Boatmans Cabins

Opinions vary on the benefits of a boatmans cabin. Some people hate them, others like me appreciate the multi functional space and flexibility of a traditional cabin. Styles vary tremendously but its worth playing around with the original dimensions to create a modern living cabin, giving you the benefit of having a bedroom, study, day cabin and separate chill out room all rolled into one, especially important if you live aboard!

"Katy"

Working boat cabins had to serve as living accommodation for the whole family. The cross beds were narrow, about three feet. These days its much better to make a four foot cross bed which can sleep two comfortably. 

"Katy"

There is a huge amount of storage in a back cabin, with cupboards over and under the bed, the bench seat, table cupboard, and even the "ticket" drawer where the captain would have kept all of the paperwork associated with his cargo. Ours houses the indispensable stanley knife fitted with a hooked blade and a rubber band to go round your wrist for the inevitable prop clearing, keys, D shackles and associated tat.

Heres a few snaps of different boatmans cabins in various stages of completion.

NB "Owl"

 

 

NB "Isis"

 

NB "Electra"

Good friends Bernie and Leigh have done a fantastic undercloth conversion on their historic narrowboat "Electra".

,

 Following my work on gravity fed central heating systems they asked me to have a look at their vintage Caledonia solid fuel range in the hope of generating some hot water. Electra is a gasless boat, and they wanted to keep it that way. The cooking range is in more or less constant use and therefore a good candidate for a gravity fed hot water system.

Due to the age of the stove and the risk of cracking potentially brittle castings it was decided to opt for a new non invasive boiler mounted on the side of the fire box. Many old French cooking ranges used to generate hot water using a similar system, drawing the hot water directly out of a tap on the front of the stove. 

 

Using a custom made calorifier (not as expensive as you may think) with a one inch coil to promote pump free circulation, the system works very well providing hot water for at least two showers and plentiful washing up every day. Being fond of bling, the Captain now also has some posh copper pipe in the saloon to polish to keep him out of mischief! The cylinder does have an immersion heater fitted as a back up, but so far it has not been necessary to wire it up.

 

New LPG Hob

This is our new Lpg hob on nb"Barden". Although the Rayburn is still going strong providing all of our hot water and 90% of the cooking, sometimes you just want to quickly boil the kettle or knock up a quick pasta sauce for the poor starving crew! 

Nearly all gas appliances are fitted with flame failure devices these days making them suitable for use on boats. This has led to much greater choice for the boat owner, as well as reducing the upfront cost of the appliance. This two ring model is only 300mm wide leaving a small but very useful angled work surface in our galley. The tiling adds another dimension to the angles of the work surface to keep you interested when peeling onions!