Lock Advice

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....having seen my boat caught on the side of the lock at Caversham ;........was quite frightening as the lock keeper was busy chatting...

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A £ to a penny that she (the lockie) was on her mobile
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"more damage likely to be done "

Ahem....Having been in this situation more than once and again very recently,would like to disagree a tiny bit.
Cut that rope,the alternative is a bollard being ripped out of the glassfibre and then the boat being violently released anyway,but also with a lump of metal on the end of a rope flying about.
We always keep a sharp old kitchen knife velcroed next to the wheel for such problems.
 
The official line is to do what it says on the poster as in the link. Press close sluices button once. You should then go back to instruction No 1.
We did manage to add 7 more OOP systems this year and the last 3 locks are getting it this winter. I will be asking for a review of how they are working and whether they need any more changes when they're all in.
 
Wouldn't disagree with that, but its surprising how much strain a "decent" cleat and rope will take, I think my point was that in many situations running to operate the sluices first is preferable to cutting the rope.
 
Well angelaq I can honestly say that after 30+ years of winding those @@@$$$g handles, OOHP is the best thing ever to happen on the river /forums/images/graemlins/cool.gif

Just need the depth sorting now, oh and can you raise a few of those low bridges around Oxford and....
 
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The official line is to do what it says on the poster as in the link. Press close sluices button once. You should then go back to instruction No 1.


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But, am I not right in thinking that there are more than one type of OOHP procedures depending on the lock?

Also, my casual observation is that these instructions need to be made much more visible AT THE LOCK - I had never seen the link previously and wouldnt even know where to find it.

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I will be asking for a review of how they are working and whether they need any more changes when they're all in.

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Can I politely suggest that the right time to do this is NOW at the beginning of this season? A responsible person desptached to every lock to try it for real and consider placement of instructions etc might reveal a lot.
 
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The official line is to do what it says on the poster as in the link. Press close sluices button once. You should then go back to instruction No 1.
We did manage to add 7 more OOP systems this year and the last 3 locks are getting it this winter. I will be asking for a review of how they are working and whether they need any more changes when they're all in.

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It's a joy to have all these modified locks in operation, and I for one am extremely grateful, especially so as we tend to cruise the whole length of the EA river several times a season.

BUT I would repeat a plea I made to PP last year to make the last three easier to wind OOH. One would expect Marlow to be a pig as the gates are large, but Whitchurch and Iffley?? These are small shallow locks and one would expect them to be easy, but they are not.

Here's my remembered experience:-

Marlow
Upstream - heavy
Downstream - light, a pleasure

Whitchurch
Upstream - moderate
Downstream - very heavy - unpleasant

Iffley
Upstream - heavy
Downstream - moderate

Being hydraulic in operation, surely the valves, pumps can be adjusted; to my mind it's a matter of gearing.

I understand that Goose Grease has been tried, but it doesn't last long...

Perhaps you'd be kind enough to pass this on to PP and get an answer?
 
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....having seen my boat caught on the side of the lock at Caversham ;........was quite frightening as the lock keeper was busy chatting...

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A £ to a penny that she (the lockie) was on her mobile
/forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif

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Well just for once she was talking to another boater. Probably her battery had run out.
 
Luckily for us, we have a responsible person at every lock almost every day! They would have been involved in the testing and are expected to report any issues. I'm sure the instructions have been placed in the best place possible for each site - at least that would have been the instruction. If you think some of them aren't right and there is somewhere better to put them, mention it to the lockkeeper.
 
Hi Angelag,

As an Inspector of Works for some 30 odd years can I suggest you send along a complete novice at working a lock, monitor his/her difficulties without giving any help at all.
Then modify signage and/or the system to suit.
 
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Hi Angelag,

As an Inspector of Works for some 30 odd years can I suggest you send along a complete novice at working a lock, monitor his/her difficulties without giving any help at all.
Then modify signage and/or the system to suit.

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Absolutely spot on. Don't even let them ask the lockie where the instructions are !!

Angela, believe me, there is at least one lock where the head gates instructions are on the pedestal BELOW and BEHIND the wheel !!
Wish I could remember which one but probably down in the Staines to Teddington section.
 
"winding those @@@$$$g handles"

Don't I know!!!!!!

Coming back upriver one night from an ADLS function, I think we had to wind about 10 locks and as it was summer time we got pretty warm so I took my jacket off. About 2 locks later 'no jacket and as it contained car keys etc we had no choice but go back. No tow path to just run back so we had to wind the locks again. Boy talk about a workout.

Have never tried the electric ones so can't comment, but another poster said the sluices can be stopped/started but this has to be done at each end of the lock, so running backwards and forwards will keep boater fit. Not good in an emergency though.
 
I think it would be a good idea for the EA to have better advice on operating the powered locks. There's not a lot of info on their web site, I cannot find any images of the power panels, you know, a picture tells a thousand stories etc.

Lets face it, its not rocket science, but there are tricks and traps to working the powered locks out of hours.
 
Re: Right I take it back, a bit..

Went through Culham lock last night on OOHP, going downstream we saw another boat in the lock coming up so we hovered around rather than moor on the assumption they would soon be opening the gates, ummmm after 5 minutes we moored up, the lock was clearly full but clearly they were having problems with the gate so I wandered up, green light flashing, lock full for the last 10mins but gate would not open, they had called the duty watchman at the EA. Answer all ok but it hadn't finished the sequence, button pressing out of frustration at not being able to open the gate had restarted the sequence at least twice and now we had to wait another 25mintues for it to complete the sequence before it would allow us to open the gate arghhhhhhhh....

PLEASE FIX IT, the Culham lock fills in 10mins on even a partialy open sluice not 25! this is H&E madness, get rid of the timer program and just have a fixed sluice opening then at least peeps can open the gate.

If it remains like this I shall get a large axe and give it a reprogramming it will never forget /forums/images/graemlins/mad.gif
 
Re: Right I take it back, a bit..

I don't understand why pressing a button other than open gates would do anything, let alone start a non-existent sequence. Surely the lock didn't empty again?
 
Re: Right I take it back, a bit..

If you press "close sluices" something appears to happen after what seems like ages, but then you have to press open sluices again to be able to open the gates and it won't let you do it for 25minutes regardless of the state of the lock.
I know this lock is a special case like Marlow because of the depth, but they've gone too far on the side of caution.
 
Re: Right I take it back, a bit..

Hopefully it's teething troubles, after all Mapledurham or Sandford aren't as slow and they're both big locks.

Having suffered declining service for two seasons and putting up with it I for one will not take kindly to locks mechanisms which in effect are worse than the "old" manual operation.

It may be time to go on the attack (like Apollo....)
 
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