# Re-intro



## JMcgill (Sep 19, 2002)

Been a while since I've spent any time here so thought I would re-introduce myself.

Life long sailor. Sold my sailboat a few years back and promised myself I would look into buying another boat when I retired.

Well, that time has come and since I have more time than money, I bought a project boat: a 50 year old Pearson Triton yawl.

She needs a bunch of TLC but I've got the time and most of the skills to put her right.

The project list is currently 3 pages long and growing... 

First major effort is an electric repower. I have a bunch of questions and plan to see if anyone here-abouts wants to chime in with some suggestions.

Home waters are Buzzards Bay Massachusetts. 

Planning to cruise solo coastally around New England, and when all is deemed solid, I plan to venture south to Caribbean and North to PEI and area.

That about covers it. 

Best.


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## capta (Jun 27, 2011)

*E*lectric *P*ropulsion is not a good idea for a long distance cruising boat. What you might save in engine weight you are going to spend in battery weight and on such a small boat you do not have the area for a decent solar array. A windgen will rarely make an amp or 2 an hour and the average is much less.
EP works great for getting in and out of a marina (best because you can keep your batteries charged from shore power) or to a mooring, but it is not a solution if you need to power for any length of time in difficult or severe conditions. An engine is not a necessity for Caribbean cruising (one year we did over 2000 miles of interisland sailing {no passages}, using the engine less than 20 hours), but there are calms behind every island (lees) that are very hard to work through under sail. Some channel crossings can leave you 6 to 10 miles west of your desired landfall, with little choice but to sit out there in confused and choppy waters without enough wind to get up to the island, if you can't power up. A few calm, overcast days and you might not have the power to get underway to reset your anchor, should a squall blow through, and you drag or have problems with another boat doing so in an anchorage.
Of course, if you've the deep pockets for LI batteries and a method to charge them, you can completely disregard this post.


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## JMcgill (Sep 19, 2002)

Thanks for thoughts. I plan to learn what EP can do while sailing coastally and see if I can make it work. 

Planning on spending almost no time at a dock, but will have shore power charging available for those rare situations. Otherwise, we are talking regen+solar+wind for charging. 

Planning on having a small portable (and quiet) generator that I can use for situations that warrant. This should be on only rare situations.

I am not planning on crossing oceans but am planning on some offshore passages. 

In terms of what is really necessary? Many many have cruised with no aux power at all so that question has already been answered.

I REALLY don't want the noise and hassle of a diesel engine if I can avoid it. Bottom line: my decision is made- I am going EP, or else I will use a sculling oar.. : )

In terms of battery type- Of course would love to go Li,,, but expense will probably dictate AGM.

Again- thanks for feedback.


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## eherlihy (Jan 2, 2007)

Welcome back!

You may want to check out this website: Sailing Uma? HOME This couple has been sailing on "Uma," a 1972 Pearson 36' for over two years. Uma is all electric.

and in particular this; Sailing Uma? ELECTRO-BEKE


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## Jeff_H (Feb 26, 2000)

Welcome back.... Interesting project.

I think that Capta took the words right out of my mouth. While there certainly have been successful conversions to Electric Propulsion, it would be extremely difficult to make that work on a boat the size and configuration of a Triton if your goal is long range cruising. As much as I like the idea from an environmental 'small footprint' point of view, I really don't think its practical. 

I will say that on the few electric propulsion projects that I have seen the costs published, it would be wildly cheaper to install a new diesel and tanks than to switch to Electric Propulsion. If initial costs are a problem, then you might even be able to buy a rebuilt rather than a new diesel. There are companies like Beta which claim to make drop-ins for the Atomic 4 in terms of the same leg positions and coupling location. 

And while it might seem cheaper to run an electric propulsion system, the reality is the difference in cost when you factor in the initial installation, the limited market value of an EP Triton, and the replacement costs for the batteries every 5 or so years, the diesel is probably less expensive as a life cost as well. 

Respectfully,
Jeff


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## misfits (Dec 9, 2011)

I'd also recommend the Yahoo Electric Boat Forum & Electric Seas.
There's many pros/cons to electric propulsion but having an ICE is also a real PIA at times.
There are many people out there that are cruising with EP & it works for them.
Cost wise, you will not save any money when compared to a diesel re-power however if you're handy you can get a lot of bang for your buck.

I installed a 10KW 48 volt motor from Thunderstruck last year. I purchased the "kit" with the controller, throttle & Clearview Display, it set me back $2,700.00. The final tally to install my system run approximately $6,500.00 but included a browning helical gear drive, ss drop pan, motor mounts, lasdrop shaft seal, prop shaft, 14X10 3 bladed wheel, a 48 volt 4 bank battery charger, 1 bank 12 volt battery charger, 2-Duracell GC6 batteries for the house, & 4-Trojan T1275 batteries for the propulsion bank. This year I will be adding a little solar & a Honda 2000 generator to the mix which in the end would have been the cost of a Beta 14. It's not for everybody but having a mechanical & defacto engineering background, it's a pretty cool science experiment.

When I made the switch to a sailboat from the power boat/sport fishing scene I decided to be patient, bag the schedule & always run with the tide so you get a free bus ride.


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## JMcgill (Sep 19, 2002)

Funny. I am addicted to this series of Vlogs.

I've been watching about 10 episodes a day for about a week. Dan and Kika are a great source of encouragement.

And these two show that major sailing adventures can be had with electric power.


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## JMcgill (Sep 19, 2002)

I don't know how you can say it is impractical to do this when, the couple doing the "Sailing Uma" series proves that it can. They are doing it right now.

What am I missing?

Don't get me wrong, I appreciate the sentiments,,, it's just that there are people right now, today, doing what you say can't practically be done...

Are you saying a 28 footer is too small for this gear? Or that there isn't enough room for the recharging capability I need?


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## eherlihy (Jan 2, 2007)

I believe that they spent <$3K on the whole setup. Dan has recently modified the setup to a direct drive arrangement that allows for regeneration when they are under sail. Also, they have been using flooded-lead-acid batteries since they went electric.


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## JMcgill (Sep 19, 2002)

misfits said:


> I'd also recommend the Yahoo Electric Boat Forum & Electric Seas.
> There's many pros/cons to electric propulsion but having an ICE is also a real PIA at times.
> There are many people out there that are cruising with EP & it works for them.
> Cost wise, you will not save any money when compared to a diesel re-power however if you're handy you can get a lot of bang for your buck.
> ...


Like you, I'm an engineer (EE) so not scared of any of the technical stuff.

I have a bit of a head start on things because my brother in-law (who is in the business) is getting me a fairly ridiculous deal on the controller and motor (like, maybe free?). Add a few other parts for a few hundred bucks and all that is left is the battery bank.

Would love to go for 400 aH of lithium batteries but not willing to spend the $ right now. I plan to got with 250 aH or so of AGM batteries for now. Eventually I may add a Lithium bank to the mix.

I'd also like to add a Maxprop but have you looked at the price of those puppies? Yikes. Guess I'll stick with the stock prop for now.

I figure, batteries aside, I can do this for under $500.

And I will be free of the noise, pollution, maintenance time and cost, fuel cost, and smell of a putt putt.

I am loving the thought of it !


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## JMcgill (Sep 19, 2002)

eherlihy said:


> I believe that they spent <$3K on the whole setup. Dan has recently modified the setup to a direct drive arrangement that allows for regeneration when they are under sail. Also, they have been using flooded-lead-acid batteries since they went electric.


This is my understanding to. Personally I wouldn't use brush DC motor like he did, but I admire his ingenuity for buying a used forklift motor and making it all work. Great for him.

I hear lots of people comment that you can't sail the world with electric, but I almost never hear a solid explanation of me why.

For me? I plan to use my motor to get in and out of sticky spots. For example- In my old P35 I never ran my Atomic four for more than 20 minutes. I even sailed on and off my mooring when single handing.

Afraid of getting caught in a wind hole? No big deal, they don't last that long.

Afraid you might need to out-run a storm? Try better planning. Also learn to sail in heavy weather. Generally you aren't going to out-run a storm anyway... Not at 5.5 knts (full bore with my A4, and almost hull speed for my little Triton)

Need to claw off a lee shore at night? Fine, kick on your electric power plant, which is, if chosen correctly, just as strong and powerful as that unreliable gas engine or the little diesel you replaced it with.

OTOH- find yourself in the middle of nowhere with no access to clean diesel? No, problem,,, even with low batteries. lie at anchor for a day and read a book while your wind and solar top off your battery bank with 10 or more hours of steaming time.

Want a more guaranteed solution in the case of a run of full calm and cloudy days? Hide a little camp generator in the lazzarette, with a gallon of gas, for an emergency situation.

Don't want to spend $10/gal to fill your boats big tanks? See above...

Afraid that when you hear the breakers in the dark, your cranky old engine won't start? See above...

Perfect solution? There isn't one. But I think the motor, control and battery technology are finally in place to be a viable solution.

Me? Hope I never have the misfortune of dealing with an A4 again. Diesel is definitely better, and if my boat had one, I would probably juct stick with it. But since my boat's A4 died and was removed, along with teh fuel tank, muffler etc. before I purchased the boat, I am starting with a clean slate. And I think EP could be a fit.


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## miatapaul (Dec 15, 2006)

Well UMA has been sailing essentially engineless as they have been having issues with over heating and batteries only lasting a few months. They were only able to run the motor for a few minutes at a time. i too admire there spirit, but from the beginning though they would have been better off with the diesel they got but could not figure out how to install. Why depend on a generator to charge batteries when a decent diesel will be more reliable? 

Biggest stumbling block is batteries, I think they are coming, but may well be a while off. I doubt it will involve lithium.


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## RobGallagher (Aug 22, 2001)

20KW EV batteries (lithium Ion) from scrap yards can be had for under a thousand bucks.


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## misfits (Dec 9, 2011)

miatapaul said:


> they would have been better off with the diesel


Maybe. 
They put a lot of effort & cash into adapting the fork lift motor to the existing ICE transmission.
If we look at the mass of the transmission & the inner workings, it takes a lot of energy/torque to spin it. 
Personally I think this was the biggest mistake of their conversion & IMHO was an unsound idea.


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## amwbox (Aug 22, 2015)

miatapaul said:


> batteries when a decent diesel will be more reliable?
> 
> Biggest stumbling block is batteries, I think they are coming, but may well be a while off. I doubt it will involve lithium.


The answer could be nickel-iron. They seem to be making a resurgence with all this renewable tech going mainstream...prices could start going down. They are an extremely durable, long lasting battery. Could be just the thing for electric drive sailboats....assuming they have very large battery banks anyways. Not a lot of quick discharge performance from nickel-iron...


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## miatapaul (Dec 15, 2006)

amwbox said:


> The answer could be nickel-iron. They seem to be making a resurgence with all this renewable tech going mainstream...prices could start going down. They are an extremely durable, long lasting battery. Could be just the thing for electric drive sailboats....assuming they have very large battery banks anyways. Not a lot of quick discharge performance from nickel-iron...


Yea there seems to be a lot of technology coming up, and likely some things we don't hear about. Are nickel iron why the Navy use/used on submarines, as I have heard of people getting surplus batteries that are old, but still work great for off the grid applications.

Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk


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## amwbox (Aug 22, 2015)

I'm not aware of the Navy using them on subs, at least not recently. They might have experimented with Edison batteries waaay back? You get way better energy density per mass with FLA or lithium, iirc. Plus they charge faster. The reason I even mention nickel-iron is because a sailboat of any size won't be much bothered by the weight of a large bank if the diesel and fuel tanks have been removed anyways, and because they are extremely durable, able to withstand the sort of abuse that very well might slay an FLA battery, the sort of abuse a sailor who _needs_ to motor might inflict on a battery bank by sucking it dry turning the prop. They can seriously last decades, and can even be reconditioned.

Just sounds to me like FLA batteries are being eaten like skittles by electric drives on boats. If Nickel-Iron can deliver the needed juice to feed that motor...might be worth thinking on.


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## Jeff_H (Feb 26, 2000)

JMcgill said:


> I don't know how you can say it is impractical to do this when, the couple doing the "Sailing Uma" series proves that it can. They are doing it right now.
> 
> What am I missing?
> 
> ...


I suggest that electrical propulsion is impractical for distance cruising based on several of my own personal experiences. I realize that the technologies are changing but here is why I said what I did. Not that many years ago I was friends with a man who was an electrical engineer who had worked on hybrid cars for the automotive industry.

He was very bullish on the idea of modifying his Pearson 323 to electric propulsion. His plan was to do the Bahamas in winter and Maine in summer. He figured that he would do the ICW going south and offshore on the trip North. Heading south he figured that he could plug in at night on a regular basis.

He concluded that he needed enough storage to run the boat for at least two days in cloud cover without damaging the battery banks by running them into too deep a cycle. At the time he was looking at AGMs because they were physically compact, or lead acid deep cycle batteries because they were cheap and robust.

His plan was to keep the boat very simple and low energy draw. He focused on trying to pick all of the electric components to be low draw. This included installing the usual low draw stuff like LEDs, and picking his instrumentation by the lowest draw. He planned to live without refrigeration, and planned to use a windvane steering offshore. He added foot pumps for the water systems and so on.

He planned to live without energy users that have become the norm like single side ban, computers and plotters.

For energy production he planned to use PV for a little more than half of the recharge and a wind generator for the rest. He also planned to use regen from the prop, but concluded that would not produce enough reliable electricity to count in the equation.

He also concluded that to work within those parameters he would need roughly 50 square feet of PV panels, and that there wasn't 50 enough area to mount sufficient collectors with comparatively clear sky view to make it work.

In my own experience, I have gotten slammed offshore with 3-4 days of heavy air, big seas, and completely overcast skies. That over cast lasted for well over a week after we got back in. After three days in those conditions, we then needed to run the engine for 4&5 hours to get in safely. I would think that conditions like that would severely tax the limits of a small electric propulsion boat.

Jeff


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## SanderO (Jul 12, 2007)

Of course the stored energy in fuel is always available. Perhaps using fuel to drive a gen set to charge batts to make up for what solar can't do. It's a whacky solution... but if conditions are optimal you would need to use the gen set.... Maybe.


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