Mary's view - part 6

Available here.

Note: the prudent saving of old fibreglass insulation is not 'ridiculous'.

Work

Another weekend and some more rust treatment. Mary and I drove up on saturday to get some more of this out of the way. After lighting the stove to take the chill off, we were able to carry on where we left off. One of Alan's crew, Nobby, helped us by doing some needle gunning, Mary and I were impressed by how much better his work was than ours. Hopefully he'll be able to do whats left of the inside.

The holes in the deck are getting patched and there is less water in the bilge each time we come up now. Still, I was able to pump out a bit which kept me amused.

My brother has mentioned in emails why there are no pictures of me working, so here's one.

Followed by a more typical one....

Alan's team have done some more work on the front hatch and hawse pipe (the tube through which the anchor chain goes below deck).

Other activities over the weekend included Hope (the barge moored next to us) going for a little trip to fill up with water - they're planning to take her down south this week if the weather holds.

I also started the engine, which hadn't run since July. It did fire eventually, but only ran for about 5 minutes before stopping. Luckily, years of similar experience with various cars and bikes has taught me to check the obvious first, and yes, there was no fuel in the tank as it had been drained for welding.

The more things change.....

Mary and I went up on saturday, just for a day. I guess its quite a thing to get up early, drive 200 miles, work for 5 hours and then come home again. But its starting to become strangely normal.....

We fired up the Stanley range to provide some heat, set the ipod shuffle up and set to with the rust converter. There is lots more to do, but after a week of hard work and needle gunning at half term, this seemed quite pleasant. Mary did the sides and I did the ceiling, using Vactan, the conversion product mentioned before. There is still lots more to go, but its nice to do a 'building up' instead of 'tearing down' task.

The waterways museum has a new barge, Service, that they plan to turn into a floating classroom. Mary and I looked at the clean interior and reflected on the fact that we've had to gut Misterton to get the same result. Hey ho. One thing that is apparent from the picture is how much deeper a Sheffield sized keel is as the bow is much higher out of the water than Misterton.

Alan's team had been able to make some progress in between the rain. The front crews quarters has some new plate and an access hatch tack welded in place. We'll be putting some water tanks down there...

In the engine room, there are saddle tanks either side, these would've been filled with canal water to ballast the stern down when running empty. They're no longer needed, but the space can be used for storage. The first one has been cut out here (hint - its the most rusty bit with the blue tub sitting in it)

Thats about it, tune in for more of the same, oh, anytime in the next three months.

Mary has also updated her views here.

A woman's point of view

Mary has written a few thoughts about the whole experience from her point of view.I fully expect Candace Bushnell to be in touch soon for first dibs on screenplay rights.

Now updated (again) part 4 added!

Glory Hole

One of the reasons for Misterton's dimensions being longer (by 13ft) and lower (by about 1.5 feet) than a Sheffield sized keel is this bridge on the High Street in Lincoln, known locally as the 'glory hole'. She was built to be able to go through this. It looks quite spacious, but I suspect I might think differently if I was trying to get a 60 ton barge through it. Maybe we'll get to try that someday.

After seeing that, there was nothing to do apart from go to a bar.