The Case for Going Slow

ksanders said:

Steve

In my 4788 I get very close to 2 NMPG at 7.5 knots. with each engine burning around 1.75 GPH at 1250 RPM.

If I increase the speed to 15 knots my consumption goes to around .6 to .65 NMPG as my fuel burn in the twin 330's goes to around 12 GPH each.

I have two ways of determining fuel burn. The first and most accurate is as you posted filling up the tank after a run at X RPM. The second is that i have flowscans installed. These are not perfect but give a very good measurement as well. I find the flow scans are more accurate at high RPM and engine loading than low speed BTW.

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Kevin,
Your boat is the closest for my comparison. Your engines are 330, mine 250
I just filled my tanks to the brim, filled the same over one year ago.
Both engines 154.3 hours running, the GEN, the diesel heater on many occasion and the fuel replaced is 1574 litres or 416.4 US gal. My math 1574/154.3=10.20 litres per hour or 2.69 US gal per hour at an average speed of 7 knots.
That is 1.35 gph per engine which includes GEN and Heater.

Wait, the bolded you said 2nmpg @ 7.5 knots, that should be 7.5/2=3.75 GPH gallons but then you say 1.75 GPH. more confused. The 1.75 seemed like a good comparison.

Good discussion! We also have a boat where the decision was made for us in the design phase. 2x120hp Lehmans don't get our CHB41 up on a plane, so it's either 2nmpg at 8.5kts or some number much less than that and a tremendous racket at 10kts.

One thing missing (maybe) in the discussion: I like the simplicity of my small NA I-6 engines. No turbos, after coolers, pretty cheap to keep going. We're looking at upgrading to something in the 55' range, and some of the engines on the bigger boats are a bit terrifying to contemplate. Some of the big MAN 800hp engines require rebuilds every 7-8 calendar years at a reported cost of $25k/side. @ranger58sb and others, I'm curious if this factors in? An example would be the Hatteras LRC 58 versus their 58' MY or YF. One has the tiny 120-150hp NA inline 4/6-71's, the other might have 8v71s, 12v71s, or the bigger 92-series. There's certainly an advantage to the smaller engines in cost, reliability & engine room access. That's in addition to the marginal gains in efficiency at 7-9kts for the smaller engines.

40 years ago, when I started annually traveling to & from South Florida , it was most always in a fast sport-fisherman with a good friend and sometimes an occasional 14-18 kt motor yacht. We made good time every day but while the trips were most enjoyable, they were also slightly stressful on the tighter ICW when we couldn't be offshore. I remember flying by all of the pretty anchorages and scenic towns and wishing I could slow down and take the time to enjoy the views. I made a promise to myself that in the future I would try a slower boat and the trawler lifestyle.
My record was 3 1/2 days from Delray to the Chesapeake but again, while on the ICW ,I never took my eyes off of the chartbook, chartplotter and depth machine long enough to see anything other than the next marker I was coming up on at a high rate of speed. Now that we own and cruise a slooooow boat , I can honestly say I wouldn't trade our 6.5 knot cruise and fun anchorage each night for a 35 knot boat and dockage in a marina.
The fact that our Lehman burns 20 gallons of fuel a day and the 16-92's in my pal's 63 burnt 900 gallons a day also makes a tiny bit of difference in my preference for going slow.

RickyD said:

Well my question was: do I take the measurement at right angles to the bow and stern or actually following the curve of the boat?

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Waterline length is the longest length touching the surface of the water.

Ted

socalrider said:

Some of the big MAN 800hp engines require rebuilds every 7-8 calendar years at a reported cost of $25k/side. @ranger58sb and others, I'm curious if this factors in? An example would be the Hatteras LRC 58 versus their 58' MY or YF. One has the tiny 120-150hp NA inline 4/6-71's, the other might have 8v71s, 12v71s, or the bigger 92-series. There's certainly an advantage to the smaller engines in cost, reliability & engine room access. That's in addition to the marginal gains in efficiency at 7-9kts for the smaller engines.

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I don't remember saying that $$$ for our normal MAN service? We had a big rehab bill up front because our most previous PO provided no evidence of maintenance... and because during survey we also found two exhaust risers needed replacement and both of our electronics monitor screens needed service. IOW, we were bringing the engines back into the service schedule AND repairing stuff that usually doesn't need repair.

Not to suggest it'd be inexpensive, but I'm thinking the normal service would be more like $10-15K per engine if you have a MAN service tech do the work. Much of it is user-doable, though, and having a tech do it mostly means the labor hours are what add up.

My take on the Hatts is that the LRCs were meant to go slow and inexpensive (4/6-71NAs), the MYs were meant to cruise at faster speeds (71s), and the YFs were meant to get to fishing grounds and back (8v71s or 92s). Given my preference for a cockpit, I've for years thought the YFs, especially the 58YF, would be the bee's knees, perhaps ideally with the 8v71s. Cruise it like a trawler but with a brief burst of RPM at the end of each run.

-Chris

ranger58sb said:

I don't remember saying that $$$ for our normal MAN service? We had a big rehab bill up front because our most previous PO provided no evidence of maintenance... and because during survey we also found two exhaust risers needed replacement and both of our electronics monitor screens needed service. IOW, we were bringing the engines back into the service schedule AND repairing stuff that usually doesn't need repair.

Not to suggest it'd be inexpensive, but I'm thinking the normal service would be more like $10-15K per engine if you have a MAN service tech do the work. Much of it is user-doable, though, and having a tech do it mostly means the labor hours are what add up.

My take on the Hatts is that the LRCs were meant to go slow and inexpensive (4/6-71NAs), the MYs were meant to cruise at faster speeds (71s), and the YFs were meant to get to fishing grounds and back (8v71s or 92s). Given my preference for a cockpit, I've for years thought the YFs, especially the 58YF, would be the bee's knees, perhaps ideally with the 8v71s. Cruise it like a trawler but with a brief burst of RPM at the end of each run.

-Chris

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I hadn't heard that figure from you, it was from another forum I believe. Thanks for the corrective - I'd conclude that there is a parts & maintenance (and space) premium for the larger engines in addition to the marginal efficiency loss at 8-9kts. Overall I can certainly appreciate the case for a boat with the capability to do 17+kts, but I'd also say that if you're never or very rarely going to use that capability, there's a strong case for the smaller engines and a FD hull. Horses for courses!

I'm still irritated by a lot of the SD hulls out there that have engines 3x bigger than what's required for displacement cruising, but still not big enough to get on a plane. So 1.5nmpg at 9kts, or 0.3nmpg at 13-14kts. Lots of the older Hatteras seem to fit this category. Seems like the worst of all possible worlds.

socalrider said:

I'd also say that if you're never or very rarely going to use that capability, there's a strong case for the smaller engines and a FD hull.

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And the justification that I keep hearing for the infrequent need for a couple of monstrous engines (allowing 18 knots at 32 gph) is "in case of an emergency." Somebody really thinks that 18 knots is faster than VHF radio waves? Faster than a CG helicopter? If somebody is going to burn 32 gph in an emergency, I'd much rather that it be the helicopter because the helicopter can land right at the hospital. A boat would have to go much faster than 18 knots to launch itself up onto a remote hospital's helipad.

I finally located the little smiley things.

socalrider said:

I'm still irritated by a lot of the SD hulls out there that have engines 3x bigger than what's required for displacement cruising, but still not big enough to get on a plane. So 1.5nmpg at 9kts, or 0.3nmpg at 13-14kts. Lots of the older Hatteras seem to fit this category. Seems like the worst of all possible worlds.

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That was the case with Slow Hand my Cherubini Independence 45. Replacing the single engine from 450 HP to 132 HP about cut the fuel consumption in half. Doing much of the work myself and selling the original motor at a good price kept the cost to about $10K. Probably saved 9,000 gallons ($35K to $45K) of fuel.

Ted

Over-powering boats is nothing new and driven by market demand. Vega produced the Willard 36 from 1961 to 1970. Bill Garden spec'd a 75hp engine which in my opinion is perfect. But customers wanted bigger so a remarkable number were built with much larger engines, even variants of 6.71 DDs of over 200hp. Eventually, the Perkins 6.354 (135 HP) was offered which was a popular upgrade.

Many buyers just want bigger. Heck, even on this list of knowledgeable owners, many people extoll "you can always go slower." True, but few stay within the sweet spot of efficiency - 1.1-1.15 SL.

Peter

socalrider said:

I'd conclude that there is a parts & maintenance (and space) premium for the larger engines in addition to the marginal efficiency loss at 8-9kts. Overall I can certainly appreciate the case for a boat with the capability to do 17+kts, but I'd also say that if you're never or very rarely going to use that capability, there's a strong case for the smaller engines and a FD hull. Horses for courses!

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Yep. All that.

We can go slow and be more economical than when we run fast. That's not as economical as going slow in a boat made to go slow.

I was aiming for a 20 kt boat, got a 30 kt boat. We still run it more often like a trawler than we do on plane (at around 20 kts). Easier, on calm water. Faster with this hull usually works better in chop and confused seas, though, so there's that.

-Chris

RickyD said:

Well my question was: do I take the measurement at right angles to the bow and stern or actually following the curve of the boat?

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Perpendicular. It’s about the length of the wave the hull makes, not how far the water has to travel to get around the hull. Typically measured (straight line) on a drawing.

socalrider said:

I'm still irritated by a lot of the SD hulls out there that have engines 3x bigger than what's required for displacement cruising, but still not big enough to get on a plane. So 1.5nmpg at 9kts, or 0.3nmpg at 13-14kts. Lots of the older Hatteras seem to fit this category. Seems like the worst of all possible worlds.

Click to expand...

mvweebles said:

Over-powering boats is nothing new and driven by market demand. Vega produced the Willard 36 from 1961 to 1970. Bill Garden spec'd a 75hp engine which in my opinion is perfect. But customers wanted bigger so a remarkable number were built with much larger engines, even variants of 6.71 DDs of over 200hp. Eventually, the Perkins 6.354 (135 HP) was offered which was a popular upgrade.

Many buyers just want bigger. Heck, even on this list of knowledgeable owners, many people extoll "you can always go slower." True, but few stay within the sweet spot of efficiency - 1.1-1.15 SL.

Peter

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I agree that plenty of people think more power = better. And that leads to some FD boats being overpowered. But in reality, many SD boats are just underpowered planing hulls in my mind. It's one thing to intentionally power it for displacement speeds only, but once you go beyond that, it only makes sense to power it to plane. Powering it to run at plowing speed is a waste (assuming it's a hull that plows and transitions onto plane rather than smoothly running above hull speed). If you're going to give it enough power to get much over hull speed, give it enough to plane.

I also think that there are far more hulls called "SD" than actual SD hulls out there. A typical lobsterboat would be SD in my mind, but many boats that I see called "SD", including my own, are really just slow planing hulls. They may not handle well much north of 20 kts, may not have some of the hull features of faster planing hulls (like lifting strakes), etc. but they very distinctly go through the plowing speed range and then break onto a clean plane, so I consider them a planing hull. Some are just too underpowered to actually get onto plane (or can only just barely do it at WOT).

For our boat with a 33.5' waterline, we typically cruise at 6.5 - 6.7 kts, which is right around 1.15 S/L. The steepening of the power/speed curve beyond that is very noticeable, and I'm sure it'll be more noticeable once I figure out why my new fuel flow meters aren't reading accurately at lower flows. I did make an interesting discovery yesterday that when running on plane (where the flow meters seem to work perfectly), running at 3300 RPM for a bit over 18 kts is slightly more efficient than our more typical planing cruise of 3200 RPM and just about 17 kts. And even powered to run those speeds, I'd say we're borderline underpowered. Not in terms of total power (WOT is good for ~25 kts), but continuous power available, as 3300 is pretty much max continuous based on the RPM we see at WOT, so there's not much between "best fast cruise" and "max continuous".

socalrider said:

Good discussion! We also have a boat where the decision was made for us in the design phase. 2x120hp Lehmans don't get our CHB41 up on a plane, so it's either 2nmpg at 8.5kts or some number much less than that and a tremendous racket at 10kts.

One thing missing (maybe) in the discussion: I like the simplicity of my small NA I-6 engines. No turbos, after coolers, pretty cheap to keep going. We're looking at upgrading to something in the 55' range, and some of the engines on the bigger boats are a bit terrifying to contemplate. Some of the big MAN 800hp engines require rebuilds every 7-8 calendar years at a reported cost of $25k/side. @ranger58sb and others, I'm curious if this factors in? An example would be the Hatteras LRC 58 versus their 58' MY or YF. One has the tiny 120-150hp NA inline 4/6-71's, the other might have 8v71s, 12v71s, or the bigger 92-series. There's certainly an advantage to the smaller engines in cost, reliability & engine room access. That's in addition to the marginal gains in efficiency at 7-9kts for the smaller engines.

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Hey Socalrider I love my Californian 55. Its 33 years old and only the stb engine has been rebuilt due to a serious overheat from a prior owner. No they don't make them anymore but some survive.

SteveK said:

Wait, the bolded you said 2nmpg @ 7.5 knots, that should be 7.5/2=3.75 GPH gallons but then you say 1.75 GPH. more confused. The 1.75 seemed like a good comparison.

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Good morning Steve

I get between 1.75 and 2.0 NMPG total fuel burn at hull speed.

Sorry for any confusion.

RickyD said:

Hey Socalrider I love my Californian 55. Its 33 years old and only the stb engine has been rebuilt due to a serious overheat from a prior owner. No they don't make them anymore but some survive.

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Cool boat! I've seen several around here & the islands but never been aboard one. How do you run it, and what kind of fuel burn do you get?

rslifkin said:

I agree that plenty of people think more power = better. And that leads to some FD boats being overpowered. But in reality, many SD boats are just underpowered planing hulls in my mind. It's one thing to intentionally power it for displacement speeds only, but once you go beyond that, it only makes sense to power it to plane. Powering it to run at plowing speed is a waste (assuming it's a hull that plows and transitions onto plane rather than smoothly running above hull speed). If you're going to give it enough power to get much over hull speed, give it enough to plane.

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You are entirely correct.

a SD boat is a planing hull with too small engines to really efficiently plane.
They do generally include a keel , something you do not need on a planing hull boat.
This makes directional control better at hull speeds than a boat optimized for only high speed travel.

My boat is a perfect example. With twin 330's i can cruise at only 15 knots, hardly fast.

But the ability to double my hull speed has proven invaluable, and the ability to travel reasonably efficient at hull speed is important.

right now I am making way at 1250 RPM, and 7.3 knots. I'm in no hurry.

rslifkin said:

Powering it to run at plowing speed is a waste (assuming it's a hull that plows and transitions onto plane rather than smoothly running above hull speed). If you're going to give it enough power to get much over hull speed, give it enough to plane.

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So that's it. They think that they are planing.

When we came through Active Pass last summer, we timed it so that the current had changed to be flowing with us. On AIS, we could see that a lot of other boats had been waiting at the entrance. We finally entered with a 7-8 knot favorable current and were surprised to see on AIS a vessel entering from the other direction at 5 knots. Pretty soon around the bend comes a big boat "on plane" and throwing out a 5 foot wake that really knocked everybody around. Apparently, if a big boat hogs down but then has enough power to lower the bow a little bit, that is what they consider "on plane." Nope. Maybe it was an emergency for them. It could be that they were late for a beginning navigation seminar.

The boat has such a long name that it couldn't appear in full on our AIS. All we could see was Yacht Knot S. My wife thought the full name was probably Yacht Knot Sea. We use that as a generic name for all similar vessels "on plane."

I've never understood why so many people run vessels up on plane poorly. Either too slow and plowing, or with the bow trimmed way too high. It's not fast or efficient, so there's very few operational reasons to run like that (and certainly not in calm water). Much better to just speed up more. And when we're passing near someone on plane I'll typically sacrifice a little speed and trim the bow flatter than best speed trim (conditions permitting) to flatten our wake as much as possible (which is already not nearly as bad as the monstrous walls of water some hulls produce).

ksanders said:

Good morning Steve

I get between 1.75 and 2.0 NMPG total fuel burn at hull speed.

Sorry for any confusion.

Click to expand...

SteveK said:

Kevin,
Your boat is the closest for my comparison. Your engines are 330, mine 250
I just filled my tanks to the brim, filled the same over one year ago.
Both engines 154.3 hours running, the GEN, the diesel heater on many occasion and the fuel replaced is 1574 litres or 416.4 US gal. My math 1574/154.3=10.20 litres per hour or 2.69 US gal per hour at an average speed of 7 knots.
That is 1.35 gph per engine which includes GEN and Heater.

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I don't understand why everyone is using much more fuel than I am at the same speeds. Is my math wrong?
On a recent cruise I started at 2200 rpm and noted SOG 10Kn, dropped 100 rpm, noted SOG until 1900 RPM and the SOG was 1/2 knot less at 9.5Kn but that was when the engines seemed to sound like they were at a non screaming sound. Currents ignored. Usually try for a cruise speed of 8 which I can get at ~1650RPM. Now have 9-9.5 option

Hello everyone,
i´m new on the forum and still without own boat. But the planning is going on and the naval architect is busy to realize my wishlist. And that´s the point with slow or fast cruising. My wishlist at beginn was dominated from many things, but speed was not on the list. So it was at trawler style full displacement and seagoing boat. I know that I´m a slow guy with boats, because I´m a professional captain with own river cargo ship in Europe and we sometimes can reach not more than around 4 NM against the flood and I have no problems with that slow speed.
But back to my boat.
To payback a bit of my invested money I have plans to do some charter or make deals with some tourist tour companies or day trips. And for this kind of trips a slow boat is a no go. The guests will not stay 6-10 hours on the boat and visit the next port city only at late evening. So I changed to a SD hull but with parallel hybrid propulsion system and big battery pack. So my 50 kW elektro engine can do the slow speed very efficient and for more power the diesel engine do the job at the single propelled boat. The parallel hybrid at one prop is same safety like two props and two diesel engines, because at broken diesel engine the e motor can bring you back at home (separate generator and sun panels are loading battery)
New hull designs allow efficient SD hulls with good sea stability and high space capacity inside the boat. Last week we was in Amsterdam at the Elektro & hybrid exhibition to get newest info about the possibilities and the costs of all.The boat will be more expensive but a payback is sure if you drive many miles in few years. And the boat will be very quiet hopefully at slow speed. But it will need more 2 years to have the boat in water....

Laboremus said:

To payback a bit of my invested money I have plans to do some charter or make deals with some tourist tour companies or day trips. And for this kind of trips a slow boat is a no go. The guests will not stay 6-10 hours on the boat and visit the next port city only at late evening. So I changed to a SD hull but with parallel hybrid propulsion system and big battery pack. So my 50 kW elektro engine can do the slow speed very efficient and for more power the diesel engine do the job at the single propelled boat. The parallel hybrid at one prop is same safety like two props and two diesel engines, because at broken diesel engine the e motor can bring you back at home (separate generator and sun panels are loading battery)
New hull designs allow efficient SD hulls with good sea stability and high space capacity inside the boat. Last week we was in Amsterdam at the Elektro & hybrid exhibition to get newest info about the possibilities and the costs of all.The boat will be more expensive but a payback is sure if you drive many miles in few years. And the boat will be very quiet hopefully at slow speed. But it will need more 2 years to have the boat in water....

Click to expand...

The type of chartering you want to do will have a large impact on the design of the boat, so keep that in mind. If you want to do day charters in the Netherlands you will need a completely different boat than let's say week charters in the Med.
For charters speed is indeed better, but a SD hull does come with added instability and if there is one thing you don't want with chartering it is someone getting sick. That ruins the whole charter and ultimately bad reviews. If however your boat is completely stable under all circumstances you will get positive reviews and more bookings. So that means stabilization under all conditions (navigation, anchor and dock) and no, it does not mean a gyro.
Running the boat electric is a good idea, am looking into the same option. As soon as we arrive in the cruising area we normally do about 2 - 3 hour trips and an electric motor would be ideal for that. However, re-charging the batteries with solar will be difficult. At the moment we have a large solar array (3.2 Kwp) and the daily production now lies around 15 Kw, which means it would be insufficient for running an electric engine. If you do day charters and come back into port every night you can recharge the batteries using shore power, but if you would do week charters in the Med you would run into trouble if you would try to rely on solar panels to operate an electric engine. Recharging on shore power in the Med is not an option, many places now charge between 2 and 3 euro for a Kw, so that is going to be a costly affair if you have to charge 50 or 100 Kw.

As for speed, we now have 2 x FL 120s, normally cruise at 6.5 to 7 kts, but especially when the weather turns sour we wish we could do 20 kts, so we could outrun it. However, also that depends on where you are using the boat. On the rivers and canals in the Netherlands you can always find shelter close by, however in the Med it is a different story, unless you charter in the areas where it will take you 2 to 3 hours to get to a new anchorage.
And then of course there is the need (or no need) of air conditioning. In the Med, for a charter boat, you will need air conditioning, which means energy consumption. In the Netherlands you won't need it that often, but I would make sure it is installed already.

Running the boat electric is a good idea, am looking into the same option. As soon as we arrive in the cruising area we normally do about 2 - 3 hour trips and an electric motor would be ideal for that. However, re-charging the batteries with solar will be difficult. At the moment we have a large solar array (3.2 Kwp) and the daily production now lies around 15 Kw, which means it would be insufficient for running an electric engine. If you do day charters and come back into port every night you can recharge the batteries using shore power, but if you would do week charters in the Med you would run into trouble if you would try to rely on solar panels to operate an electric engine. Recharging on shore power in the Med is not an option, many places charge between 2 and 3 euro per Kw, you don't want to be recharging 50 to 100 Kw at those rates.
And then of course there is the need (or no need) of air conditioning. In the Med, for a charter boat, you will need air conditioning, which means energy consumption. In the Netherlands you won't need it that often, but I would make sure it is installed already.

One thing that I have learned is that ship yards don't always think in your interest. They will tell you what they want to sell you, not what you need for a specific situation. If you are planning to build a boat for chartering my advice is to contact someone who has experience in that field, that person can tell you exactly what you need to think of, so that you get a boat that will make your life easy, not complicated. Good luck

Hi Mambo42,
yes a charter boat must have different design than totally private use. And to be honest I´m still not sure if I will really do this, but it will makes the things more easy in case of the financial side. But in the moment I plan to do so. And the consequence was a hull design and an engine layout for higher speed. I prefer the slow cruising speed for my self. And yes, the stability can go down with a SD hull, but with a good design it can be possible to be stable at many weather and sea conditions.
I was nearly one year thinking about the use of my boat because I know many owners buy some boat and later they are disappointed because it was the wrong boat for they really use. many high speed boat owners never drive high speed because the high costs or some trawler owners are not happy because always slow.....
And yes shipyards will do business and earn much money as possible, but this shipyard owner is a friend of mine and my project is a "no win" work for him. The shipyard works on my boat if they have not enough work for the workers, so it needs more time but will be cheap. And the whole equipment (electronics, engine room, interior ....) is B2B price for me with no win for the yard.
Now back to the threat
Fuel cost is only a small part of the total cost of ownership in my mind. Yes, better safe your money on every point you can do, but I think to be happy with your boat is more important than to save maybe few dollars. Don't misunderstood me, I´m not rich and I need to look every € , but sometimes you maybe need the higher speed to reach your port in only 1 day. Or you must hurry because the weather. Or you have an emergency on board and need to reach the port as fast as possible. So speed CAN be important but normally it is only a money burner. I decided (for my "maybe" charter business) and for the safety and family happiness (my wife is not happy on sea more at land) to be faster than hull speed if needed.

Laboremus said:

Hello everyone,
i´m new on the forum and still without own boat. But the planning is going on and the naval architect is busy to realize my wishlist. And that´s the point with slow or fast cruising. My wishlist at beginn was dominated from many things, but speed was not on the list. So it was at trawler style full displacement and seagoing boat. I know that I´m a slow guy with boats, because I´m a professional captain with own river cargo ship in Europe and we sometimes can reach not more than around 4 NM against the flood and I have no problems with that slow speed.
But back to my boat.
To payback a bit of my invested money I have plans to do some charter or make deals with some tourist tour companies or day trips. And for this kind of trips a slow boat is a no go. The guests will not stay 6-10 hours on the boat and visit the next port city only at late evening. So I changed to a SD hull but with parallel hybrid propulsion system and big battery pack. So my 50 kW elektro engine can do the slow speed very efficient and for more power the diesel engine do the job at the single propelled boat. The parallel hybrid at one prop is same safety like two props and two diesel engines, because at broken diesel engine the e motor can bring you back at home (separate generator and sun panels are loading battery)
New hull designs allow efficient SD hulls with good sea stability and high space capacity inside the boat. Last week we was in Amsterdam at the Elektro & hybrid exhibition to get newest info about the possibilities and the costs of all.The boat will be more expensive but a payback is sure if you drive many miles in few years. And the boat will be very quiet hopefully at slow speed. But it will need more 2 years to have the boat in water....

Click to expand...

If I understood clearly this sentence with my poor English :
"The parallel hybrid at one prop is same safety like two props and two diesel engines.."
Sorry but in my point of view it is not "same safety" because in this case you still have only : one shaft and one propeller...
In case of damage on your propeller and/or shaft ...you became a pontoon.
And it could happen, I remember long time ago we must stop near Dakar to load material, diver and motor boat and bring them to an another Esso tanker-ship who ...lost one blade of his 4 bladed propeller ( the diver cut one symmetrical blade to allow it to continue slowly ).
No not the "same safety"

long-cours.62 said:

If I understood clearly this sentence with my poor English :
"The parallel hybrid at one prop is same safety like two props and two diesel engines.."
Sorry but in my point of view it is not "same safety" because in this case you still have only : one shaft and one propeller...
In case of damage on your propeller and/or shaft ...you became a pontoon.
And it could happen, I remember long time ago we must stop near Dakar to load material, diver and motor boat and bring them to an another Esso tanker-ship who ...lost one blade of his 4 bladed propeller ( the diver cut one symmetrical blade to allow it to continue slowly ).
No not the "same safety"

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Yes you are right, in case of problem with the shaft or prop it´s over! But I´m born on ship, was at a child on ship, working since nearly 38 years on ship as sailor and captain. And in all the time I was never in trouble because a lost propeller or such a big issue with the shaft that we can't get home. And in all this years in my life I owned one time a double engine / shaft ship for 8 years. It was the most expensive ship i ever owned or worked on. How many of the forum users lost one of there driveline completely in how many years of use? I drive every year around 3000 - 3500 hours since more than 37 years and never had this. last year my 5 blade propeller was damaged without ground contact very hard and I lost 1 blade to 70% and 1 blade was damaged to, but I still was able to end my tour after 10 hours with full loaded ship and drive with empty ship 60 hours to next shipyard.
OK, maybe a commercial ship is build different than a pleasure boat and the quality of the used parts is lower, but I build my boat at a professional commercial shipbuilding shipyard and I think they use good stuff

socalrider said:

Cool boat! I've seen several around here & the islands but never been aboard one. How do you run it, and what kind of fuel burn do you get?

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I have used 10kts as my normal cruise speed and I get about 1gal per nmile with my twin Cat 3208TAs. I also get an average of 7.75 gallons per hour probably because of idle time through the marina, slow out of the harbor and then anchoring etc. Where are you in So Cal?

Laboremus said:

Yes you are right, in case of problem with the shaft or prop it´s over! But I´m born on ship, was at a child on ship, working since nearly 38 years on ship as sailor and captain. And in all the time I was never in trouble because a lost propeller or such a big issue with the shaft that we can't get home. And in all this years in my life I owned one time a double engine / shaft ship for 8 years. It was the most expensive ship i ever owned or worked on. How many of the forum users lost one of there driveline completely in how many years of use? I drive every year around 3000 - 3500 hours since more than 37 years and never had this. last year my 5 blade propeller was damaged without ground contact very hard and I lost 1 blade to 70% and 1 blade was damaged to, but I still was able to end my tour after 10 hours with full loaded ship and drive with empty ship 60 hours to next shipyard.
OK, maybe a commercial ship is build different than a pleasure boat and the quality of the used parts is lower, but I build my boat at a professional commercial shipbuilding shipyard and I think they use good stuff

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It is always funny for me when people had only for argument " I was x year..."
Because I given to you one example of the lost of one blade of propeller ...and it was on 250000t tanker ship in the middle of the gulf of Guinea and at this moment I was a sailor only since 3 year it was in 1975...
If you have an idea of the size and weight of a tanker ship propeller you could understand it can't continue only with 3 blade
If it can, we don't lost one week with our tanker (the second one the tanker Esso Paris also 250000T) to move to Dakar load motor boat , diver and equipment and going back to the tanker to unload all this material.
Very rare the trouble ...Are you sure ?
In another travel from Europe to Emirat we ...broken our " reducteur" .(gear box)
Don't know if in your working time you saw the size of this equipment on a S/S tanker ,
on a "steam ship" between the turbine and the shat at 80rpm . it is a huge piece and damaged at sea... it can happen.
I also see some river "barge" who lost their ...propeller in a look
Ok the tanker ship run in the seventies 1440 h and stop 96 h and again 1440 h stop 96h
it means more than 7000h per year at less.

socalrider said:

Good discussion! We also have a boat where the decision was made for us in the design phase. 2x120hp Lehmans don't get our CHB41 up on a plane, so it's either 2nmpg at 8.5kts or some number much less than that and a tremendous racket at 10kts.

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I'd suggest a third option: 4nmpg at 6.5 knots.

A lot of people think that displacement speeds at 1.3 SL is the sweet spot. That's only in comparison to faster speeds.

I've built a chart for my boat (135 hp, 49' WLL) that illustrates the further efficiencies below hull speed. In my case MPG is doubled by reducing speed from 1.32 SL to 1.0 SL. I think that's pretty typical for a SD boat.

SL | l/hr
0.8 | 1.9
0.9 | 2.5
1.0 | 4.2
1.1 | 5.6
1.2 | 7.1
1.3 | 10.5
1.4 | 18.0
1.5 | 26.0

I'm usually happy cruising at < 7 knots (1.0 SL) getting 5+ nmpg.

O C Diver said:

Waterline length is the longest length touching the surface of the water.

Ted

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Well again the curved angle of the water line is touching the surface of the water. Do I count the curvature distance or not?

Jeff F said:

I'd suggest a third option: 4nmpg at 6.5 knots.

A lot of people think that displacement speeds at 1.3 SL is the sweet spot. That's only in comparison to faster speeds.

I've built a chart for my boat (135 hp, 49' WLL) that illustrates the further efficiencies below hull speed. In my case MPG is doubled by reducing speed from 1.32 SL to 1.0 SL. I think that's pretty typical for a SD boat.

SL | l/hr
0.8 | 1.9
0.9 | 2.5
1.0 | 4.2
1.1 | 5.6
1.2 | 7.1
1.3 | 10.5
1.4 | 18.0
1.5 | 26.0

I'm usually happy cruising at < 7 knots (1.0 SL) getting 5+ nmpg.

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How did you derive this data? When PAE/Nordhavn did their round-the-world marketing stunt with the Nordhavn 40, Jim Leishman developed a tightly calibrated burn-tank to closely monitor fuel burn. The accuracy seems indisputable which is why PAE did it - would suck to run out of diesel 100 miles short of Hawaii. I was on 2-year old N63 a few months ago and it still has the burn-tank so I guess they still view this data as core vs ECM provided data. Although I don't have a ton of experience with burn rates off modern ECM-controlled engines, the ones I've seen seem to be at least 5% optimistic compared to the full-tank refill number expected.

Peter

This is reported by the ECM, and I did two way tests in calm water.

I don't have a ton of confidence in the absolute value of each reading, but the numbers also align pretty well with the prop demand curve supplied by the manufacturer.

Obviously the values are going to vary by boat, displacement and engine, but I think the curve is probably typical.