Trawler Fuel Consumption

[Seasalt]

Perhaps I missed it, but I have not found a concise compilation of owners' reports of actual fuel consumption for trawler yachts with various engines. This information would be very helpful to me and I expect it would be to others as well. I have found a few reports scattered through miscellaneous threads, but no comprehensive thread on trawler fuel consumption. What I have in mind would be similar to the comment posted by "Boatpoker" in November of 2008, as follows:
"My 38 year old trawler with a 38 year old Perkins HT6-354 (diesel and turbo-charged) went to 20,000 hours before we rebuilt it 2 years ago. It makes the run from Toronto to Dry Tortugas or Bahamas and back on less than 800 gallons at 1.6 US gallons per hour at 1600RPM and 7.5 knots."
I'm sure that this group could provide a lot of information on this topic.

Thanks for any contribution that you can make.

Dick Allen
Still Shopping

[cat man do]

Originally Posted by Seasalt

What I have in mind would be similar to the comment posted by "Boatpoker" in November of 2008, as follows:
"My 38 year old trawler with a 38 year old Perkins HT6-354 (diesel and turbo-charged) went to 20,000 hours before we rebuilt it 2 years ago. It makes the run from Toronto to Dry Tortugas or Bahamas and back on less than 800 gallons at 1.6 US gallons per hour at 1600RPM and 7.5 knots."

http://www.cruisersforum.com/forums/...tml#post235192

[Seasalt]

I had browsed the "'gas or diesel thread but did not find much on actual fuel consumption based on experience. I missed the information that "bastonjock" posted on Dec 23, 2008:

"My buddies prout sirrocco uses about 1 liter per hour at 5knots using a 15 year old diesel,the equivalent gas engine on a sirrocco a 9.9 yam burns 2 liters of gas per hour to do the same speed,so its either 0.60 an hour or 1.90 an hour,you can save your mooring fees if you run on diesel."

The information posted by Boatpoker was very helpful because it indicates a much lower fuel consumption than I had been told for the Perkins 6-354. One broker told me to expect to burn 5-7 gallons per hour with twin 6-354s. He didn't say at what speed, so it is helpful to know that Boatpoker could make 7.5 knots at 1600 RPM with one 6-354 in a 38' trawler. It's hard to find specific information like that. I'm hoping that others will have similar reports.

[scubasteve]

I would only compare fuel burn between similar boats with similar engines. Most people will be “optimistic” with fuel burn rates.

Diesel will be better with fuel but the initial cost and expense of parts will probably exceed fuel savings compared to gas over the long run. That being said, I favor diesel.

What are your requirement pertaining to gas/diesel & fuel consumption?

[Seasalt]

I'm simply trying to get diesel-powered trawler owners to relate their actual fuel consumption. I'm not interested in gas vs diesel. There was a very informative discussion of monohull sailboat fuel consumption in November and December of 2005. Members provided very specific information on their boats, engines, speed, and fuel consumption. I'm interested in the same information for trawlers.

[Boracay]

We've a John Deere 4045D in Boracay, rated at 80hp continuous at 2500rpm. Cruising at 1800 rpm over smooth water we get about 6 knots and burn about 5 litres an hour. That's about 4.6 nautical miles per US gallon.

Where you may need to rethink your question comes when a semidisplacement trawler is considered. These are those boats that leave huge wakes as they travel at slightly faster than hull speed, using extraordinary amounts of fuel (My calculations suggest that they can only afford to run their boats for 5 minutes at full power - that's when they're passing my moored boat). I doubt if owners of semidisplacemt boats ever work out how much it costs per mile, or they never tell anyone, especially not their wives.

I know my John Deere uses about 20 litres of fuel per hour at full power, so those semidisplacement trawlers could be using 60 litres (for a 240 hp engine) or more as they plough off into the distance.

At 8 (my theoretical maximum hull speed with a S/L of 1.34) knots I'm using every horse that the engine will produce and using 20 litres an hour or about 1.5 nm per US gallon.

[doug86]

40' Marine Trader Trawler, single Ford Lehman 120hp, 2.6gph at 7.5kts. at 1850rpm.

[MarkJ]

Ours just did 70 hours at 2,100 rpm using 150 litres at about 5.3 kts for 370 nms. using a Yanmar 4JH3E 56hp

Thats 2 litres per hour (1/2 US Gal per hour)

But its not a trawler. We just can't catch fish!

[motion30]

34' marine trader 1973 120hp ford lehman 2.3-2.6gph at 8 mph @1650 rpm

[jdoe71]

We have friends with a Monk 36, 120 hp Perkins, they use about an Imperial gallon per hour at around 7.5 knots.

But why not post this on some of the trawler forum sites?

Trawler Forum

There's probably way more trawler owners there with hard numbers than on this site.

[stevensc]

I bought a 2003 Monk 36 trawler near Annapolis last November, follows fuel consumption from the trip home. The engine is a 6BT5.9M Cummins about 220 HP Typical cruising speed 7 - 7.5K
These are the fuel consumption figures for our trip departing Chalk
Point,West River, MD on Nov 28, 2008 to our last fill up at Dauphin
Island Alabama Feb 1, 2009 approximately 1870 statute miles (the trip
was nearly all along the ICW system so I found it easier to work with
St. miles) consumed 558 gallons of fuel. This included 94 hrs of
generator use. We usually ran the engine between 1600 and 1800 rpm.
We left the boat in Charleston and went home for Christmas so had
35 tavel days, the shortest being 26 miles the longest 80 miles. The
longest non stop stretch was 25 hours crossing the Gulf from
Tarpon Springs, Fl departed at 2pm, to Apalachicola,Fl arrived 3pm,
approximately 185 st. miles. We crossed Florida via L. Okeechobee
Engine hours on departure 1432, on last fill up Dauphin Island,
Alabama 1689.
Steve

[boatpoker]

This post may get stripped because my site is considered commercial, however if you google Port Credit Marine Surveys I have logs of two trips from Toronto - Dry Tortugas and Toronto - Abacos which show all the RPM/distance run and fuel usage on my HT354 Perkins

[Nordic32]

1999 5.9B Cummins 220hp, 40' Transpacific Eagle 28,000lbs., 1650rpm, 7 knts = 2 1/2-3 gal. / hr.

[Mark Zarley]

1978 49 DeFever RPH 68,000lbs wet, twin 120 lehmans nap, @1700 rpm 7.3 kts fuel burn 4 gal/hr

[cat man do]

I like this site as it has plenty of relevant info regarding "this" style of vessel

On a displacement boat of 40 – 50 ft your best fuel economy will most likely be a bit under hull speed, or about 6 - 8 knots. On Lifeline we travel at 7 knots at 1150RPM, which gives us fuel economy of 8 litres (2 US gallons) per hour or about 3 tenths of a gallon to go 1 nautical mile.
After cruising the boat for twelve months we are consistently getting 7 - 8 litres per hour at 7 knots (1100 RPM) and we are ecstatic

49 ft Timber Trawler with Gardner 6LK Diesel

I did help take a 47 ft timber cray boat to Vanuatu a while back and it had a Garner 6LX as well. She was a bit skinnier than the vessel above and consistently did 8 knots at 1150 and similar economy.

I then helped take this vessel across with twin Volvo D6 330's Turbo's.

Due to time constraint they ran them fairly high keeping the speed up around 18 knots and it was using around 30 litres x 2/hour

Would have loved to have seen what a drop back to 10 would have done, which is what mine is looking at for a cruise speed, but I much lighter displacement and build and have slow spinning 3.3 litre Cummins @ 65hp x 2