Any boaters out there.

[Nauti]

Just thought i'd share a couple of photos of our narrowboat being built.....may be of interest to anyone with a nautical interest.

 

[hawgdawg]

Looks similar to a mini Ark ,,,is it raining there ?

 

[Nauti]

Lol.....its always raining here.......never thought of them as looking like Arks,you do have a point.....wouldn't fancy trying to get an elephant on it though.

 

[Pondmn]

Are you going to live full time on it. How long and how wide.. Just curious where you live. Looks like a European canal boat. Sure beats my 24 ft boat for salmon. Very nice.

 

[Nauti]

Hi bud,
I'm over in England.We will be living on it full time,our idea is to retire early and go off exploring our canal system.....at a maximum permitted speed of 4 mph this should take a long while.
The boat is 60 feet long and 6 feet 10" wide.

 

[hawgdawg]

That will be cool. Looking forward to your pics. Are you doing all of the work yourself ? I know nothing about ship building , or the art of designing a boat that would actually displace water , versus taking on water ,,,,,,But is it going to be a flat bottom boat ? To me it just looks top heavy. Please don't think I'm critisizing your work , it looks great . I guess it's more of a question. I know a sailboat has a keel to help with the weight and stress from the wind. Just curious. And also , I know very little about England and thier canals .

 

[Nauti]

Hi bud,we have a boatbuilder to do all the hard work,we just give him our ideas on how we want the design.The boat does have a flat bottom,this is because of the depth of our canals which are around four feet in the middle,sloping up towards the banks.
The floor of the boat is below the waterline and there is a lot of ballast in the bottom of the hull giving it a fairly low center of gravity.
All the best,neil.

 

[Nauti]

Latest photo showing the stern rail,rudder and tiller fitted.

 

[jim tn]

With the canals that narrow, how do you get around a sharp bend with the 60' length? Neat looking boat and interesting endeavor. HH jim tn

 

[hawgdawg]

That last pic there gives a better picture of its buoancy . And a good question from JimTn,,,,
Thanks for the replies .

 

[Nauti]

Hi Jim,luckily there are no bends sharp enough to cause problems with turning the boat,there are narrowboats on the system up to 72 feet long.At certain points there are junctions that need a bit of forward and reverse manouvering to get round or sometimes boaters use bow thrusters to help in tighter spots.
At certain points on the canals there are also cut outs in one side of the bank so that we can spin the boat around and go back the way we came.

 

[hawgdawg]

How many miles of canal ways do ya'll have over there ? I'm assuming a good amount. Sounds like a nice peaceful retirement plan.

 

[jim tn]

Thanks for the reply. Sounds like a heck of a retirement idea. Good luck! HH jim tn

 

[Nauti]

Cheers Jim.
Hi H D,
Currently there are about 2200 miles of canal and navigable river in the uk but there are ongoing schemes to reopen stretches of unused canals that have fallen into disrepair and also schemes to connect existing stretches together with new canal systems.There seems to be a healthy interest in the canal network at the moment which is always a good thing as the network takes a lot of maintenance and money.
Birmingham in the midlands which played a large part in the industrial revolution,has more miles of canal than Venice.

 

[hawgdawg]

That's a lot of canal ways . I wish you the best of luck on your journey's . And will be looking forward to some pics as well .
Bon Voyage ,,,,,lol

 

[Nauti]

A few more photos.

 

[Nauti]

n/t

 

[hawgdawg]

Nice !!

 

[Gayle Houtx]

Nice work. Much larger than many RV's in the US. Must not tyke a large motor since the MPH is so low.
HH Gayle in Tx

 

[Nauti]

Hi Gayle,
You are quite correct.......it uses a 43 hp motor.......hardly earth shattering but enough to get it around the canals.
I will put some more photos up soon.