 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
Conservation in this day and age usually means you need pots full of money to make a real difference and a society like ours obviously is a bit short in that department. So usually we think the big ideas, and then talk about it to as many people as we can, usually at that time with no effect. But it's amazing just how many times the idea surfaces much later as someone else's idea but with the added ingredient of funding.
Martin broached the idea sometime ago that the society should be looking at restoring or preserving not just the system on the BCN (a battle won) but the very things that made it different. Martin as usual was thinking big and his idea is that we should be preserving the whole of the Titford canal corridor as a microcosm of what the BCN was like before the dereliction set in.
Recently the greater threat is the developer who wish's to turn any canal side area into a Lime House Basin, with multi layered apartments that all look the same. Retail parks that could be anywhere threaten to destroy the unique nature of any waterway and especially the BCN. So to that end the society is actively pursuing with BW the possibilities of such a scheme.
Part of this larger project was a smaller project much more able to be undertaken by us directly, preserve a boat that was once the very stance of the BCN , a day boat.
Once these boats could be counted in their hundreds, carried all types of goods, but few of them remain, most are in poor condition not being the sexiest of boats to preserve unlike a working pair. These boats had no cabin were usually open to the elements and thus full of standing water, were 70 foot long having a rudder bracket at each end meaning that they could be towed in either direction.
So we put the word out that we where looking for such a boat, looked at a number of likely boats, finding nothing immediately suitable, or finding that again considerable funding would be required to fully restore the vessel, long term projects. (I.e. Station boat "May" Boundary Post No 157).
Then at the beginning of December 2002 Ian Braine of Canal Services offered to the society the long term loan of such a boat that he had just acquired and duly delivered a boat to the Black Country Museum. The boat delivered was a bit better than a day boat having a proper bow and stern that gives the boat a much better shape.
Conditions were agreed verbally, that the society would empty the boat and take it out of the water, get the boat inspected and if a going concern paint the boat inside and out, and insure the boat. Ownership would remand with Ian who would loan the boat to us long term and would supply a similar boat if for any reason he required the use of the boat.
So on Thursday 19th December 2002 Phoenix along with a number of us who could get out of work or shopping picked up the boat from the Museum. The canal was frozen over and having removed both boats from the arm by winding up the lift bridge at the museum we set off bound for Hawne Basin. We broke ice all the way along the Old line and down Brades locks and through the Netherton Tunnel and into the Dudley No 2 canal arriving at Hawne Basin late afternoon.
The boat slipped through Burton Bridge into the Basin as if she had been there before many times. She probably has, as a quick inspection found what looks like a faded number 51? Painted on the inside of her bows, that could be a Stewarts and Lloyd's number, Hawne Basin being an interchange basin for the previous Coombeswood Steel Works. Like any day boat she was full of rubbish and years of silt that was removed slowly over the Christmas period. Two small holes in the bottom plate were found that will require patching. So as not to waste a slot on the slip way, Phoenix was taken out of the water, quickly, pressure washed and blacked at the same time.
After Christmas Phoenix was re floated and the day boat dry docked and the job of finishing the cleaning inside and out completed by pressure washing her. She then awaited an inspection by a surveyor to see if she is a going concern.
Ian Braine asked his father Malcolm Braine to survey the boat and this he duly did on Tuesday 8th January 2003. The result of the full survey indicates that the boat has been re bottomed at some time, the original riveted bottom having been removed and replaced with a welded one. The latest bottom is probably 40+ years old and is thin in places. Long term to make the boat fully serviceable two sections of the bottom need to be replaced and a number of rivets on the sides are worn flush with the plates that make them probable points of leakage. These repairs are well beyond the society's resources requiring boat yard facilities and money so they will not be under taken. However it has been agreed with Ian that we retain the boat, patch the two small leaks and black the outside of the hull, whilst Ian ponders the longer term future.
With the able assistance of Tony Friar the boat builder at Hawne a member of the society, the holes where patched and the hull on Monday 13th January 2003 was returned to the water. However another leak appeared and the hull was again pulled out of the water. Further repairs were carried out and extra plates welded to the bottom. All the leaks are in the bottom plate identified as requiring replacement. Various other attempts to re float the boat always ended in the bottom plate cracking just where the knees of the boat met in the middle of the hull. Numerous other plates were welded in an attempt to re launch her, and she was finally returned to the water on Tuesday 14th January 2003 with one further leak. This leak was stopped by the application of some puddling clay. She looked like no other day boat I've seen, empty and very smart in her new black paint work.
In this state the boat is not a practical boat for to use as a work boat as her bottom could soon be holed by placing some of the rubbish we pull out of the canal. Her future with the society after talking to Ian is that she will be moored in the top pound on the wharf below the ash tunnel until Ian can collect her when she will be taken to his yard on the Trent and Mersey at Weston to be re bottomed in due course. Ian's dad Malcolm has kindly not charged for his inspection so except for the paint no cost has been borne by the society, Thanks to Ian and Malcolm Braine and Tony Friar. So Phoenix towed the day boat up to Titford where she now is moored next to the pump house, and her presence adds an air of yester year, a real photogenic scene.
We will continue the search.