What will yachts and yachting look like in 2015?

Professional Boatbuilder article on Hybrid Project

I read that also, and have prepared a response letter to go to the author Nigel Calder and the builder Jack McCoy.

Too bad the article is not accessable on line yet, as my response addresses a number of particular portions of the article, and thus might not make as much sense as a stand alone posting. I will probably make the posting over in subject thread I referenced above, a hybrid 'Kitesail assisted Trawler/Motorsailer'

BTW, this fellow Nigel Calder is one of the most expert sources of knowledge on these new hybrid marine power subjects. If you go to the 'digital issues' of Professional Boatbuilder and look back thru a series of articles he did on these subjects you will see what I mean.

It's a relatively quick process to sign up on their website to access the full magazine article online.

BS, Marmot (isn't a Marmot a ground squirrel) Give me a spec. for your Motor and the range and speed you want to go and LiFePO4 will beat the crap out of Lead Acid hands down for the cost amortized over (12) years and the weight (1/3) of your favorite "boat anchors"!

LOL.

Hi,

Where has it been suggested that Lead Acid Batteries were suitable to be used for an Electric Boat the size of which Marmot was referring to?

What would be the battery specs, size and weight, recharge time and requirements etc to replace the following Diesel Power Plant including the safety margin carried by Diesel Vessels.

A Yacht that is 2100 GRT, has a range of 5000 NM at 16 kts developing 3000 kW plus an average 240 Kw load on one genset.

He isn't going to answer that, or any other question. He keeps bringing up lead-acid batteries as if someone here is promoting them and then calls diesel shaft propulsion a "strawman." I think the guy is a high school student and simply cannot respond to any of those questions.

Subscription to Professional Boatbuilder Mag

But is everyone required to show a linkage to the boating industry to obtain a subscription ??

It is a great publication, lets hope it survives this economic tsunami

Click on the image on the left where it says 'hybrid auxiliary power prototype'.
http://www.proboat-digital.com/proboat/e20090405/
(...hey I hope I can do this link thru- apologies if not! )

Bringing up batteries as a replacement for Diesel fuel as the primary fuel on a motor yacht is a lot like bringing up Lead-acid batteries. Its a closed book, No one thinks we are anywhere near batteries being a good storage medium for energy on a boat that will use a lot of power over a long distance. Its a closed book. We are all talking about Hybrid systems, which are very much a different story.

Changing the subject, The FFC-Cambridge process promises to lower the price of titanium, could we expect to see more boats with Titanium superstructure? Its a lighter choice than steel and it doesn't suffer from excessive fatigue like Aluminum.

It will depend on how low the price is compared to Aluminium because the cost of working and welding it is a lot more than Aluminium owing to the complexity of doing so.

Try this: http://www.energytechmarine.com/

Carbon Offsetting

Might see more countries following this lead;

'The new Maldives “Carbon Neutral” policy has prompted a leading 74m superyacht to balance its carbon footprint through Yacht Carbon Offset. The President of the Maldives has announced his government’s intention to make the Republic of Maldives the world’s first carbon neutral country, within a decade.

Responding swiftly to express support for the President’s initiative, a leading 74m superyacht has turned to Carbon Offsetting. The yacht’s Owners have, through Yacht Carbon Offset, balanced the greenhouse gas emissions from the vessel’s engines for the duration of her stay'.

Yeah... finding/training the highly skilled workers will prove difficult enough: it's a leap from Steel to Aluminium let alone Aluminium to Titanium.

The Yard I work for used to look after a fleet of inter-island highspeed hydrofoil ferries 20 years earlier. The hulls were Aluminium and the foils Titanium.

When I joined the yard I found sheets of metal with just 'TN' written on them, not knowing what they were. I used leftover bits and pieces as backing pads and dashboards on my RIB thinking it was just Ally. The holesaws took a bit of a beating but I thought nothing of it. Only later did one of the old boys tell me what it was (some of them have been with the yard for 45 years).

So someone, somewhere has some very expensive additions to his boat!

DOH


Fish

surface piercing pumps

Its been awhile and I'm curious if there are any commercially available examples? Another potential efficiency gain is the lessened head and "carried weight".

You can make that wish.... but is a personal wish with justifications not rooted in facts or reality.

Some of the very cleanest running outboards on the market today are two strokes. I suggest you look into the emissions generated by the BRP E-Tec line of 2 stroke outboard engines (at idle, cruise, and WOT).

Infinyte i8

It doesn't exist, the technology won't scale to MY sizes, and it will probably never come close to doing 20MPH.....

But if you wanted to kiss a tree with a sexy little tender, this would be a candidate:

Infinyte Marine

Here we are in late 2012 and this thread was only restarted by a few posts today...why did this interesting thread suddenly die in April 2009 and just now restart??

With the IMO Tier III regulations coming into effect for Jan 2016, has nothing truly new and exciting come up on the horizon?? What about LNG?? Hydrogen?? I guess we will certainly see more effort in more efficient hull designs (unless hulls are already as efficient as they can be)....sure would be nice to see something concrete with diesel fuel topping $5/gallon (and will likely never drop) that could reduce the yearly operating costs (fuel), etc....

Cheers,

We could see some different design approaches that incorporate one or more of the following:

1. Solar/diesel hybrid systems that use solar power for low speeds and for powering the various on-board systems at rest.

2. Narrow hulls similar to what Dashew yachts are exploring. They have similar hulls to a sailboat in terms of length vs width.

3. Motor-sailers that uses sails for all or part of the power while underway. Nordhavn has one model and there are other manufacturers with motor-sailers available. I would have to say some of the Rhodes-Alden designs are among the most graceful and beautiful around.

This particular picture is one shows the grace of their designs:

Yes Carelm, I like that one also....

But it needs a little more sail area to really perform well under sail. I'm trying to find the time and the impetus to work on such a modification.

Brian,

I kind of thought you would since I stole it from one of your other posts on motor-sailers. It would be just the ticket for cruising up and down the Chesapeake Bay.