Powerboat Circumnavigation Possible ?

[donradcliffe]

Motoring around the world is quite an accomplishment, and the Nordhaven is a great boat for doing it. That being said, you could have bought the Hylas and motored around the world, never putting the sails up, and using half the fuel at the same speed.

I'm shopping for powerboats and can't believe how inefficient their hull shapes are compared to sailboats under power.

[dc9loser]

Originally Posted by donradcliffe

Motoring around the world is quite an accomplishment, and the Nordhaven is a great boat for doing it. That being said, you could have bought the Hylas and motored around the world, never putting the sails up, and using half the fuel at the same speed.

I'm shopping for powerboats and can't believe how inefficient their hull shapes are compared to sailboats under power.

Yeah, that is a good point..lol

I guess ya could set up a sailboat with larger fuel tanks and make a pretty good motorboat for hull speed travel. Typical interior layout for a sailboat of the same length is pretty lame compared to its powerboat equivalent.

Endeavor makes a trawlercat 44 and a sailing cat 44 with basically the same layout, but different hull profiles. The sail version has a lower top speed but much better gas mileage at hull speed or less.

Still, for some operations in some conditions, a powerboat is cheaper and better.

[markpierce]

Originally Posted by markpierce

The pecking order around here is catamarans, monohulls, and lastly, motorboats.

Like I said, if you didn't do it in a catamaran, they'll say you did it wrong.

[MarkJ]

Originally Posted by markpierce

Like I said, if you didn't do it in a catamaran, they'll say you did it wrong.

Quoting yourself?


Hmmmmm. Time to ring the Funny Farm

[rgscpat]

Going back to the comments about esoteric/alternative power sources for a bluewater boat and the impossibility of nuclear power getting into civilian hands, I wonder how much a former Soviet icebreaker would sell for?!

There were a few non-military nuclear-powered ships, though they had strong govt. connections. Wiki lists:
NS Mutsu, Japan, 1970–1992. It never carried any commercial cargo.
NS Otto Hahn, Germany, 1968–1979 (re-powered with diesel engine in 1979)
NS Savannah, United States, 1962–1972 (now in Baltimore being decommissioned and rehabilitated under MARAD, not open to public but tours occasionally are available)
NS Sevmorput, Russia (former Soviet Union), 1988– (still in operation).
along with the Russian icebreakers
NS Lenin (decommissioned, museum ship)
NS Arktika (inactive, awaiting refit or scrapping)
NS Sibir (inactive, awaiting refit or scrapping)
NS Rossiya
NS Sovjetskij Sojuz
NS Yamal
NS 50 Let Pobedy, formerly the Ural
NS Taimyr
NS Vaigach

[Blue Stocking]

Originally Posted by MarkJ

Quoting yourself?


Hmmmmm. Time to ring the Funny Farm

----and I said to myself, "myself, by God, you've got it right this time"

[lorenzo b]

Norhavns are nice boats, but they are too much like a tricked out travel trailers, and cost a bomb. Much more fun to get an old steel fishing boat with huge tanks and a large Detroit Diesel. With the $650,000 you will save you can buy enough fuel to go around the world seven times.

[cat man do]

Originally Posted by lorenzo b

. Much more fun to get an old steel fishing boat with huge tanks and a large Detroit Diesel. With the $650,000 you will save you can buy enough fuel to go around the world seven times.

See link in my sig or click Here

[S/V Antares]

Great idea and good luck. Others have done it why not you.
I wanted to do a similar thing, 300k, 1 year , 1st class cabin on the QE2

"Dreaming just comes natural, like the first breath to a baby"
John Prine

[EricGrab]

Originally Posted by donradcliffe

you could have bought the Hylas and motored around the world, never putting the sails up, and using half the fuel at the same speed.

Spending 1/2 on fuel would be about $25k less, which is only 8% of the budget. Although subtracting out the boat downpayment and monthly payments that would save about 33% of the consumables. However I would not recommend doing this with no stabilizers and no way to do the long crossings without massive fuel bladders. And of course it is less space. So no, not a good value at all. Sailboats are meant to be sailed.

Originally Posted by donradcliffe

I'm shopping for powerboats and can't believe how inefficient their hull shapes are compared to sailboats under power.

Yes, but this is an important moment to be quantitative the difference. By what percentage, and is it meaningful for your budget and plan? A true full displacement boat is going to be in the same ballpark. Currents, waves, winds, and even how clean of a bottom, all have impact. While most sailors, rightfully so, think in gallons per hour, the real question under power is miles per gallon. Thus under power alone how many nm per gallon can similar heavy displacement (~20 ton) sailboats get over long periods of time in 6 to 10 foot variable direction seas? It might be a bit lower than some may think.

--
Eric
m/y Kosmos http://kosmos.liveflux.net/blog

[EricGrab]

Originally Posted by rgscpat

Going back to the comments about esoteric/alternative power sources for a bluewater boat and the impossibility of nuclear power getting into civilian hands, I wonder how much a former Soviet icebreaker would sell for?!

Ok, this is going off-topic. But...

There are some interesting things with nuclear power. First of all it does not have to be based huge industrial reactors. There are atomic batteries, in things like pacemakers and small spacecraft. Second, there are some ideas with small scale reactors running on relatively low concentrations of minimally enriched radioactive material.

So imagine a sealed oil drum sized object that puts out 50,000 watts of electric power and runs for a couple years. To start the chain reaction (i.e. turn it on) it might require temporary high concentration of radioactive material, but this is something can be done at a secure facility. Rip out the diesel, pop in the ACME Atomic Battery 5000 and an electric motor or two, and away you go.

No likely anytime soon, and maybe just some science fiction. However chasing E=mc^2 is very compelling, because it is thousands of times more efficient than just shuffling chemical bonds around. And thousands of times more dangerous. However consider how internal combustion engines literally capture explosions and turn them into useful applications. For hundreds of years explosions driven by chemical reactions were crudely controlled things used to blast rock and shoot piece of metal out of tubes at high speeds. Yet wrap the right technology around it, and you get an internal combustion engine.

Huge advances in other fields have certainly happened, and who knows. Things such as GPS, sonar, radar, electronic chart plotters, alloys, fiberglass, internal combustion engines, carbon fibers, etc. would be pure magic to previous generations of mariners. Maybe someday there will be safe, inexpensive micro reactors for small pleasure boats. Yeah, and even then there will still be sailors. Because it is nice to catch a breeze, and no matter how many times I see it or experience it, the wind moving a huge boat feels like magic.

--
Eric
m/y Kosmos http://kosmos.liveflux.net/blog

[markpierce]

Originally Posted by S/V Antares

Great idea and good luck. Others have done it why not you.
I wanted to do a similar thing, 300k, 1 year , 1st class cabin on the QE2

There are too many formal nights (tuxedoes/suit-and-tie) nights on Cunard. Better to take a less pretentious line unless that's your thing.

[donradcliffe]

Originally Posted by EricGrab

Spending 1/2 on fuel would be about $25k less, which is only 8% of the budget. Although subtracting out the boat downpayment and monthly payments that would save about 33% of the consumables. However I would not recommend doing this with no stabilizers and no way to do the long crossings without massive fuel bladders. And of course it is less space. So no, not a good value at all. Sailboats are meant to be sailed.



Yes, but this is an important moment to be quantitative the difference. By what percentage, and is it meaningful for your budget and plan? A true full displacement boat is going to be in the same ballpark. Currents, waves, winds, and even how clean of a bottom, all have impact. While most sailors, rightfully so, think in gallons per hour, the real question under power is miles per gallon. Thus under power alone how many nm per gallon can similar heavy displacement (~20 ton) sailboats get over long periods of time in 6 to 10 foot variable direction seas? It might be a bit lower than some may think.

--
Eric
m/y Kosmos Kosmos Travel Log | Kosmos is Greek for world. It is the name of our boat, and the scope of our travel ambitions.

Being quantitative, our last passage was from Panama to Hawaii, 4600 rhumbline miles in 29 days for an average speed of 6.6 knots. We motorsailed a lot of the first 500 miles due to light winds. While motorsailing, we consume about 0.5 gph at 5 knots, for about 9-10 mpg. For the entire passage, we consumed a total of 45 gallons of fuel for an average of about 100 miles per gallon and a cost of $225.


A new set of sails costs us $9k, and our last set went 60,000 miles, so our sail depreciation on this passage would be about $700.

Rigging costs are harder to calculate, but we replace the standing rigging every 10 years or 60,000 miles at a cost of $3k, so you could call that about $230 on a mileage basis or less than $10 on a time basis.

[cat man do]

Dont forget the initial cost of mast, winches, tracks, blocks, additional mounting points, spinnaker poles, squeezer socks , halyards, sheets, chainplates, fastenings etc etc
All things that the power vessel has not had to purchase

[GordMay]

"Voyaging Under Power" is the definitive guide for those who wish to cross oceans under power.
Voyaging Under Power ~ by Robert Beebe, revised by James Leishman
➥ Voyaging Under Power - Google Books