Peter's Waterways Blog Pawls This was first published in IWA West Riding's Milepost in May 2015 about safety equipment for paddles

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Paddles annotated

The Canal and River Trust are asking for comments on Pawls. Or to be more precise there's a press release entitled “CANAL & RIVER TRUST WANTS BOATER INPUT ON PAWL CATCH DESIGN“. And if that's still confusing, the filename of their document is “LockCatchesFINAL.doc” which gives us a better clue.

Think of winding up a groundpaddle or gatepaddle on a Midlands narrow lock or wide lock. To hear that satisfying clicking noise, a ratchet mechanism needs to be clicking on the paddle gearing, and preventing the paddle dropping if you let go of the windlass. That's the pawl. Mostly you have to flick it on to the gear before you start winding, and flick it off again before the paddle can be lowered.

Schematic of gearing

Llangollen Canal's version of the inhibiting bars

At Atherstone flight, and elsewhere, CRT have been installing new pawl STOPS, small bars of metal that prevent the pawl being flicked all the way off: the idea is that the pawl is always on the gear ready for the next winding-up. But to wind-down you need one hand to hold the pawl the inch away from the gearing that is now allowed, and take the weight of the paddle with the windlass with the other hand.

It solves one issue and creates a worse problem. Everyone now has their fingers unnecessarily close to finger-squashing gearing: those who need two hands to have the combined-oomph to raise the paddle, still need to take the whole weight to release the pawl and then lower it under control, but now have to use one hand on the pawl leaving insufficient hands to do the job safely.

Grindley Brook Gate Paddle

Peter Scott @peterjohnscott