Emma, this is the best narrow boat electrical video I have found on U tube - and I have been looking for some time. I am about two months behind you in fitting out my boat. Hope your next video shows your electrical progress - before you put all the covers on. Alan

I just have to say how lucky you must feel to have such a wonderful intelligent wife to help you, you both are doing so well congratulations on a great job well done. i am so looking forward to the finished boat as i will be thrilled for you both.

OMG love your spreadsheet! that must have been a nightmare! well done!!!!

Thanks for a great update. Sounds like the build is gaining pace and its all looking very solid. Big thumbs up.

I'm seriously impressed!

I am sure there will be plenty of jobbing electricians who will criticise you for your work. However as a professional engineer I just have to step back and commend you for your resourcefulness, application and sheer doggedness in executing this project. I do think that plastic trunking, rather than the hefty plywood would have been better but hey - you have done a good job. BTW you can wee plastic number hobbies for identifying your cables they just slide onto the cable insulation like beads on a necklace, probably too late now - but maybe invest in a dynotape labeller - they are cheap enough. In Sum, Bloody well done and thank you for sharing - you are great people.

Sax and Emma utterly brilliant, well-explained and understood most cheers.

wow you two are a good team !! Looks like a good job . Look forward to more videos

thank you for your time ,great job

Wow...very impressive! Nicely done you two! :)

I am have been following your story and videos with quite some interest. In the early 1980s I converted a bus to a motorhome over here in the states and went through the things you are doing now. Now, I am considering a boat to help expenses. I'm looking forward to more postings of your adventure . Hal

That looks mind boggling job well done 😯

Since to see you both you have been very busy and well done it looks great !!

Hi, one other item I should advise on regarding data cabling, do not run data cables within the same trunking or conduit with 12v or 240v circuits as you will have signal interference. If you are running cables in the same direction (parallel) run them at least six inches apart.

The 12 Volt Bible for Boats has been added to my Amazon wishlist. I'm quite technically minded, but there's no replacement for someone who's been there, done it AND knows what they're talking about.

You's two are an inspiration as ide like to follow in the same footsteps. When you's mentioned the cost of 2k for materials, that sounded a lot! Just for the electric

Ah, so that's where you've been ... Great video... As usual

That looks like an interesting job. I think it is good that you seem to be prioritizing a 12V DC system on the boat as this is a much more efficient way of handling your electrical needs. Though sometimes 12V appliances can be a lot more expensive than their 240V AC equivalents. I have known boaters to use substantial transformer and rectifier systems to feed their 12V DC requirements from shore mains as well.

Hey, nice channel, interesting work

wow you guys are brave! I bet you will learn to much and be able to fix everything tho!

Another brilliant episode on this project, I really feel for you, all the books readily available from boat design ,layout plumbing, electrical schemes all seem to apply to individual builds and nothing in general. Most references to any standards of compliance, like you say are largely well out of date and copies such as you obtained are a must. You may have to do a similar exercise on plumbing installation too. I cannot recall if yours will be a "gas free boat" but if not this may be an area where a man / lady gas fitter may have to be employed . Perhaps someone out there will perhaps put together a complete technical bible on boat design and fit out to enable self builders an easier and safe route to completion. I have to say that your ply trunking will at least provide the best finish than any p.v.c. Brand which looks rubbishy quite frankly and which can also be removed when required........Well done, and good luck.

hi there, thanks for sharing this film it has helped but also freaked me out a little, is there any way I could get hold of your shopping list for the electrical system as you guys seem to know what you are doing? thanks

Would you by any chance be willing to share an electronic version of the British Standards?

amazing job Emma.. a very scary looking part of the project to tackle. going downthe sides (rather than top central) does that mean if you get a fault you can just take off the veneer to sort it out (reading a bunch of boaters blogs that are suffering annoying lecky glitches after just a year or two of a professional build)? sounds like a minefield. great video guys

Great Job., I like the fact that you did not use your hull as the return, which causes a ton of issues in boats that have been wired by those not so diligent.... Cheers

When do you plan to have the boat finished?

Hi Sax and Emma, i noticed they've updated the BS EN ISO 10133 document (the DC electrics one). Was revised late 2017. Assume you've been working from the 2012 revision but hopefully wont affect you!

cutest couple :3

Hi Emma, Great work. You're doing a fantastic job. Could you tell me what tool you used on the iPad to layout your boat electrics? And the spreadsheet you used would also be great too! Me and a friend are about to embark on the fit-out of a 60ft sailaway so anything you could offer (advice, links to suppliers, etc.) would be very helpful.

The plywood ducting isn't there just to provide a route for cables, it provides structure when the lining is being attached to the inside of the boat. It provides the optimum solution to a number of problems, and that is why it is so popular among professional boat builders. On the subject of 240 volts, I've been boating for years, and I don't recall seeing that many landline connectors conveniently placed along the banks of canals and rivers. So like it or not, you need to go 12v or 24v. You need thick cables because low voltages are subject to significant voltage drops which is why pylons carrying power around the country are carrying electricity at hundreds of thousands of volts.

Also... What iPad app were you using?

May I ask why you chose 12 volt system instead of 24 volt ? I must extremely organized, and bless your souls such hard workers! Beautifully installed too.

Really interesting stuff, and so many things I'd never thought of. Any chance you might be up for surreptitiously handing off a copy of the BSI standards to someone who may be in a similar situation soon, but isn't a student?

The surface area determines the amount of current the wire can handle. The surface area of a circle is pi*radius^2, therefore 50mm^2 = pi*radius^2, i.e. radius = 4mm, i.e. internal diameter = 8mm. Did I get it right?

Forgive me if I misunderstood what I saw but ...... where you are running thicker cable to a junction box and branching off to smaller cable this raises issues with your fuse protection I.e the fuses should be rated for the lowest amperage capacity cable on a circuit, the fuses are protecting the cable so that should there be an excessive current draw, from a faulty connected load or a short in the wiring, the fuse blows before the wiring reaches its maximum capacity and heats up and potentially catches fire. You can avoid this by having distributed fuse boxes with high current eg 16mm feeds for say bow, stern and galley with shorter low current feeds for you loads. The bus bar junction boxes are really designed for the neutral returns where you can make a saving on wire costs by having a number daisychained around the boat with high current return to the battery.

You can't have enough mains outlets. If your done wiring the boat you might want to purchase a few plug strips so you have additional outlets. Example. Computer cell phone charger iPad charger etc. make sure all outlets have usb outlets with the mains then you can put you individual chargers in the closet. Now you can charge all handheld devices from any outlet on the boat with just the usb cable to charge your iPhone or android phone etc. all usb outlets are 5 volt dc right around 1000 milliamperes or slightly higher. I've been using them at the coffee shop with no ill affects.

Resistance. Think of an electric cable and current as a hosepipe and water flow - something nearly all of us are far more familiar with. It's logical that the bigger the diameter of the hose, the more water you can pump through it. Same with cables and electricity. There are differences - trying to push too much current down a too small cable causes heat to be generated and possibly fire - something I have yet to see with a hose pipe full of water!

I know it's a little cheeky but what are the chances of maybe being to get a copy of the BSI PDF files? 😬

I don't know about the UK but here in Canada you can cut your wire size by using relays close to such things as high power lights, (but not so much any more since very high power OUTDOOR LED are now available for things like such lights) horns. it is funny to hear you refer to wire size in mm we here it is in 4ga, 6ga.,16 ga.,14ga, 1/0, 2/0,3/0 and so on, battery cable is in that 1/0 to 4/0 sizing all marine wire has yo be tinned copper,, I watched this video long ago but came back to day to refresh what you last did on the boat not much change to todays

just one thing, all those cables cable-tied together will start to get warm. if you are really unlucky the insulation can melt and you can start having interesting electrical problems. What we do in the trade is use "pins" across the trunking to hold the wiring in whilst the lid is fitted. The pins are normally just a wedge fit and made out of either scrap cable or trunking. Talking about trunking, you should not use wood as a trunking medium for any voltage as its flammable. Any fire in the cable can ignite the wooden trunking. That ugly pvc trunking that everyone derides is actually flame retardant and the majority are also self extinguishing. Pvc trunking comes in many finishes including a decent wood effect, it also comes with purpose made back boxes for sockets which can make life so much easier. There are also versions that have a shielded data compartment to allow you to have all the wiring in one location without any interference. Make sure that any 12volt cable run with mains cable is rated at mains voltage as well. It should have a rating printed on it "350-500" volts normally. Take care with the standards as you also have to comply with BS7671:17edition:3rd amendment if you want to use shore power.

one AMP is 6.23 times 10 to 18 pwr electrons per second. that's 6.23 million billion electrons a second. or million million million if you prefer.

please check your youtube message box

formost I am sitting here Comfy with my Coffee , and just really really enjoying that I do not have to write the spread Sheet of doom !! Well done !! and and narrow boat layout (measure 2wice and cut once ) i'm just impressed ,, also I never realized it would happen ,,Voltage Drop ? really in 30 m,, interesting , , in power transmission lines on the hill from the power station yes sure ,, live and learn I guess ,, thanks ,, just a wonder full explination ,, now do black holes pls

Hmm, now who do you think the “straight man,” is in this duo? Anyway, helps to have a sense of humor in complicated, exasperating situations in life.

I am sorry to hog the comments but I feel I should mention a further point. I notice from your schedule that you are wiring the lighting in 12v. As you are aware this is from your battery bank and is dc(direct current). This has a different characteristic from alternating current when lighting is involved. If eg. in the saloon you have say six lights on a circuit, you must wire them in parallel and not series. If wired in series you will find that the first light will be brighter and the last light will be dimmer. In parallel they will all remain the same brightness irrespective of the state of your batteries.

...and you have to pay us for making a copy of our regulations which were made by your tax money. .. hah you should upload that pdf on the pirate bay!

Emma you could go to victron on line they can help you with the installation of their electronics .

what a rip off for the BSI electric info....glad you had access to them and ....like me ...I would have printed them off too......

:-)

put all your wires in a wooden duct is asking for trouble big fire risk.

I admire your efforts but wiring a narrowboat is not rocket science. An inverter, 6 way distribution board/isolator, a 240v ring main for power and a 240v circuit or two for lighting would suffice. Include for a galvanic isolator and provision for a landline connection, the 12v system should be minimum. The labour and material cost for the ply ducting is not necessary, you could have used a pvc 2"X1" trunking easier and junctions(bus bars) should not be enclosed in the duct, if a loose connection occurs due to vibration you will create a high resistance point causing heat and possible fire. All junctions should be free to air and easily accessible. I think you should have sought some advice before embarking on a task you know little about.

He's annoying and she's tollerant.....lol