A Visit To The Vet

Arrow went lame while we were out walking so I brought him home as soon as possible. In the dark there was a little blood visible on his paw. Half an hour later he was still bleeding on the bathroom floor so I called out the emergency vet and we went to meet her at the surgery. She kept him in overnight to repair his paw. He'd managed to cut open one of his pads - to the bone. Luckily he missed the tendons and major nerves. He came home from the vet with his paw in a cast and a course of antibiotics.

Home Again

We set off early (for us) as we wanted to be sure of arriving back in Blisworth with daylight to spare.

We stopped at Cosgrove for lunch:

and travelled in the company of a convoy of 12 boats from the Lionheart Boat Club of Great Linford whose membership are restricted to a maximum length of 38 feet as they moor pointing out into the canal in a layby. The great advantage is that they can fit four of their boats into a Grand Union broad lock at a time. Unlike the broad beam "Moose Drool" which completely filled the lock, going in the opposite direction.

We passed Castlethorpe Wharf from which we could just about see the windows of our first home at 3 South Street. At Stoke Bruerne we refuelled with ice cream at the Boat Inn before tackling the Blisworth tunnel. We met a novice steerer on a boat from Gayton Marina in the tunnel a short way from the north portal who stopped and it took a few minutes for them to straighten out enough to pass. We finally moored Syncopation at her home mooring again at about 5.30 PM.

Moored at Blisworth.

Total distance is 13 miles, 1¾ flg and 8 locks.

Back Through Milton Keynes

We passed back through Leighton Buzzard, picking up a replacement satellite cable connector from Homebase as well as essential supplies at Tesco and passing the Wyvern Shipping hire base.

We passed through Milton Keynes again in the afternoon, a surprisingly attractive place from the canal and stopped in Stantonbury.

Moored Stantonbury Bridge no. 75.

Total distance is 19 miles, ¼ flg and 8 locks.

Turn-Around

We turned around and headed back north to our home moorings today. We left Berkhamstead in the morning, passing back trough the Tring summit level and back down the Marsworth flight (hello again nb Harnser). We stopped for lunch near Wilstone reservoir, one of the ones built at Marsworth to supply water for the canal. They are also very picturesque, with attractive walks on their margins. We ventured into the woods and found mud and a stream.

After we had emptied his wellingtons, showered him down and dressed him in dry clothes Ewan was fine.

Moored at Slapton.

Total distance is 11 miles, ½ flg and 23 locks.

Marsworth and the Tring Summit Level

Cathy left for the day to deliver some of her paintings to exhibitions at Stowe House (Buckingham Art for All) and the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition. We were joined by our friends Brian and June and their daughter Hannah for the day.

We passed up the Marsworth flight to the Tring summit level and then began descending to Berkhamstead where we stopped for the night.

At the bottom of the Marsworth flight is the junction with the Aylesbury arm.
I walked this arm as part of a sponsored event when I was at school in Aylesbury in the late seventies.

At the top of the flight is Bulbourne junction where the Wendover arm branches off and wooden narrowboats are still built and repaired at Bates' boatyard.

At Cowroast we passed the working pair Owl and Hampton.

Moored at Berkhamstead.

Total distance is 9 miles, 7 flg and 21 locks.

Near Ivinghoe

We passed through Leighton Buzzard today with it's very usefully located canalside Tesco store. The nearby DIY store is great for hardware bits as well.

We passed this caravan and lots of wildfowl including several herons and a pair of mandarin ducks.

Moored near Ivinghoe

Total distance is 9 miles, 5½ flg and 8 locks

After Milton Keynes

Today was a day of aqueducts and surprisingly green route through Milton Keynes. We passed Thrupp Wharf near Castlethorpe where we lived just after we got married in 1989. I often imagined passing that spot in our own boat. Today was that day. Later we passed over the new Grafton Street aqueduct.



We picked up our friends the Stockers for a couple of hours in the afternoon, dropping them off at Fenny Stratford lock.



This raft appears to have been abandoned in the canal.


We arrived at Willowbridge marina in the nick of time to fill Syncopation's fuel tanks.

Moored Near Stoke Hammond.

Total distance is 17 miles, 7¼ flg and 3 locks

Yardley Gobion Again

We have returned to Yardley Gobion, the destination of our initial weekend cruise in Syncopation. This time we're out for a little longer and the boat has a few more battle scars. We started out just after 4PM and arrived near Yardley at about 8PM.

Moored near Yardley Wharf.
Total distance 6 miles, 2¾ flg and 7 locks and 1 tunnel.

Spring

I did some spring cleaning today. Upholstery mostly as we've recently acquired a Vax.

Spring has sprung in Blisworth. The blossom is out over Syncopation. There are still a lot of little jobs I'd like to get done but it seems unlikely any more will be before we go boating the week after next.

Syncopation Spotted

Hadar passed Syncopation at her mooring yesterday. See the picture of the cherry blossom.

Water at Gayton

Last weekend saw me washing the outside of Syncopation for the first time this year. There was a lot of decayed leaf and algae to scrub off the non-slip roof surface. I washed the sides down and everything looks shiny again. Today I took Syncopation up to Gayton junction to fill the fresh water tank and empty the toilet cassette. I even had enough time after I tied up at our mooring to polish one brass mushroom vent. As it had a solid accumulation of tarnish developed since last October it took nearly 30 minutes. At that rate I have a good two or three hours of polishing ahead of me to get all the exterior brasswork sparkling again!

The Last Flying Vulcan Needs You

The Vulcan to the Sky trust need your help. They restored Avro Vulcan XH558 to airworthiness and it's a remarkable thing to see this relic of the cold war in flight. But now they are running out of funds. You can pledge cas on their web site or sign the petition to ask the Government to step in to help assure the future of this unique aircraft.

Dog in Harness

Arrow is a dog who loves to pull on a lead. He's like a small carthorse when he's got his lead on. That's why he now wears a Halti head collar whenever he is out with us. The collar stops all the pulling.

Girly Switch Back On

After some consultation with Vetus I have managed to fix Syncopation's bow-thruster. The problem began when I inadvertantly replaced the bow thruster battery back to front after removing it for charging. The main supply fuse blew when the bow thruster battery formed a short circuity with the main domestic battery bank. After correcting that problem I found the bow thruster control panel would not switch on. After I checked all the wiring and the supply fuse at the bow thruster end I was at a loss. After a quick call to Vetus and a post on the Canalworld forums I decided to check the supply panel fuse inside the bow thruster unit. I had found this fuse before but it looked like another socket for a cable connection. Today I replaced the fuse and everything works!

In the meantime, Mill Wharf Boats have replaced the main water supply pump filter housing under guarantee. The filter cover has cracked three times since we took delivery and leaked into the saloon. Hopefully a complete new filter housing will resolve this.

Time to Get the Haynes Manual Out

On Thursday Cathy started the Picasso up not realising the wipers were switched on and the blades were frozen to the windscreen. Both wiper arms were bent and the wiper blades were destroyed.


On the Picasso the wipers cross in the middle of the screen, passing wihtin about a centimeter of each other. They were impossible to bend back accurately and so one of the arms had to be removed so that the drivers side wiper could work unobstructed.

Our friendly local mechanic tried to order new wiper arms only to find that there are none available until after 24 Feb.

So we hit the internet looking for second-hand wiper arms and came up with a good deal from Cit-Ren. The parts arrived today (the day after they were ordered) and I will fit them this weekend with the help of my trusty Haynes manual.

Lunch Time in the Snow

Lots of snow here so I'm working from home as the transport infrastructure between here and Central London is somewhat unreliable. So in my lunch break I was able to play with the family. We built snow men, sledged down the slopes in the nearby fields on teatrays, had snowball fights and watched the dog running around.

Charging all the Time

I reconnected the warning lamp on the domestic alternator and now have a charge being supplied to the batteries whenever the engine is running. As expected, the Victron multiplus tends to run through a very short charging cycle as it now detects the voltage being supplied by the domestic alternator and assumes the batteries are at full charge. On balance it's probably the arrangement that is most likely to ensure the batteries are adequately charged because the 240 v supply to the Victron is only likely to be present for about 50% of the time the engine is running.

Party Flood

We threw a floating party for Siobhan's eighth birthday. We made our way up the cut from our mooring at Blisworth to the winding point at the top of Rothersthorpe locks turned there and went back to Blisworth. We stopped at Gayton Junction for a Pinata.



Here I am with the chinese dragon pinata suspended from the boat hook on the tow path. The greatest danger during the exercise is from young children swinging a stick. It is much worse if the child is wearing a blindfold - something we just had to try.

Alas, as we approached Blisworth again and after running three bowls of washing up water the cover on the freshwater pump cracked again, just like last summer. We're quite practised in the leaking pump drill now and the situation was under control in about 30 seconds. I think I'll be returning the whole pump under guarantee rather than just the cover this time.

Total distance is 3 miles, 6¼ flg and 0 locks.

Multiple Charging Circuits

I returned to the boat with a new fuse for the bow thruster circuit. Once connected I measured the voltage at the bow thruster with the Travelpower providing 240ac to the Victron Multiplus inverter/charger. All is well there. Further tests at the domestic battery bank revealed the domestic alternator was not supplying any current.Time for a bit more wire tracing. With the help of the Beta Marine engine manual I found the cable that normally connects the domestic alternator D+ terminal had been cut at the engine end. This meant that the alternator will not start supplying current until it reaches quite high revs.
Alternator fact: The alternator only needs a current to energise it at low revs. At high revs the weak magnetic field already present in the rotor will generate enough current to energise the alternator.
I think it was disconnected to avoid having the alternator and Victron compete to charge the batteries. I'm going to reconnect it because the domestic alternator is essential for recharging while cruising when the Travelpower is not running. The two charging systems will only compete in as much as the one with the lowest voltage output will shut down and leave the field clear for the other. I'd rather have the two systems running than none at all as we had when the Travelpower drive belt broke.

Things that Go Pop

After two weeks of battery-pampering I returned the batteries to Syncopation. There were five to refit: four domestic and one bow-thruster. I put the bow-thruster back in first and then got to work trimming the side of the battery box to make replacing the domestic batteries easier. Twenty minutes later I had all the batteries in and began connecting them. I connected the cable from the bow thruster battery to the first in the domestic bank and was surprised by a fat spark. When I touched the terminal with the cable again there was a bigger spark and the nearby fuse blew. Oops! A quick check revealed I had put the bow thruster back in back to front, so the 175 Amp fuse protecting the bt battery charging cable blew when I completed the circuit.

When everything was connected I started the engine and checked the battery voltage and found as I suspected that the domestic alternator was supplying no charge. I switched on the Travelpower and fired up the Victron Multiplus and found a healthy charge going into the batteries.

A check of the instrument panel revealed no red light on starting the engine for the domestic alternator so I traced the cable from the back of the panel. The loose cable looked suspicious and proved to be the connection from the alternator to the charge light - so no charge. It was easy to fix - just plug it in - and the domestic alternator was still not charging. Further investigation required I think.