dom

I did both, with a couple of years at Stalham High in between - but left 10 years before you.

My memory may be deceiving me, but I think I saw him at an Oulton Broad meeting not long before his accident. We always used to take two boats from Wroxham to Ranworth on a Saturday evening after turnaround and I can remember waving to one or the other of the family whenever we passed their house on sunny summer evenings. I think I probably went to school with his daughter Katie, but suspect she moved on to a better school later on. I'm quite surprised he still holds the Oulton lap record and that it didn't eventually go to Peter(?) Sabberton. I can remember the sound of a huge V8 being tuned coming from Sabena Marine when I was working or on our boat around Summercraft. I seem to remember Sabberton's boats were always incredibly loud, terrible cornering, but then blew everything away on the straights.

Did you go to St.John's or Broadland High schools? Wondering if I might know you! @Vaughan just noticed your old post and had to Google to confirm whether you meant Tom the racer, or if his father or another of his family had the same first name. Assuming it's the former I'm a bit thrown thinking how old he'd now be. Can still remember the shock at hearing of his accident.

I wouldn't mind betting that one gets breached fairly regularly. Especially Fleet Dyke, Womack Dyke and Womack Water. I wonder what, if anything, BA rangers do in terms of checking that oversize vessels aren't in prohibited areas.

CE marking on these things is a joke. It doesn't stand for anything in my experience. It's there to deliberately decieve, as there are no quality control standards on this sort of international trade. I went to CES in Vegas one year and there was an entire hall full of Far Eastern manufacturers displaying blatant clones of top selling products. They'd quite happily take orders for any product from their catalogues and add any branding or quality marking you like. I've ordered product from China in the past and stipulated that it should comply with, and be marked to EU standards (actually TUV in that case). The manufacturer duly complied, but there was nothing whatsoever in terms of checks or controls to ensure that the goods actually complied. The onus for safety in the UK really falls on the UK seller. eBay and Amazon, etc facilitate direct selling by Far Eastern manufacturers, effectively bypassing all UK standard enforcement. It'd be great to think we could somehow suddenly reverse the last 30 or 40 years of trade and make these things ourselves, to known standards in the UK, but the horse has really bolted and it'll take a massive change of course for government to make anything change. The Chinese also have a totally different attitude and culture, to win export business at all costs, even subsidising postage to win more business. Whether you buy a Webasto, a Planar or an eBay special, it's best to just view all these things as likely to kill you and to put precautions in place to warn of an adverse event, with either CO or fire. Chances are, some or all of their components are all being produced in the Far East these days.

Absolutely mirror that sentiment but, buying a branded unit is no guarantee of safety. The most recent heater related CO fatality was an Eberspacher unit. Chinese and branded units are virtually indistinguishable internally. It's the exhausts on chinese units which are absolutely lethal. CO poisoning is generally a fairly slow process. The key to stopping it is making sure you have a working CO alarm, which will highlight the rising CO level before it becomes critical. It's now mandatory for BSS, but I'd urge people to add more than the standard level of detection, to set an alarm on a phone or similar to remind yourself to test detectors regularly and to replace batteries at the start of a season irrespective of whether they're still working. If you look back through MAIB reports for the last 10 or 15 years, there have been something like a dozen CO deaths, mostly from petrol engine or generator fumes. In every case, it was judged that proper CO detection could have prevented the deaths.

I view it like the boating equivalent of an Audi Q7 or Range Rover Sport. Technically excellent, but invariably used in the wrong context by people who choose it thinking it's superior, but actually have an inferior experience as a result. Boats like that, Fair Regal, etc which push the limits of length, yet only manage to accomodate 4 people would really be better off on more commodious waterways. I've never experienced the Scottish or Irish waterways in person, but suspect they'd be more fitting there. It's also just putting more pressure on moorings. Two of these take up the best part of 90ft, but only house 8. 3 more traditional 30ft boats fit the same space and house up to 18. I can't remember if it's that exact boat and video, but can recall the 2 Men having issues finding a mooring on at least one occasion.

You can buy refurbished Webasto Thermo Top hydronic heaters on eBay for fairly sensible money. There are also a few cheap chinese clones around, ie. https://ebay.us/YvrzY3

Congrats on the purchase. Nice boat. I saw her a few times at Jones Boatyard, as I'm just up the road.

I think the chinese ones are all pretty similar in quality. A lot are probably coming from the same source anyway. A common chinese tactic is for one source to flood the market with a number of seemingly different brands, so the market is saturated and difficult for competitors to enter. Whatever brand you go for, be aware that the major issues are: Exhausts leak and are lethal. If you can't re-use your Eberspacher exhaust, don't fit one from a chinese kit. The pipes tend to be weak and silencers are generally spot welded, so leak from the seams. They're designed for external fitting on trucks, where CO build up isn't a problem. Stick with branded pipe, and fully seam welded silencers from trusted sources. A common failure with all diesel heaters is carbon build up. Running at low level for extended periods is the worst culprit. Run the heater flat out for a while on a regular basis to burn off deposits. I've heard some suggestion that running on paraffin reduces the issue and might potentially be cheaper. Add an extra CO alarm or two. Everyone who's done a BSS recently should have one per cabin with a potential source, but CO alarms fail like everything else. Add a bit of redundancy and check batteries regularly. At least two major fatality incidents investigated by MAIB in recent times have been CO related, one from diesel heating. As long as you're mindful of the above, you should be fine with a chinese unit, and the cost savings are vast - so much so that you can afford to replace several times before the cost equals a branded unit.

It's interesting to see that Richardsons actually quote review ratings across a number of sites as key performance indicators in their financial accounts.

I've fixed escalating poor review issues for several businesses in the last year or so. You'd be surprised what an impact it can have. When you have poor overall ratings, people often just see the total and don't read the detail. It works both ways though - bring the total back to a more decent number and it can be used as a positive marketing tool. I've been cynical about the whole thing in the past but, at this point in time, it's an important issue. NBD obviously recognise its importance.

Bridge Broad even. Weird you can only edit posts on here for a limited period of time.

Have you got a bow thruster? Using the dummy for that would be another option if so.

Wroxham bridge will never be removed unless something causes a major structural failure. The clever thing to have done would have been to push a relief channel through from around Broads Tours area into either Daisy Broad, or the old Broads Tour's boatsheds, then raise/extend the new bridge so it clears both the old and new river routes. It would have needed foresight and collaboration from various groups to achieve though, which is never going to happen when they can't even sort out a bypass, or foresee the issues in allowing residential development on the downstream side.

Looks like that would probably be fine if you were directly dumping current straight into a bank of standard lead acids, but the situation is more complicated in this case. It's using AGM batteries, which need higher voltage and the DC-DC units might see a slightly lower input voltage due to the splitter.

Two alternators in parallel doesn't sit comfortably with me. I worked in automotive electronics for quite a lot of years, including around the car audio scene. I have photos kicking around somewhere of a US manufacturer's demo truck at Daytona Spring Break "Sound Off", with a big aluminium bulkhead and something like 8 or 10 alternators hanging off it. The thing you have to consider taking any tips from that scene is it's considered a success if you crack your own windscreen (or even your roof - I've seen it happen). Reliability is rarely considered, fires are not unheard of and hardware is often treated as consumable. In theory, two alternators in parallel will work OK. The problem is, in practice, you'll probably end up with some disparity between the performance of the two. There's a risk that towards the end of the bulk phase, one alternator regulator may decide to stop charging whilst the other continues. You've then got two DC-DC units trying to pull 30A each from a single alternator - or possibly current flowing in an unintended manner from one alternator through the other (can't even being to think what effect that might have). The other concern I'd have is that if your engine battery ever fails open circuit (or a cable becomes disconnected), you'll probably fry both alternators, rather than just one. The only simple solution I can think of is to replicate the setup on a typical dual engine system. Connect each alternator to a standard lead acid battery - one for engine cranking, then use the second "spare" battery to run a single item, such as your fridge or water pump. May be worth asking Victron their view, as you can't be the first to do this? They've probably got some ridiculously expensive bit of hardware to suit!

I suspect Barnes are probably starting to suffer the effects of "death by social media", whether they realise it or not. They need to employ someone to engage with and encourage social proof (I'm currently available for the right price ). Just compare them and NBD on Trustpilot and ask yourself who people are going to steer towards.

They're a commercial interest though. Given a choice between 100% booking at 80% of regular price, or the opportunity to book 100% at 100% of the regular price, there will always be pressure to opt for the latter by the board or investors. Discounts come from bottom line margin. If you're working on slim margins, it doesnt take long to enter a loss making position.

What I really meant was wide at height, ie. height at the top corners, where it causes issues with a curved bridge like Wroxham. I think Potter is too extreme a case to try and cater to these days (although perfectly feasible with small, 2 berth models). Wroxham is more sensible under normal conditions and doesn't take anything revolutionary. Sliding canopies have always been a sensible solution - or you can use lateral thinking and produce something like the old Sancerre 33, dropping the saloon floor to keep the air draft down. There's more scope than ever now for clever design solutions, as hybrid drives reduce the need for a big lump of steel in a central position. There are opportunties for hirers who know what they're doing, but do you really think it's practical for someone who, for example, just hired Bolero from Richardsons and headed straight to see Roys on their first holiday? Swinging 44ft of boat round in the river whilst competing with trip and day boats. The same 6 people on that boat could just as easily be on an Alpha 35 style boat, head under the bridge and use the staithe or viaduct moorings (actually 84 moorings!). I think half the problem is boating holidays are being sold on luxury and facilities like home. I can't help but wonder if that's wrong and gives an an excessively sanitised experience, which people kind of enjoy, but don't have any great urge to return to. This is exactly my point. Ditch the 44ft battleship with playstations and coffee makers, and put those 6 people back in a 35ft sliding cockpit style boat. The overall investment for the yard is less, so costs can be cheaper. Air draft is less so they'll have access to the best areas and less hassle mooring. Do something outlandish like ditch the Playstation and offer a free sailing dinghy instead. Everyone goes on about kids not wanting to do anything but stare at electronic devices these days, but I question this and think it's probably still perfectly possible to get young people back into doing the things I did as a kid. I got cold,wet and muddy, fished, sailed, canoed and loved every second of it. Give the kids an unforgettable experience and they'll be nagging parents to come back as soon as the holiday's over. I think a lot of the problem is just lazy marketing, selling a home from home, when the broads is fairly unique and has a lot more to offer. I think you want people to experience a bit of adversity and get to outside their comfort zone. If you think back to early experiences, what do you remember? The TV and shower, or the failing in/breaking down/getting muddy?

Traditionally, there's a mad rush immediately after Christmas. Once Boxing day comes around, people start to think of the coming year and start to book holidays. If yards offer early discounts, there's a danger they get fully booked too soon and sell themselves short. I can imagine it being very difficult for them at the moment, having seen huge demand due to Covid followed by the year just gone, so not now knowing how a season is going to pan out. I suspect the whole thing is probably exacerbated by the cost of living impact as well. Previously, boats were getting larger, more luxurious and hence more expensive. We're probably seeing a double dip, with post-covid demand drop-off and cost issues occuring simultaneously. Vaughan has commented that these things always go in cycles. I personally think there needs to be a push for more budget friendly options, giving a reduction in cost per head by getting more people onto smaller boats. A lot of the new generation boats are also excessively high and wide. If we saw more updated traditional designs, more people could head upstream of Wroxham, easing pressure on moorings, giving better access to Hoveton and allowing them to enjoy one of the best bits of the northern broads. It's crazy that people can hire boats from Stalham and have no easy way to moor at Hoveton and Wroxham, supposedly the capital of the broads.

It won't be any concern for you with the Victron kit you're using (as far as I'm aware). Renogy do a 50A MPPT DC-DC unit with dual inputs. You can use it as a DC-DC charger, as a solar regulator, or as both at the same time. In dual input mode, it limits each input to 25A. With the engine running, if you've got 100w of solar connected, you'd only get around 33A in strong sun. If you disconnect the solar input when the engine is running, the unit pulls the full 50A from the alternator in the bulk charge phase.

Keep us updated - it'll be interesting to see your progress.

Surcharging vessels without a home mooring seems high risk to me. I'd be very surprised if that didn't get deemed as discriminatory in the current climate. You'd never get away with charging travellers more for road tax.

Definitely all in with the Multiplus. I have quite a bit of electrical experience, so I think I'm going to do things slightly differently and to try and avoid big invertors, adapting things to run natively from 12v and resorting to a generator if I need mains and can't access a hookup. One thing I've heard is to be careful about heat and ventilation with the Victron DC-DC units. Apparently, they can get very hot and will start to throttle if not well ventilated.