Vlog 163: Grime Time Viewing
The sun is out and it’s time to sort a few bits of the narrowboat that are looking less than prime, notably the paintwork needs a spruce-up and polish plus one or two tiny rust spots on the roof need attending to.
Category Archives: Engineering
Vlog 161: Soap on the Water
After getting frustrated with the cheap little twin-tub washing machine I had aboard the boat from the early days, I ditched it and bought a proper automatic machine.
In this video I explain what I think of it and why it fits the bill.
Vlog 138: Clean Sweep
Last winter, I was disappointed during winter to find white grungy muck dribbling down the flue inside the boat onto the top of the stove. This was down to a badly fitting and broken chimney. Rather than buy an off the shelf replacement which might also not have fitted well, I opted to get a custom-made replacement.
Vlog 136: Drawing Current
Following a few recent questions and comments from viewers, here is a beginners guide to how electrics work on a narrowboat. It may also have general relevance to people in campervans, motorhomes, caravans and RVs although there are slight differences but the gist is similar.
Vlog 131: Star gate
Every winter the Canal & River Trust shut parts of the network down for a time in order to do maintenance which often includes taking out broken or old lock gates and replacing them. New lock gates are not something you can just order in from Amazon however, so the CRT have to make their own and in this video I visited their Birmingham workshop to see how the process works.
Vlog 130: National Treasure
The third and final part (for the moment) in this mini-series about unusual, rare and vintage narrowboat engines. Here we meet Keith Lodge who had a replica working boat built to his specification including a two-cylinder National DA2 engine from 1949.
Vlog 129: Dual Fuel
This is Part 2 of a three part mini-series about classic / vintage narrowboat engines as often heard chugging past on the canal. In this episode, I talked to Rob Goodman about his 1940s-era Kelvin K2 and its unusual starting procedure!
Vlog 128: Rusty Newbolt
This is Part 1 of a three part mini-series about classic / vintage narrowboat engines as often heard chugging past on the canal. In this episode, I talked to Chris Wenham aboard NB Herbert about his Russell Newbury engine.
Vlog 126: Back to Black
This vlog picks up immediately where the last one left off, as I head from Hillmorton Wharf to Yelvertoft marina where I had the boat taken out of the water and into their shiny new boat shed for blacking.
Vlog 125: Utter Bilge
In October last year I headed along the North Oxford canal to Hillmorton Marina where they have a little dockside crane, suitable to lift an engine out of a boat. Over the course of the next week I scrubbed out a load of muck and rust from the engine bilge, treated it with Vactan and then primed and painted it before getting the engine put back in.