Osney lock 18-19th. June

TrueBlue

TrueBlue

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Subject to EA waking up.... there will be no attended service at Osney Lock next week on Thursday and Friday 'cos no relief is available / allocated and therefore the very willing volunteer wont' be allowed to run the lock on his own.

Probably subject to somebody in 'authority' changing there mind.....
 
But if he was not a willing volunteer but just a bystander who just happened to be there, he would be allowed to operate the lock?
 
I suppose the point is it will be on public power and as Osney is quite a deep lock were you to arrive with the lock set against you it would take an age to set it in favour where a lock keeper would be able to bypass the public power timers and get the lock turned round considerably quicker.

I am personally glad to hear that volunteers are not allowed to handle the lock on lock keeper settings without supervision - I have come across a few remarkably clueless volunteer lock keepers which has had me a little worried at times.
 
I forgot that the lockies have access to fast mode which certainly helps to turn a lock round quickly, and that it is not available to the untrained. However, there must be a way to speed things up on some of the locks when on public power. Penton Hook is very slow in DIY mode. Chertsey is ok, but of course much smaller. Perhaps a bit of fine tuning by the EA is needed.
 
It seems to be a restriction on how quickly you can raise the paddles on the gate. It seems it opens to a certain amount and then makes you wait till you can open them completely. I don't know if its based on the level within the lock or if its just a timer. You would think if its a timer it would be fairly simple to tweak.
 
I suppose the ultimate would be a sensor which will allow faster filling if there is no boat in the lock or close to the top gates and faster emptying if there is no boat in the lock or near the bottom gates.
A bit like big versions of supermarket checkout belt sensors which halt the belt automatically when an item of shopping is detected.

Its more sensors to go wrong so maybe not ideal. I don't think speeding up the locks with boats in the chamber and no lock keeper is a very good idea although perhaps there could be a standard test like moor an EA patrol boat with a strain gauge on each rope and see just what the pull is in each lock then set all the timers to be equivalent. All locks behave a bit differently so I guess that wouldn't work either ..

The status quo is OK really after all in theory there is no hurry anyway :)
 
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