Quote:
Originally Posted by cberkholtz
As for the electric engine thing, the only reason I mention it is because, if the engine were aging, I might be ok with it because I would consider replacing it with an electric. A good friend of mine worked on the University of Calgary solar car, so I have some idea what it is capable of. Many of the cruisers I have read in magazines say they use very little fuel, there was even one guy who had been cruising on a 30' boat for years without a motor. He just sculled in and out of ports. You would need some serious gahonas to try that in some of the anchorages around vancouver island though. There are lots of ways to die on a leeward shore, if I have to put my life in the hands solely in a temperamental old diesel then I shouldn't be sailing. If you have weather reports, gps, a storm jib, vhf and a sea anchor/drogue you should be fine without a diesel. That said, anyone can make mistakes, and a diesel could save my ass. I would definitively want a diesel until I was comfortable sailing.
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You have to take my input on this with a grain of salt as I come from the trailer sailor world. We like to dream of small boats doing big voyages, and many have, but mostly it's day sailing and maybe an overnight now and then or multi-day on very rare occassions. I have only had my current boat for about a year. Before that, all my sailboats were dinghy types and none had a motor. My current boat has not had a reliable motor most of the time. So I am used to depending on wind only to move a sailboat. But I am also used to boats where grounding is a nuisance, not a catastrophe. I have had several fishing boats with gas and electric outboards in fresh water and found electric motors to be much more reliable than gas with respect to moving the boat within their capacity if you had fuel/power. But an electric is not good for moving far or fast. However, I would maintain that for a large percentage of sailboats, you rarely need to. There are some significant tradeoffs. If the wind dies and you are day sailing, you will be late for dinner. If you push the limits with an electric, you can kill your batteries and there will be no savings.