floydraser

On the Berney Arms website there is a photo of the gate at the side of the White Swan, is that the one?

Hmm, but do they smell of old lock gates? (aplogies for swearing on the forum).

I think thats the stuff to go for unless... my friend has to get some silicone grease for plumbing purposes and if he has to buy a decent quantity it may be worth him squibbing some of that on as a first try. More research says that hornets are attracted to sweet foods and not grease anyway. Not mentioned so far but he is actually concerned that the wrong stuff may instigate deterioration of the wood? My friend intends staying there long enough for it to matter!

Thanks for the suggestion. I had a quick look and it contains the magic words, "clean both surfaces" or something like. It's actually great stuff to have around though; it's excellent on plastics.

Not sure about that Mark, I think where the hinge is penetrated it stays quiet most of the time. The problem is caused when the finger rubs underneath the bridge. My friend says.

Looks like it according to Google. Painted over history!

Thanks Howard, thats a vote for Teflon.

Howard, I've just looked at the Berney Arm website and found there was a link line between the Beach station and the line near to Vauxhall station. It went alongside the White Swan which some oaf has now painted black! From 1994 to 2012 I drove for the famous pocket-slapping supermarket now in the Vauxhall goods yard. As the road goes behind the station next to the river, I remember seeing a flat bottomed, double ended punt like boat with what looked like a home made cabin. I have a time-lapse type memory of this boat slowly disintegrating over the years until nothing was left. It looks a bit cleaner round there now according to Google streetview. I don't remember ever going to any of the defunct stations. I never used the Beach station as a lorry park either but there are a couple of original canopy supports with the railway company's logo cast into them at the entrance. Floyd.

I’m sure some of you well travelled people have experience of natural lubricants and I’m hoping you can pass on some wisdom to someone who had a more sheltered upbringing: a friend of mine. This friend’s boat is moored on a floating finger next to where the bridge from terra firma sits (the "bridge" which connects to the fixed jetty). There are two steel plates on the upper side of the finger and the underside of the bridge is wood. My friend was wondering if there is a good lubricant available to stop the finger making a noise during movement? Smell is important: he doesn’t want it to smell like a pair of old lock gates (sorry for swearing on the forum), nor does he want to attract insects like the Hornets which seem to grow to the size of small dogs around Brundall. Any suggestions will be passed on discreetly. Thank you in anticipation.

I thought this may be a place to show this scrap of paper. It must be from a very old Broads guide but how old, I don’t know. I have a vague memory of collecting a load of timber from a yard and having to be careful not to twist an ankle on the rails sunken into the yard's surface. It would have been in the early 90’s when I was driving articulated lorries for a living and I think it was GY.

Evening all, Here's the Denham Owl, a Harvey Eastwood 37 photographed at Bowling, on the Forth & Clyde Canal last year. She was transported up there from Shepperton in 2017 by a lady who wanted to live aboard. Previous to that the boat had been on the Thames for a few years where it must have acquired the name. In wondering how far it may have travelled: at some stage an auto pilot has been fitted! The lady didn't take to living aboard and if I hadn't bought it last October she may well have sold it to a student. Denham Owl is now berthed at Brundall Gardens. I would love to find out more about the boat's history in due course and there is still an advert online offering the Owl as an "air B&B" for Harry and Meghan's wedding!

Thank you for the responses so far. I am reminded that maybe I should get in touch with Craig and make it 4!

Hi Everyone, I've just nipped in here from the restoration section to see if any of you kind folks can help put me in touch with any other owners of Harvey Eastwood 37's. I bought mine last August and planned to look for other owners later in 2019 but after that glorious Easter weather I really need to know to open the canopy before Summer comes, or we'll fry in there! The sliding canopy was sealed shut by a previous owner and some of the control cables may have been disconnected so it's not as straight forward as it may at first seem. I would love to have a look around another HE37 to see where my own may have been altered. I understand there may be one at Potter Heigham moored next to a bungalow and I plan to nip along there some time, but if anyone knows the whereabouts of any others I would be grateful for a pointer in the right direction. Thank you in anticipation. Floyd.

That's lovely thank you. Could have saved me ages of searching!

Hey that's fine; as long as it's a 37 and still there it may be worth my while to nip down and take a look. I'm pretty sure the canopy mechanisms would all have been similar.

Hi Everyone, It's been a long time and a lot of water has passed under a lot of bridges. A bit of a health scare didn't help progress. I've been unable to change the mystery tank so it's been cleaned and lined with epoxy. So having flushed it through and got pressure into the system once more the latest problem minifested itself in the form of a jittery pump. At the same time the flow control on the water heater has become jammed. My first thought is that because I must have been the first person in years to winterise the water system, it's dried out and chunks of limescale have come loose and moved around the pipework. Investigating it is the first job, next visit. Main priorities have changed since the Mrs Raser and I visited the Owl on Easter Saturday. We went over to see what we need to do to make the boat habitable for a couple nights stay. There doesn't seem to be much to do but having chosen a design with large windows for the greenhouse effect, we were cooking in there! I was leaving the renovation of the sliding canopy until after the deck was sorted but we really need to have the front windows opening for the Summer. The trouble is: the windscreens need to open before the side windows can open, but the windscreens won't open until the canopy has opened! So to this end I could really do with making contact with any owner of another HE37. A while ago someone here said Seraphina was berthed down at Potter Heigham, does anyone know if that is still the case? I'll stick a note on the main forum too I think. Thanks again in anticipation. I hope you all enjoyed a great Easter; it was certainly busy on the water! Floyd.

Hi everyone, I nipped over on 13th Jan, cleaned the oil from the forward bilge and fitted the new bilge pump. I also took over the new Ecoair dehumidifier which is being controlled via a Sonoff switch and eWelink app. The switch also has the temperature/humidity probe. The Ecoair drains into the bilge where the new pump can hoof it over the side if necessary. At one point while over at the boat and with the Ecoair off, the app showed 6 degrees C and 90%! After a couple of days it dropped to 60% and stayed there for a while, but now it's down to the mid-fifties. The temperature has stayed above freezing up until now but if it drops below 1 degree I'll switch it off. But what about the mystery tank I hear you cry? Well, I freed up the offending floorboard and all became clear: there's a chuffing great galvanised tank down there! It's 6ft long, 15" deep and 27" wide, with a slight chamfer for the hull shape. As it's mate is GRP I think I'll assume the original set up was a pair of galvanised tanks. The metal tank also explains the brown water I got from the taps after the move south by lorry, and the eternity taken to drain the tanks. So for the sake of the future of the boat I think a WRAS standard new tank is called for, but as I'm a bit short on boaty experience could anyone suggest a more practical size to go for? I'm thinking about a quick emptying system too if there is such a thing? To help keep the water replenished. Thanks in anticipation. Floyd.

Thanks John. I may have to try something like that if the latest rig fails.

Three latest Denham Owl vids: Part 3: Part 4: Part 5: Nothing much doing in the January sales and I ended up with an Ecoair Simple. Next trip over will involve experimenting with a Sonoff TH16 with temperature/humidity sensor to control it. It works here at a distance of 3 feet via my home broadband; just need to add 142 miles....

Thanks London Rascal. There was an 80W tube heater already in the engine bay of Denham Owl, and Consort Frost Fighter next to the water and black waste tanks. I have replaced the tube for one with a thermostat and put a 40W version under the galley floor where there's an inlet I can't isolate. I have oil heaters but don't have them on. As we have wi-fi at BGM I am considering getting a desiccant dehumidifier and operating it via a smart plug. A couple of my neighbours there have Ecoair models but there doesn't seem to be much between them and the Meaco DD8, so it's down to the January sales!

Thanks Mark, I also discovered the free wi-fi on Tuesday and wondered if the technology to use remote control has come down in price to a worthwhile level.

Actually I had thought about leaving a couple of windows open as everything is covered anyway, I just wasn't brave enough to because of spiders and hibernating hornets. I'll put more crystal dehumidifiers in next visit, open windows with net covers and consider an electric dehumidifier.

And the winner is: .......dramatic pause just like the telly....and just as corny......grendel! Everyone else is voted off the show. Or not. I nipped over on Tuesday for three things: to see why the bilge pump didn't work, make the cover fit without making a swimming pool with every rainfall, and investigate the mystery tank. All that was overshadowed by the appearance of mould everywhere! In the short term I've hoovered and cleaned the upholstery and treated everything else with mould remover/killer. Then installed a crystal dehumidfier from the local hardware store. The bilge pump switch has three positions: auto, off and manual. When switched to manual, there was no sound or action from the pump but there was quite a load registering on the ammeter, which has always bothered me. The actual bilge pump seemed to work perfectly, but independant of it's switch, then it packed up between my visits. Yesterday I went after the wiring. My circuit diagram showed a white wire and white/black wire to the pump but present were black and red. I traced them back to the supply for the freshwater pump. So having drained the water tank(s!) for winter, I had to switch off the freshwater pump/pressure sensor and hence, no bilge pump. I put "rewire bilge pump" on the list of jobs for next time. That would mean going into the spaghetti behind the dash! I had put an old pallet which I had "upholstered" over the Houdini hatch at the front to help stop condensation but I still wasn't happy about the cover. I added a double folding step to the pallet so the cover could be higher than the rail and fit better all round. It would also keep more of the deck drier for longer enabling work to continue underneath. Did that, knackered myself crawling around under the bloody thing for an hour then found a hole in it! Thank God for kneepads but damn that anchor locker Houdini right at the bow, with a broken handle which I reckon made the hole. Nothing is ever straightforward is it? Just lift the correct floorboard and the mystery tank should be underneath right? The floorboard in question is about 6ft by 2ft and held captive by the engine hatch. The engine hatch is most of the saloon floor and lifts to just beyond vertical. The heavy, 6 person table has to be moved first and the only space is on the 6ft by 2ft floorboard. I turned it over onto the seating and just managed to get it clear. I lifted the engine hatch and tried to lift the big board, but it would only slide a bit as it was still held captive by the woodwork for the non-existent log burner! I gave up and lifted the smaller board under the helm seat. I found a pipe which came from under the tank and headed accross the boat and although I couldn't see for sure, I assumed it was connected to the tank. I also found more of the intact cable/pulley system for the canopy, then put everything back. The pipe went under the kitchen stairs so these came out followed by the floorboard below them. BINGO! Pipes and taps to balance two freshwater tanks as foretold on this forum! See pic (taken from video) Will those yellow topped things be NR valves? And to the rear of the left one is the biggest surprise of the day: the original bilge pump! Well not quite the original but it does have the correct wiring and it must be jammed because it gets current when switched to manual. The other pump is further forward under the kitchen and it's main job is to take away water from the shower tray which drains there. The wiring diagram only shows one pump. So unless someone has a better suggestion I think the way forward is to replace the "main" pump and drop the shower pump into a plastic sump because: nothing is going to get pumped overboard for a while as there is oil everywhere! There'll be nowhere to hide if I produce an oil slick on the still waters of Brundall Gardens! After I've got as much out by soaking rags there'll still be traces of oil to flush out so any tips would be most welcome. I have at my disposal an old homebrew bucket, 240 volt sump pump and of course, 12v pumps. I also have a 12v sump oil pump, the sort for sucking engine oil up via the dip stick hole. Video soon.

I'll be looking next time I'm over. There's a vent and an outlet on the port side: the vent is the breather for the fuel tank (inline with the filler on the deck), and just forward of it is what looks like a drain. There is a similar drain on the other side suspiciously near to the freshwater filler..... I've tried to upload a pic but it's not having it. Thanks for the replies, it's given me a bit to look for.

I think that may well be the case. Firstly, it took ages to drain the water even though the open tube indicator showed the level to be low. Also, some information gives the fresh water capacity as 100 gallons which I thought would be a lot of weight to have on one side of the boat. So I should expect to find a connecting pipe accross the bilge and a vent somewhere if that's the case. I'm getting more and more intrigued. I'm trying to think of a prize for the most correct guess....