole. His family have deep roots on the Broads, especially in boatyards such as Harvey Eastwood and Eastwood Whelpton. I am especially attached to Thurne Church since in the 70s it was effectively closed, with no vicar. All the same, one Christmas, we managed, with the Bishop's influence, to get permission to hold a service of nine lessons and carols, with the choir all formed from members of the East Anglian Cruising Club, who were based on the Thurne and whose "clubhouse" was the Lion. One of those memories of the Broads in the 70's, that I shall never forget.

I have read that this is where a light was shone in the direction of the abbey, to inform the monks that a service was about to be held in the church. There is evidence that there used to be a ferry across the Thurne, somewhere near to the "Bishop's bungalow"* which gave direct access on foot, between the two. * That's another story!

The Buck in Thorpe was a Morgans pub in the 50s. Youngs and Crawshays had a large brewery in King St., in the old port of Norwich. They were more well known for bottled beers, especially their pale ale.

Hi Karizma, We are going back a bit a bit now! I joined Crown Blue Line in 1993 and their new boats all had the Nanni 4190 engine, which ran very well. It was only when they changed to the 4220, with the same size raw water pump, that we began to have trouble. So we fitted a larger raw water pump and it was then that we started having the vanes stripping off the impellers. We set up a test bench at Peachments and discovered it was caused by too much flow from the 12 blade impeller, causing a back pressure in the pipework. So we fitted a 10 blade impeller and that cured it. I think though, that this pump was larger than the one you have today on your 4190. I suspect that the problem may lie with the tube stack in the heat exchanger. It may look all right but it might be "furred up" and need putting in a bath of mild acid to get it clean. There is also a more modern design of tube stack which gives a better flow of engine water, around the tubes. I suggest the best thing is to talk to Peachments about it. Ask for Andrew Peachment, tell him that you have spoken to me, give him my kind regards, and I know he will give you the best advice.

I have been thinking a bit more about this (as one does) and wondering whether we are actually making PROGRESS. I can remember when every village around the county had a garage and filling station. Even most country pubs had petrol pumps on the front of the car park. This was because you couldn't expect the average car to go very far on a tank, so there were lots of filling stations. Even in the 60s, you couldn't expect more than about 200 miles out of a Mk1 Cortina. Just off the top of my head, I can remember at least 5 filling stations between Thorpe and the Foundry Bridge in Norwich. How many are there now? As cars got more modern they went further on a tank, so filling stations became fewer and further, as they gradually went out of business. The further you can go, the less often you need to fill up. My car has a little computer which tells me (according to my style of driving) that I can go for more than 1200 KM on a full tank. That means that from where I live in the south of France, I can almost get to Norfolk on one tank. I could certainly get as far as London. So now where have we got to? If you are lucky, your brand new EV, costing up to 40K for what amounts to an electric shopping trolley, will only get you about 100 miles, or only 60 in rough weather, before you have to fill it up. But where are all the filling stations? They are hundred of miles apart, even if your downloaded APP will persuade them to work when you get there. I am sorry but as I see it, the sheer practicality of motoring on English roads is going back to about 60 years ago. At this rate, we haven't made any real PROGRESS since the days of the Austin Seven.

I can't help having a little chuckle "up my sleeve" at the news that hundreds of electric car drivers over the holiday weekend, had to queue for 3 hours or more at service stations and supermarkets, as there weren't enough charging points and about half of them weren't even working. Apparently there are 420,000 electric vehicles on the road but only 30,290 public charging points, of which only 5494 are "rapid" chargers. It also turns out that if they say your car will do 150 miles on a charge, it may only do about 60 in this winter weather when you have the heater on as well as the headlights and wipers. In other words, the whole thing is going off at half cock. I suggest that if the system is already collapsing at peak times on the roads, it certainly isn't going to work on the Broads!

Don't forget we are also just coming on to neap tides at the moment, so the rise and fall will be at minimum anyway.

This sets me thinking. I have looked at your photos but there is not a clear view of the starter, although I can see a terminal on the side. This may mean the starter is insulated from the engine. Boats are almost always wired "earth return", which means the engine is used as the negative return for all the electrics, in the same way as a car. "Insulated return" means that the body of the engine is kept separate from all the electrics, and all appliances or instruments have their own return, to a common bus bar and then to the battery. This is normally only done with steel hulled boats. Before re-wiring the engine, you need to establish whether your boat is wired "earth return". If the starter is an insulated type, that is no problem but you will need to make sure that the engine also has a substantial negative return cable, otherwise the alternator won't work and neither will any instruments.

That's not strictly true - it is a flasher unit, the same as you have for the indicators in a car. It was used to power a large amber light on the dashboard in parallel with the warning light and was probably also wired to a second oil pressure sender. There may have been a loud buzzer unit, also fed from that circuit. Even so, hirers would totally ignore the warning and carry on merrily, until the engine blew up!

Talking of footprints, does anyone remember the original Stracey Arms, before they built all the extensions and turned it into such a ghastly disco "venue"? It was quite a small building, rather like a typical marsh man's house and had obviously served the river wherry trade for a long time before the new Acle Straight road was built. In those days the main Yarmouth road went over Acle bridge and up through Caister. There was one room inside, with a small bar and a fire place at the far end. All round the walls were old bus seats and over the bar was a large stuffed coypu in a glass case. The landlord, who was a Canadian, called it a "marsh mouse". My father used to love the place, for some reason! If you look carefully you can still see the original building, hidden away behind all the later extensions.

This is effectively a small dynamo, driven by the camshaft, which feeds its own separate circuit to the rev counter. It is quite possible that this might still be working - if so, leave it alone! All the same, it would be around 55 years old, by now. Modern rev counters are sensed by a connection to the AL terminal of the alternator.

This is a fast fuse. The top fuse is a spare. This would have been the wiring arrangement before the boat was fitted with separate domestic batteries and a charge splitter. In those days, everything was fed from the battery side terminal of the solenoid, which was usually mounted on a beam alongside the engine. Unlike the BMC, the Perkins has a starter motor with a "Bendix" centrifugal pinion gear, so the solenoid is simply a relay from the key. It is possible your engine has a more modern starter with a solenoid mounted on it. This will also act as an electromagnet, to throw the pinion gear into mesh with the teeth on the flywheel. In this case, the wiring is still the same. The battery side terminal of the starter solenoid is the main feed for rest of the engine electrics. The negative cable from the battery is connected to the mounting bolt of the starter, simply because this is the best place to connect it to the engine.

What you are looking at here , at bottom, is a 4TR alternator regulator, as well as a 6RA relay. These were necessary for the Lucas 11AC alternator, which most boats used in the late 60s. At bottom right looks like the remains of a starter solenoid. This is a warning light unit, also needed for the 11AC alternator. Perkins used to have a mechanical rev counter, cable driven from this position, connected to the camshaft. This is a later adaption, for an electric rev counter. With modern alternators, this is no longer necessary.

It is possible that the engine was refitted with a Bowman exchanger, without up-grading the water pump. All the same, when you next have a look, remember Sod's Second Law of Engineering : If it is running smoothly and performing as you want it to, don't bugger about with it!

It is important to make sure that the pump is adjusted properly on its mounting to ensure that it is exactly aligned with the drive pulleys. Also that the belt tension is not too tight, as this will put a side load on the pump shaft and cause wear of the gland. You should almost be able to slip the belt off the pulley with your fingers. You know, I never thought I would find myself talking about raw water pump pulleys on Christmas Morning! Happy Christmas everyone!

It sounds to me as though you have one of the older Jabsco pumps with two grease caps on the pump shaft and driven by a belt? On a BMC 1.5 engine I assume? In which case it is a much smaller pump with only 5 or 6 vanes on the impeller. These do last a great deal longer, and were only changed for larger ones when they started using the Bowman heat exchangers. So it will last a lot longer, but you may have trouble preventing the shaft from dripping all the time.

I dare to hope that this compliment might be aimed at me? All the above posts are quite correct but they also show that there are two schools of thought : 1/. Do I change the pump impeller every spring? 2/. Do I remove the impeller in Autumn, after winterising and then re-fit it in spring, so long as it is not damaged? First thing you need to do, is winterise the system and nowadays we usually pump antifreeze through the raw water system before finally stopping the engine. After this, you can remove the pump impeller and store it for winter. If this means you lose a bit of antifreeze, who cares? You are going to pump it all away when you start the engine in spring, anyway! In spring, you don't need to fit a new impeller if the old one is in good order. This is just personal, but I don't trust the little sachets of lubricant supplied with a new impeller. I always use a lot of specific water pump grease, such as Morris, which must also be spread on both sides of the face plate paper gasket. These pumps are self priming but they rely on a good seal between the impeller and the pump body. The grease is important in maintaining this seal. Griff, being ex R.N., believes in "preventive maintenance", which means replacing a part regularly, before it is likely to wear out. A lot of boatyards renew their impellers every year as a routine and nothing wrong with that! All the same, the most damage to an impeller is when it is left in the pump over winter and the vanes which are bent over become brittle. Next spring when the engine is run, they will fracture and snap off. So if you take the impeller out when winterising and you find it is in good condition, you can indeed continue using it for 3 seasons or more. A lot of this also depends on water quality. If you are running a lot in muddy, silty water, this will wear the impeller, as well as the pump itself.

That was a big slipway, too! The gradient of it went right up to the road.

Yet another article in the EDP yesterday, which announces that the BA has engaged a firm called Small World Consulting, who have found that nearly 800,000 tonnes of "CO2 equivalent" emissions are produced each year due to industry, residents and visitors. They don't say whether this is just in our area but in any case, such a wild and unsubstantiated statistic means bugger-all to me. And I wonder how much of our money these consultants have cost? Dr Packman goes on to say that The authority, which has cut its own carbon footprint by 21% since 2019 has already outlined how it intends to encourage boaters to switch from petrol and diesel vessels to electric craft so the more polluting boats can be phased out. (his bold type, not mine). Interesting that the article includes a nice aerial view of the moorings at Acle Bridge. How many boats moor there overnight, every night, in the summer season? 50 at least, or maybe more? So how is he going to provide enough charging points and enough power, for all those boats to charge propulsion batteries overnight? The BA have not "outlined any intentions! They are just relying on businesses and private owners to come up with some kind of solution, while they use this sort of publicity to seek £8m from the government's "Pioneer Places" scheme - whatever that is. Meanwhile, One of the findings of the report was that transport to and from the Broads is the largest single source of CO2 in the tourism economy. Leaving aside how the hell they have managed to work that out, it seems that we will be OK to carry on cruising the rivers in our gas guzzlers, so long as we travel to the Broads by bus. Personally I think this sort of article is irresponsible as it bears no relation to what we all know by now, to be the true facts of the matter.

Oh Gawd, I seem to have started something here . . . I actually agree with most of this post but does it apply to what we are all doing on the Broads? One point I would make is that the fitting of a domestic battery to the starter is not practical because of CCA - cold cranking amps. The average "domestic" battery would not be powerful enough to start an old fashioned engine such as a 4108, let alone blow a fuse. That is all I actually said. It is based on my experience of running literally hundreds of hire boats. Edited to add : Perhaps I could gently mention that I "liked" your post before I quoted it.

This is very bad luck and I sympathise! By chance, I only got our boat winterised the other day, before Stalham froze over. Nothing wrong with draining off the raw water system and this is what I always used to do. The hydraulic cooler has a drain plug with a square head, on the side at the bottom. You may also need to loosen the Jubilee clip on the pipe on top, to let air in when you drain. The heat exchanger also has a drain plug but beware - this is for the engine water, not the raw water. To drain the heat exchanger tube stack, simply take the impeller out of the raw water pump, which is recommended anyway, in winter. Be careful of loosening Jubilee clips around the heat exchanger as you may get the wrong one, and lose antifreeze from the engine. You may also want to drain the gearbox oil cooler, by loosening the pipes. Too late for this year I am afraid, but maybe a tip for the future. Edited to add : Just thought, in your case you don't have a gearbox oil cooler, as you don't have a gearbox!

I have been thinking carefully and I don't think I have ever seen a hire boat with a fuse on the main cable to the starter solenoid. I have seen a few (very few) with a fast fuse on the positive feed from the alternator. Also, I have always been used to soldered terminations on battery cables, with no problem. I would suppose that if the solder melted in a fire this would break the connection and shut off the circuit, therefore "fail safe". After all the reason for having a battery master switch (according to BSS) is to cut the circuit when fighting a fire.

Your Perkins 4108 starter draws 400 amps (from memory). I believe a Nanni draws a lot less than that.