Planing Dinghy: Hp vs Dinghy type vs #Passengers

[BenBowSirocco]

Originally Posted by Tupaia

That is about the same weight as a fibre glass bottomed inflatable so I don't see the advantage. My own ali / inflatable is 34kg (75lbs) less than half the weight. (26kg outboard, 5kg for the fuel tank, anchor and chain 5kg = 70kg (155lbs) all up)

Maybe it has other advantages but can't see this being useable by a couple doing a beach landing in surf.

So what makes it different?

Dinghy wheels are standard on the GoDu boats, they make dragging the boat up a beach and back off the beach much much easier. My wife is a small person and while she has to work for it- she can drag the 10.5 up the beach on her own with the beach wheels. Admittedly a mild Florida Gulf beach: not a steep mountain surf beach.



Dinghy weight is funny thing and something I have spent a lot of time pondering over the years, because even our old Fatty Knees 7 footer was about 100 pounds.

I personally cannot comfortably lift and move around anything much over 75lbs, and even that weight is kinda pushing it as I'm not a big person. So for me, anything about weight or above is something I consider a "need assistance" item. Whether that's a winch, a davit, a friend, a pry bar; whatever, but I want help.

So it seems to me, that since I am likely to never have a planing dinghy that is under 75 pounds all up: as long as its reasonable and that means its safely under the weight limits of my assistance systems (winches, davits, chocks, beach wheels, etc), I am not inclined to worry too much about it because its already too heavy for me alone and the difference between 100 pounds and 300 pounds is not really very noticeable when properly using my assistance items.


But everyone has a mothership that has particular needs and crew that has their needs and Im not saying the above works for everyone: but thats how its been for us over the years: weight started out a huge deal in theory, but not really a big deal in reality.

[rslifkin]

Beach transport issues aside, the other reason weight matters is for the mothership. Depending on the boat, lifting 300+ lbs aboard may be no big deal, while on other boats you couldn't reasonably lift and store that kind of weight. At 172 lbs this thing isn't light, but it's not the heaviest dinghy out there either. I'd think a lot of the boats that can carry something rigid of that size can likely manage the weight, even if it's not quite ideal.

[donradcliffe]

A rigid hulled dinghy is one that is going to beat up the sides of your boat.

Our dinghy system was a Swift 3.10 at 95 lbs, plus either a Tohatsu 3.5 2S at 28 lbs, or a Tohatsu 18 2S at 86 lbs. Hauling either out of the water with a spinnaker halyard was a one man job, and the dinghy lived upside down on the foredeck.

Two of us could easily drag the dinghy up the beach with the small motor, but we had to put dinghy wheels on if we used the big motor.

The small motor would plane one person, the big motor would plane four, or 3 with scuba gear.

The big motor was a two person job to mount on the dinghy, and was much more likely to be stolen. It also used twice as much fuel.

We used the small motor at least 95% of the time.

[rslifkin]

Originally Posted by donradcliffe

A rigid hulled dinghy is one that is going to beat up the sides of your boat.

Any hard dinghy needs good padding to avoid that problem.

[Mike OReilly]

Portabote. Rigid enough to row and motor well. Light enough to be hauled on board by hand, or easily dragged up any beach. Damn near indestructible, so no worries landing on hard stuff. And won’t beat up the mothership because the sides flex.

Perfect [emoji6]

[jigray3]

1995 Apex A26r 8.5ft rollup with inflatable keel, 75 lbs, 1+, 5hp Mercury 2 stroke.

[Rick Williams]

I've had the opportunity to agonize over this: size vs weight vs speed etc and I've found that a 9.9 will get 3 people up on plane in an aluminum 14' boat (around 200 pounds) as well as an 8' RIB. I did not think that was possible but I've also tried a 15 hp on the same boats and found it was over powered to the point that I would either need a larger, heavier boat or more people or a smaller engine. 15 was too big, 9.9 is just right unless you want to make your wife happy with the lightest engine possible then you get something like the 2 hp Honda that weighs 27 pounds. She likes it just fine, it's faster than rowing and it is very loud.

[MWGDVC]

10' Portabote, 5hp Nissan 2 stroke, 7.8x8 3 blade prop. Planes 2 adults pretty easily, 350lbs total. Top speed 10kts. Dry ride, even in a little chop.

[Leadfree]

270 (~9 ft) Walker Bay SLR (foam-laminate 'glass RIB, no longer made) which weighs 68 lb, pushing it with an old Evinrude 2-stroke 15hp at around 74 lb No problem planing with two adults plus gear or a full provisioning load

BTW, those who say '4-stroke weighs same as 2-stroke' do please forward me an example of a 15hp 4-stroke weighing 74 lb....