Update to 'Crinan Drying Up'

yotter said:
Very many thanks for that, we are aware of that and it is unfortunate. Another issue is exiting Crinan at HW (approaching springs) will make the Dorus Mhor less than ideal. It is a shame that the canal could have not managed their water better in the recent past. It an elderly 28 foot wooden boat, so MoK not ideal, perhaps the 40 footers should have gone that way, with their deep draughts:-(
Angus
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About a month ago we agreed to help a yacht through, to get an early start he moved up to lock 13 the night before, but a deep draughted boat had locked in so they had to run water down at Dunardry to raise the long Crinan reach (16 million gallons to raise it about half a metre) this took nearly four hours. When it was finished we had to wait another hour because if he proceeded on his own he would be 'wasting water'. So we waited for the big Polish boat, when it came they told us because of the delay they had wanted to change their mind and go down round the Mull.
How many extra lockings would 16 million gallons have provided?
 
yotter said:
Is there any news of how Crinan Sealock will be operating. We are hoping to start transit for WHW (draft 1.5 m or less?). tomorrow starting during the Friday Ardrishaig open window. Exit HW Crinan is 18:04 Friday (will not make this) and 18:44 Saturday. Only problem being that they will closed and no overtime has been mentioned previously!
Many thanks in advance for any local knowledge.
Angus
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I would check with the canal because I believe that they have said that operators will be working later in the evenings to accommodate high tide lock in up until Sunday evening at Crinan Sea Lock.

Ash
 
Quandary said:
About a month ago we agreed to help a yacht through, to get an early start he moved up to lock 13 the night before, but a deep draughted boat had locked in so they had to run water down at Dunardry to raise the long Crinan reach (16 million gallons to raise it about half a metre) this took nearly four hours. When it was finished we had to wait another hour because if he proceeded on his own he would be 'wasting water'. So we waited for the big Polish boat, when it came they told us because of the delay they had wanted to change their mind and go down round the Mull.
How many extra lockings would 16 million gallons have provided?
Click to expand...

Indeed,
That was the basis of my comments. I recall the post from a previous thread about this. I believe that Hugh is helping out and Crinan will be open till 19:45. So, hopefully the ebb in the Dorus Mor will be the final obstacle, fortunately it should be starting to ease later on. The crew might yet get a G & T in LOTI:-)
Angus
 
It was supposed to be water from the River Add. Pump is still there but whether it works or not, I dinnae ken. It was only any use for keeping the Crinan basin full (and the stretch from 14 to 13) to cope with fishing boat movements.
 
The pump never really worked, only worked for one year, depending on who you ask, later they did try portable pumps at that location one year. The water does come from the mouth of the Add estuary but a couple of miles down from the high tide line so pretty salty.
The Crinan reach is the really leaky one, compounded by the leaky gates on lock 14. Taking fresh water from a trout stream like the Add would annoy the local anglers big time, better using salty stuff and killing a few brown trout, the eels and seatrout should survive?, after all it is a canal.
The inland lock rise on the Crinan was 8' or 2.4m. so that should bring the number of lock fulls to nearer 200, in theory the same water is used each time going down hill so it probably averages out at about 40 transits, say 80 boats. (Lock 13 is closer to 3.4 m these days and 8 and 9 are around 2m. because of the generally smaller draught catered for now, it used to be over 3m.)
 
Kylora said:
Why does water spill over the gates at night?

Can the fill from the reservoir to the summit reach be controlled / closed?

Is it leaky gates which mean that the level in the summit reach is dropping overnight?

Ash
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Good question, when we were waiting overnight Saturday in Crinan sea lock I could not talk to the lock keeper because of the roar, she said it would slow down later but that was just an effort to placate me. Some of the canals important customers are in Crinan basin (including me just now) so the level in the basin must not be allowed to drop.
Seriously, leakage accounts for an awful lot more than boat transits, it is now about 3 or 4 years from the pay dispute which led to nearly all general maintenance (other than a bit of tree cutting in winter) ceasing, the lifting sling around the Ard. sea lock gate has been there that long, the guys regard the current problems as chickens coming home to roost. When they were doing all tide working, at low tide they had to run water through the sluices full chat for 20-30mins before they managed to force the gates shut for the lock to begin to fill. Scary and this is an organization dedicated to Health and Safety.
 
There are a number of burns (streams!) that run into the reaches between locks 13&14 (Bellanoch) and 4&5 (Oakfield/Lochgilphead), so not all the water that reaches the basins above the sealocks comes from the summit reach. There is a burn that runs into the summit reach. None of these burns can be controlled. I would imagine, though, that they might be trickles at the moment.
The water flow into the summit reach can be supplemented from the reservoirs in the hills above, I think via the burn. That was way above my payscale when I worked there!

There is a "sluice" that can be opened in the reach not far above lock 4, in times of spate. This releases water from the reach out to the sea - so obviously irrelevant at the moment! It used to be manually operated but might now be automatic.
As Quandary says leaks are a major problem, not only through locks/gates but also out of reaches through the banks. I think this was previously a major problem in the Bellanoch reach, but I don't know if it still is.
Quandary is your local expert.:encouragement:

Edit:
It still is!!!!!!!!
The Crinan reach is the really leaky one
Read more at http://www.ybw.com/forums/showthread.php?504279-Update-to-Crinan-Drying-Up#TVzYLKGQVcgDR8fy.99
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Another statement from Donna today
It seems to say that they propose to continue operating as they have been for another week, that is allowing transit for craft with a draught less than 1.8m. in company, with sealock operation restricted to the 2hr. window at H.W. This should help the smaller WHYW boats get home.
The wording is not exactly clear, the guys out on the ground have different interpretations and issuing policy just before quitting time on Fridays makes querying difficult.

Further to A1s post above, there is negligible free water entering the system just now. The feature he refers to above lock 4 is the world famous water waster, invented by a local canal engineer. How it works; a culvert from the canal is blocked by a big stopper, the stopper is on the outer end of a balancing lever, at the other end is a massive iron bucket with a small hole in the bottom of it. When the level rises too high a pipe at overflow level fills the bucket, which moves the see-saw to lift the stopper, opening the culvert to massive outflow. When the water level drops enough the bucket stops filling and the water drains out the wee hole gently closing the stopper, another example of Scots genius. Completely automatic and has been working for about a century, since even before A1s time, the wee house on the bank that contains it used to have windows that you could peer in to see it working but they are now boarded up.
 
"My time" was 1978 & 1979, and I remember the guy in charge of the canal having to over-ride the water waster. I don't know if it was "get it to waste" or not waste. It was the summer, so perhaps the latter.

Edit: I know not the tide times for Crinan, but if HW is ~6am and 6pm surely they can arrange for locking either side...
 
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Little Grebe said:
Why not simply have the culvert set out the desired water level rather than employing all the mechanical engineering?
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I'm not sure. They also have this which simply allows water to "overflow".
888128_5888a9d4.jpg


Maybe the volume at the "water waster" is such that they wanted a valve to control the flow, and wanted to be able to open and close it manually at times.
Waster.jpg

https://canmore.org.uk/file/image/374019

crinan-canal-automatic-water-waster-adrishaig-argyle-scotland-AX50FH.jpg
 
The top photo shows the bridge at the 'mushroom field' Mid Argyll RFC used to play there. It is on the same reach as the water waster but there is a substantial stream coming in to the canal from the hill on the other side, the level is adjusted there simply by adding or removing planks on the top of the weir at the back of the bridge. Many of you with deeper draught will know the spot because a fair bit of gravel accumulates there. There is another largish stream coming down nearby but it is directed through a tunnel and out to sea below the canal and there are conventional weired outlet culverts at various places.
The reason why the water waster is needed rather than a culvert is that its inlet can be lower and respond much more rapidly to very heavy rain, the outflow is much higher than at the weirs. Just like your bath which empties faster through the plughole than the overflow!
 
Quandary said:
The top photo shows the bridge at the 'mushroom field' Mid Argyll RFC used to play there. It is on the same reach as the water waster but there is a substantial stream coming in to the canal from the hill on the other side, the level is adjusted there simply by adding or removing planks on the top of the weir at the back of the bridge. Many of you with deeper draught will know the spot because a fair bit of gravel accumulates there. There is another largish stream coming down nearby but it is directed through a tunnel and out to sea below the canal and there are conventional weired outlet culverts at various places.
The reason why the water waster is needed rather than a culvert is that its inlet can be lower and respond much more rapidly to very heavy rain, the outflow is much higher than at the weirs. Just like your bath which empties faster through the plughole than the overflow!
Click to expand...

Greenock cut has examples of identical sounding overflow arrangement - ingenius
 
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