Powerboats and the price of fuel

[Adelie]

Commercial air transport these days generally get in the 50-125mpg per passenger range depending on route, passenger load, weather and particular aircraft.
There ain’t no road vehicle that can match that except electric and the have a different set of added costs.

Amtrak passenger rail gets about 56mpg/passenger.

Electric rail probably does significantly better.

[JBP]

Originally Posted by tuffr2

I am taking a guess when they started to use oil as a fuel. I think in the 1870's or maybe a bit later. You will never see a fuel that will be used as long as oil. 150 years and counting.

Wind has been propelling boats for thousands of years and counting. Wood has been heating homes for thousands of years and is renewable and carbon neutral.

[JBP]

US Average gas prices for the last 10 years, NOT adjusted for inflation. When I hear people panic about gas prices, I think "Meh. Been there. So what."

[rslifkin]

Originally Posted by JBP

US Average gas prices for the last 10 years, NOT adjusted for inflation. When I hear people panic about gas prices, I think "Meh. Been there. So what."

To me, it's not so much the actual price that's the issue right now, but the rate of change and not knowing where it's going to settle.

[Shrew]

Originally Posted by Shanachie

He had four 350-hp outboards on the stern, from what I could see, and he had them close to wide-open throttle.

Each of those motors can burn as much as 60 gallons an hour at WOT, according to what I read. Times four. The way I work it out, that's 240 gallons of gasoline an hour.

Let's see. 240 by $5 a gallon (the price they're predicting soon) equals $1,200 an hour to endanger manatees and annoy people content to enjoy the water at a more leisurely pace.

Wow this reads kinda preachy.

1) There is absolutely no way you can tell whether the vessel passing you at 50 mph is at WOT or not. I'm sure it was fast, but let's stick with facts.

2) By your math of a 240 gallon burn rate, the difference of $1.00/gallon is $240. Anyone burning $960/hr doesn't care if it shoots up to $1,200/hr.

3) I spent $500 on dinner for 4 on Saturday. Don't judge another man's life decisions based on your bank account. I you think it's a lot of money, I certainly encourage you to NOT spend YOUR money that way.

4) A go fast doing 50 mph is putting up pretty small wake. One of my boats is a 39 foot trawler that does 8 kts. At 8kts, my wake would swamp you in comparison.

[bailsout]

And mega yachts? I resigned my membership in my yacht club because it allowed these vessels to tie up on our dock and still call ourselves “green”.

[MicHughV]

personal car fuel usage might be high in the US...but elsewhere.....probably not so much..

I'm willing to bet half the folks living in Africa even own a car...

Many countries in Europe have excellent bus and train service, taking you anywhere...

Countries like Holland are big on bicycle usage....

Big cities invariable have the " underground" rail system...

America loves their big 5.6 litre V-8, but elsewhere, V-8's are not often seen...

Just generalizing here, but public transport in the US is pretty much non-existent. Americans love their cars.

I must say the electric car seem to be catching on..I see more and more Tesla's on the road each and every day.

As always...you have options....you can fly first class...or sit in the cheap seats...folk that fly first class have the dinero to do so and are unlikely to be giving much thought to the people in the back of the plane as they down their caviar encrusted salmon...

someone with quad 350's on his boat is likely not going to be upset about someone voicing an opinion on his fuel burn...

[jmschmidt]

"The Rice of Fuel." For a minute there I was thinking about what we called Japanese cars back in the day, Rice Burners.

[sagablu]

Last year while I was in line to order food at a marina side restaurant, one guy was showing another guy a picture of a small tuna he caught. He named it my " $5000 tuna". Apparently that was the fuel spent to catch this little fish.

Anyway, fuel prices will matter too many, not all power boat is are so wealthy. Couple years ago I had a conversation with a few powerboats at a marina BBQ who basically stated they do not travel much because of fuel costs. . Basically one side of the bay to the other, anchor and drink cheap beer. It's going to be interesting when all those new Covid boaters find out what their hobby is beginning to cost.. Just saying

[rslifkin]

Originally Posted by sagablu

Anyway, fuel prices will matter too many, not all power boat is are so wealthy. Couple years ago I had a conversation with a few powerboats at a marina BBQ who basically stated they do not travel much because of fuel costs. . Basically one side of the bay to the other, anchor and drink cheap beer. It's going to be interesting when all those new Covid boaters find out what their hobby is beginning to cost.. Just saying

It's interesting how people react to fuel prices. For us as powerboaters, when the fuel budget is tight we go slower and we tend not to go out for the day quite as much. And when we do, we keep the distances short. We also tend to cover less distance when traveling, but we try not to end up sacrificing time spent traveling.

[4arch]

When fuel prices were last this high in the summer of 2008, I remember a sharp drop-off in the number of powerboats on the water. Boat owners would come to the marina and hang out on their boats, but not leave the dock. It seems when people go into belt-tightening mode, it kind of becomes contagious across all walks of life, even among some of those who have the means to keep up their old habits. Sure, there were plenty of people who kept on doing the same things they always did, but it wasn’t enough to avoid some really painful years for some of the small towns and waterfront businesses who rely on transient boaters. I expect we're on a similar trajectory for this spring and summer.

[boatpoker]

I'll just putter along in my little trawler at 7.2nm/hr burning 0.75gph.
and let the rest of the world figure this out.

[landsend]

Originally Posted by sagablu

Last year while I was in line to order food at a marina side restaurant, one guy was showing another guy a picture of a small tuna he caught. He named it my " $5000 tuna". Apparently that was the fuel spent to catch this little fish.

Anyway, fuel prices will matter too many, not all power boat is are so wealthy. Couple years ago I had a conversation with a few powerboats at a marina BBQ who basically stated they do not travel much because of fuel costs. . Basically one side of the bay to the other, anchor and drink cheap beer. It's going to be interesting when all those new Covid boaters find out what their hobby is beginning to cost.. Just saying

Power boaters don't drink cheap beer! Especially when we can't afford the fuel!

[boatpoker]

Originally Posted by sagablu

It's going to be interesting when all those new Covid boaters find out what their hobby is beginning to cost.. Just saying

When they discover buying the boat was the cheapest part of the equation they are going to flood the market with used boats.
The vast majority of buyers in the last two years have had to pay someone to change a light bulb. I think they are already starting to wise up, especially here in the north where they had to pay for decommissioning, shrink wrap, winter storage and soon spring commissioning , bottom painting, summer docking fees and all the things that go wrong with boats ... all for 5 months of boating on the Great Lakes.

A huge number of these people also found they needed a survey for insurance and docking ... after they bought the boat !
Many of them have already had ugly surprises. We've did 11 surveys last year (after purchase) that were denied insurance due to needed repairs

[Shanachie]

Originally Posted by Shrew

3) I spent $500 on dinner for 4 on Saturday. Don't judge another man's life decisions based on your bank account. I you think it's a lot of money, I certainly encourage you to NOT spend YOUR money that way.

It's worth contemplating that the fancy dinner you're so proud of amounts to less than 25 minutes of run time for the guy with the quad 350 powerboat ...


When talk turns to conspicuous consumption, I always remember a remark by one of my brothers, an attorney who owns a large part of a sizeable community bank.


"When I worked as an attorney, I used to think everyone was wealthy," he said. "Once I became a banker, I realized that most people are up to their ears in debt."