What do you think the cost of sailing 15000 miles is in a catamaran vs an up to 60feet trawler

[Foilmagnet]

The setup in the Trawler will be single engine with a get home.
Speed max 9knots but trawling at 6 knots
Engine will hopefully be a gardner or lugger v6. Get home.... What ever there is in it
Full displacement hull.
size from 46 feet to max 60 in the trawler I know it is wish full thinking to find a v6 gardner in a 60feet trawler. Well in almost any boat from after 1998.
Age no more than 25 years of the trawler
The cat will be a sail cat. min 40 feet and max 47 feet.
Age no more than 20 years of the sailcat.

Both used in hmmm ready to sail shape. What ever that means.

 

[Foilmagnet]

I am not so much thinking in fuel cost but service and repair cost. I have a feeling from all i read and seen that a sailboat is way more expensive in the long run. But i am often wrong so why not now

 

[Mac2]

Never been a sailor, but I would think the costs would be similar depending on where you plan to cruise. In the PNW the sailboats I see are mostly motoring, so costs would be the same. If somewhere that you can mostly sail, then you will be using those sheet thingamabobs, so those would be the wear items vs mechanical's. I don't know those costs. Your true cost will depend on your capabilities.

 

[PierreR]

Hard to say because rarely will you find a trawler that is not equipped with a lot more creature comforts that are expensive to fix. Similarly equipped and no fuel considerations, the trawler wins hands down because it only has one rugged propulsion system and the sailboat has one rugged and one more vulnerable to the elements.

 

[O C Diver]

Think you need to narrow your trawler boat selection. My 45' trawler would cruise at 6 knots at 5 MPG. 7 knots was 3.5 MPG. 8 knots was under 2MPG. And it wouldn't reach 9 knots with the 135 HP John Deere. The displacement on a 60' trawler would be more than double and require a bigger motor than you're anticipating to reach 9 knots.

Assuming a 2 MPG cruise for 15,000 miles equals 7,500 gallons. Assuming $5 per gallon, that equals $37,500. I would expect to do better, but that's a SWAG. Now all you need is the half million plus plus plus to buy the boat.

Ted

 

[tiltrider1]

With a trawler you have three real expenses. Fuel, engine depletion and boat depreciation. Most likely you won’t need to rebuild the engines meaning you will most likely only need to deal with boat depreciation.

With the cat you will have two real expenses. Sails depletion and boat depreciation.

The depreciation cost is going to favor the lower capitalized boat. Meaning which ever boat costs you less to purchase and outfit will have the lowest depreciation cost.

This leaves us comparing fuel to sails. An impossible task without knowing your intended duration and distance. Shorter duration longer distance favors the sails. The opposite favors fuel.

 

[mvweebles]

Here are some real world numbers from folks who have significant passages on sail and power. Bottom line is the long term costs are roughly the same. Sure, there are scenarios where Sail can be a lot cheaper, but for the most part, you chose sail because you love to sail, not because it's cheaper.

https://www.bumfuzzle.com/trawler-vs-sail/

I cannot find the link, but Steve Dashew have a gazillion open ocean miles on both sail and power. They summarize the costs are a wash when you factor in sails, rigging, etc.

I hope I get this right, but TF'er LarryM circumnavigated under sail, and they did a very long run through the Panama Canal on a KK42. His costs were roughly the same.

Good luck with whatever you decide -

Peter

 

[long-cours.62]

With a trawler you have three real expenses. Fuel, engine depletion and boat depreciation. Most likely you won’t need to rebuild the engines meaning you will most likely only need to deal with boat depreciation.

With the cat you will have two real expenses. Sails depletion and boat depreciation.

The depreciation cost is going to favor the lower capitalized boat. Meaning which ever boat costs you less to purchase and outfit will have the lowest depreciation cost.

This leaves us comparing fuel to sails. An impossible task without knowing your intended duration and distance. Shorter duration longer distance favors the sails. The opposite favors fuel.

For the cat you will also have engine dépréciation, if you double look at the engine hour on the cat for sale you will be surprises.And you have also the rigging (running and standing one)we do the balance when we built our Long-Cours 62 24 year ago...and we décide to stay à 'motor boat' and don't fit the rigging to became à motor sailor.

 

[long-cours.62]

"Passagemaker" cherchez l'erreur ! - Trawler long-cours

Passage maker : cherchez l’erreur ! En 1993, après avoir passé prés de trois ans au Vietnam pour construire notre « motor sailor » « Oaristys », nous savourons notre longue escale à Hong Kong. OARISTYS 18,26m HT 17,40m x 5,25m x 1,50/3,70m 34T Durant...

www.long-cours62.com

With the Long-Cours62" at 6.6kts our consumption was 0.61lt per nm
it means around 6.2 nm per us gallon.
for 15000nm 9150 lt or 2417 gallons ( someone said 5$us per gallon) 12085$us.
If the catamaran will be sold with sails in good shape you don't need to buy new one for 15000nm
For example a main sail for a Lagoon 45 (81m2) could be ( probably Chinese maker )around 9700€ or 10789$us...

 

[ranger58sb]

The "cost" of sailing -- I mean with mast, sails, rigging, sheets, etc. -- should also include the physical effort necessary to make the boat go where you want it. I count our time and effort as important factors, lower being better.

Power = turn the key(s), drive the boat.
Sail = turn the key, get off the dock, wrestle with the sails/sheets, reef from time to time, etc...

Ditto cost of time and effort involved in maintenance and upkeep, of course, but I think folks have said those are often a wash...

-Chris

 

[slowgoesit]

Boat: Beebe Passagemaker, 50' registered length, Overall length 62', 5.5' draft, 16.5' beam, full up weight (full fuel/water, etc) 90,000 lbs
Fuel capacity: 2,100 gallons (we were never full up for the trip, generally filled up to no more than 3/4 full)
Power: Single Gardner 8LXB w/ get home capability. Hundested 36" CPP
Trip: From Sep 2023 to April 2024. Seattle, Washington State to Fort Myers, Florida
Average speed: 7kts
Total days of trip: 233
Number of days actually underway: 89
Nautical miles traveled: 6,422
Fuel burned 2937: gallons, at an average cost of $4.96/ U.S gallon
Average nmpg: 2.19
Repair costs: $1,779.32, of which $669.94 was repair of refrigeration
Maintenance costs: $1,540.67

Maintenance costs were oil changes, bottom cleanings, full wash and wax.
Repair costs included cost of two pumps taken out of stores to replace failed pumps.

Our boat is similar to what you are talking about. We never had a maintenance or repair issue that was an absolute show stopper. Even the refrigeration would have been worked around, since we had a large ice chest two freezers, and an ice maker which could have kept food cold for a long trip.
Zero issues with the propulsion system itself (Gardner and CPP). We did have some issues with the auxiliary engine that ran the generator and/or get home, but that was troubleshot/fixed out of on board resources (we carry a LOT of spares) It turned out to be two items that were simple fixes . . . . but FINDING the problems tool way longer!

Hope this helps!