The engine alarm

Six weeks after putting the boat up for sale the Captain received an offer on the boat, conditional on it passing its survey, which he accepted.

moored on the pontoon

Three weeks later we headed back to the marina to take the boat to Great Hayward for its survey as the local facility had shut down. It was a two day journey at walking pace or just over half an hour in the car! The Captain allowed an extra day to repair the faulty alarm or temperature control or engine coolant system even though he had reported the fault to the sales team.

One complication was that the new owner had said if the boat passed he would leave it out of the water to have its hull blacked up. We decided one of us would drive the car around while the other cruised the boat to the survey. Once the boat was delivered to the dry dock we could empty our last possessions out and head for home.

We had a reasonable journey to Kings Bromley Marina but it still took over three and a half hours in heavy traffic. The Captain decided to run the engine while de-wintering the boat so that he could check the temperature switch and decide what action to take.

stretching her legs

I took our Lurcher on a long walk while the Captain switched on the water pump and checked for leaks as this can be a tense time for him. As I arrived back the engine alarm beeped twice then stopped as the Captain charged from the far end of the narrowboat.

“Did you touch it?” he asked. I shook my head. “Strange it seems to have switched itself off,” he murmured. He poked around the engine bay to see if the engine coolant system was working.

Baffled he came back. “Perhaps the temperature switch was sticking. We’ll just have to wait and see what happens tomorrow when the engine gets up to cruising temperature,” he said.