Gas v/s diesel for trawlers

SomeSailor · Dec 26, 2012

manyboats said:
Thank's SomeSailor. You didn't need to say that but you did.

Rick misses the fact that these boats have electric motors dragging screws. They function as generators in that configuration.

Do they add drag? Sure. But no more than running on one engine and dragging a screw on our current boats. The difference is the turning screw is feeding power back to a battery. In some cases the motor that has been replaced by a generator is charging as well.

You can travel by pure electric, diesel electric, or pure diesel. In any case you get to make use use energy taken on at the dock and from solar panels.

The diesel-electric series-hybrid drives are already available, just not cost effective for an old boat. The neat thing is you could have completely variable / near instant power. No more Velvet drives.

RickB · Dec 26, 2012

SomeSailor said:
Rick misses the fact that these boats have electric motors dragging screws. They function as generators in that configuration.

That's funny.

Why not make that dragging screw big enough to power another motor and drive another propeller so you can go even faster and get even more power from the dragging screw?

Make sure you carry a sea anchor though so the boat doesn't speed up so much so quickly that you can't control it.

SomeSailor · Dec 26, 2012

What you're also missing is you're trading this drag for a recharge on a battery.

If I run on ONE engine... I save fuel because the idling motor is turned off.

If I propel myself on ONE engine... and the other is a generator... I save fuel because I'm accumulating energy in the battery... which will save me fuel later.

If I have the battery to begin with, I'm saving energy because I can store electrical energy which is cheaper than diesel. I refuel at the dock, or soak up solar while on the hook.

A generator connected to any motor uses less energy than a heavy transmission. (changing rotational direction mechanically is hugely inefficient)

Anyhow... you'll argue with anything I say, so I'll not bother with you Rick. Series-Hybrid drives exist today. They are hugely efficient and have benefit of being able to make exactly the amount of torque needed at the very moment you need it. They have been doing this on locomotives for years and cars now as well.

They are even using this technology on airplanes:

Check out the Volta Volare GT4

RickB · Dec 26, 2012

SomeSailor said:
What you're also missing is you're trading this drag for a recharge on a battery.

You are adding drag because you are extracting more energy from the water flow than if the prop just windmilled.

If I run on ONE engine... I save fuel because the idling motor is turned off.

That is the only part you got right but it begs the question, why buy two engines if you only want to use one?

If I propel myself on ONE engine... and the other is a generator... I save fuel because I'm accumulating energy in the battery... which will save me fuel later.

No, you put less energy in the batteries than you consume to produce it. You lose even more when you extract it to drive an electric motor to turn the shaft. Lose lose lose at every conversion.

As much as you desperately want to believe there is some magic way to get more energy out of the fuel in your boat's tanks, converting it to electricity and storing it through some reversible chemical process throws it away at each step.

If you seriously believe you can extract more energy from a trailing prop than the energy required to create the water flow that turns it you are simply delusional.

You aren't talking about a free lunch, you are rambling on about perpetual motion.

Marin · Dec 26, 2012

Thanks, Art, for your posting on your experience with old gas.

There is a grange store not too far from us that sells non-ethanol gasoline. On the advice of our local Honda repair shop we have filled a couple of five-gallon containers with this fuel to use in our generator at home. And we will start using it in our trailer fishing boat with 90 hp 2-stoke and 6 hp 4-stroke outboards.

The Honda fellow told us that a lot of fuel stabilizers have alcohol as an ingredient. When used in ethanol-treated fuel, this in effect doubles the amount of alcohol in the fuel and this in turn, he said, leads to water problems. By using non-ethanol fuel, fuel stabilizers like Stabil, etc. will then work as advertised.

However he still advocated running a motor out of fuel and draining the carburetor after any use where the motor was likely to sit for some time without being used. He also said that any unused fuel should be put into a vehicle after a year and the containers refilled with fresh non-ethanol fuel and treated.

Does that sound like good advice?

Nomad Willy · Dec 26, 2012

Sure does Marin.

I'm surprised to hear about the alcohol in the stabilizers. I've noticed that the gas stations that have no alcohol gas are all Union 76. Expensive too.

Marin · Dec 26, 2012

Some Arco stations around here also have non-ethanol fuel, too.

bfloyd4445 · Dec 26, 2012

RickB said:
You are talking about using an engine to charge batteries. I was talking about the fantasy that taking power from a trailing screw contitutes a means to recover power.

Not even in the same conversation.

not a fantasy that has been done. I believe there are on the market devices that do just what you describe. here is a link to one such device Cruising hydro generator

RickB · Dec 26, 2012

SomeSailor said:
Rick misses the fact that these boats have electric motors dragging screws. They function as generators in that configuration.

Perpetual motion boat

bfloyd4445 · Dec 26, 2012

Marin said:
Thanks, Art, for your posting on your experience with old gas.

There is a grange store not too far from us that sells non-ethanol gasoline. On the advice of our local Honda repair shop we have filled a couple of five-gallon containers with this fuel to use in our generator at home. And we will start using it in our trailer fishing boat with 90 hp 2-stoke and 6 hp 4-stroke outboards.

The Honda fellow told us that a lot of fuel stabilizers have alcohol as an ingredient. When used in ethanol-treated fuel, this in effect doubles the amount of alcohol in the fuel and this in turn, he said, leads to water problems. By using non-ethanol fuel, fuel stabilizers like Stabil, etc. will then work as advertised.

However he still advocated running a motor out of fuel and draining the carburetor after any use where the motor was likely to sit for some time without being used. He also said that any unused fuel should be put into a vehicle after a year and the containers refilled with fresh non-ethanol fuel and treated.

Does that sound like good advice?

I stopped doing that two years ago when i started useing non ethanol gas in all my small gas engines. Now in the spring they all start. I still add a fuel stabilizer, amsoil, all the time to keep the carbon gone. Marin, just cause the label says it is a fuel stabilizer dosent mean it really is. u gotta read the label and sometimes call the company and talk to one of their engineers. AMSOIL Gasoline Fuel Additives i am not a dealer i am just useing amsoil as an example

RickB · Dec 26, 2012

bfloyd4445 said:
not a fantasy that has been done. I believe there are on the market devices that do just what you describe. here is a link to one such device Cruising hydro generator

What part of sailboat don't you understand?

Since it is the holiday season I will be kind a let you in on something ...

A sailboat moves because the sails create lift and move the boat through the water. The sails extract a certain amount of energy from the wind to do so. If you stick one of those "hydro generator" things in the water it will convert some of the energy extracted from the wind to electricity.

It will also create drag that will slow the boat's passage through the water because not as much energy is being converted to propulsion. If you put an ammeter on the output of that thing you would see that it produced a certain amount of current when it was initially placed in the water but as the boat slowed from the drag it created, the current would drop off until equilibrium was reached. The sails still extract the same amount of power but now part of that power is diverted from propulsion to generation.

Stick one of those on your powerboat and you are in the same perpetual motion wannabe barge as that poor benighted soul from Albany.

LaBomba · Dec 26, 2012

bfloyd4445 said:
I stopped doing that two years ago when i started useing non ethanol gas in all my small gas engines. Now in the spring they all start. I still add a fuel stabilizer, amsoil, all the time to keep the carbon gone. Marin, just cause the label says it is a fuel stabilizer dosent mean it really is. u gotta read the label and sometimes call the company and talk to one of their engineers. AMSOIL Gasoline Fuel Additives i am not a dealer i am just useing amsoil as an example

I started using Star Tron Enzyme Fuel treatment on the recommendation of the Yamaha dealer who told me it was the best at converting the water produced by ethanol fuel into a burnable solution. Have had no issues and use it at every fill up and my boat sits for at least 4 to 5 months during winter and my generator even longer depending on power outages. Have a look at the following link it's interesting what they have to say.

Star Tron Enzyme Fuel Treatment - Ethanol/E10

Art · Dec 26, 2012

Marin said:
Thanks, Art, for your posting on your experience with old gas.

There is a grange store not too far from us that sells non-ethanol gasoline. On the advice of our local Honda repair shop we have filled a couple of five-gallon containers with this fuel to use in our generator at home. And we will start using it in our trailer fishing boat with 90 hp 2-stoke and 6 hp 4-stroke outboards.

The Honda fellow told us that a lot of fuel stabilizers have alcohol as an ingredient. When used in ethanol-treated fuel, this in effect doubles the amount of alcohol in the fuel and this in turn, he said, leads to water problems. By using non-ethanol fuel, fuel stabilizers like Stabil, etc. will then work as advertised.

However he still advocated running a motor out of fuel and draining the carburetor after any use where the motor was likely to sit for some time without being used. He also said that any unused fuel should be put into a vehicle after a year and the containers refilled with fresh non-ethanol fuel and treated.

Does that sound like good advice?

Marin, I'm sure that using untreated fuel (gas or diesel or kerosene) within a year’s time span is in general advisable. Although, if the correct stabilizers/organic-growth-removers and varnish liquefiers are added to the fuel it seems to me that fuels can last much longer in good condition than otherwise... also older fuel can be returned to OK condition. I never have deemed the complete draining of carbs as good idea... reason is the coating of gasoline remaining on the walls, needle valves, floats etc turns to varnish even more quickly. I believe putting a good carb cleaner into the fuel before long term shut down is what really keeps the "filled" gas lines (carb included) clean from varnish. I reemphasis Soltron and SeaFoam as my choice for fuel stabilizer and varnish liquefier... used on regular basis they both do me well. If I get a real "varnish" problem inside a carburetor (I've successfully done this twice - once with the Rochester 4bbl on my 1967 Buick Wildcat) I take a bucket and fill it with 95% fresh gasoline and 5% toluene. Submerge carb in the mix and with rubber gloves I turn the carb over and over till all air bubbles stop. Let it set for 24 hrs, remove and reinstall... works great! And, the gas/toluene mix can be poured into a vehicle's somewhat filled gas tank and used correctly.

SomeSailor · Dec 26, 2012

So Rick;

We'll keep the idea basic.

1. Have you heard of a "series hybrid"?
2. Have you heard of a "diesel electric series hybrid"?

The technology exists, but it's not economical in my opinion yet, but that does not make it fantasy. On the advice of someone else on here I'm trying to discuss this like couple of adults. If you could share your thoughts on the two questions above, that might be a good start. A 50A shore power connection could bring aboard and store 48KW hours of power in an 8 hour overnight at a dock. The Regen system has a 100KW genset that could do that in two hours on the hook.

I'd be interested in your thoughts.

psneeld · Dec 26, 2012

I know what Rick is getting at...many are missing his point...

Sure there are recoup systems...but if active while powering...it's a push.

RickB · Dec 26, 2012

Re. #1 and #2: having spent a few years on D/E submarines, as well as battery electric only submarines, yes. Having spent a few more on D/E and turbo-electric surface ships, yes, I can say I have more than "heard of" them.

Now, back to the point and the subject you are carefully evading - the "argument" is concerning your (and other's) statements about recovering power from trailing props and the fantasies that surround the supposed economies of small scale D/E marine propulsion systems.

Backpedaling and trying to redirect the discussion to some other topic is pure evasion. Your last last posts reiterated your bizarre belief about dragging screws and efficiency gains through multiple energy conversions ... now you come back with silly questions about real life installations you have only read about.

Why are you even in this discussion? You obviously have no experience or knowledge about the subject but seem intent on making a fight of it ...

RickB · Dec 26, 2012

psneeld said:
I know what Rick is getting at...many are missing his point...

Sure there are recoup systems...but if active while powering...it's a push.

Far worse than a "push" ... they are a loss, it is entropy ... losses at every turn and conversion. There is no such thing as regeneration on a powerboat. You can't recover from the water any power that has been used to move the hull through the water any more than you can pull yourself up by your bootstraps. You can pretend to make energy by ignoring where it came from in the first place but that is only the delusion of a dreamer or the barking of a scammer hiding behind his smoke and mirrors.

Why on Earth would someone post a drawing of a pie-in-the-sky aircraft to rebut an argument against the idea of getting free energy from a trailing prop?

This is so typical of these whackjob promoters and dreamers ... they can't answer the most basic question so they inject someone else's fantasy project as proof of their own imagined insight. They avoid the subject when they are shown to be dupes or duped. This exact subject comes up every couple of years and each time it ends up the same, the dupes get pissed off because their dreams have been exposed to daylight.

Anode · Dec 26, 2012

RickB · Dec 26, 2012

Hey, now you just might be on to something!

I bet if the lead magnet was on a fixed beam it would eliminate the losses from swinging around on the string and the boat would go faster!

Tom.B · Dec 26, 2012

Simply stated, even though the prop is already spinning, adding a generator of any sort to it will add more drag to it, thus making it harder to turn and therefore making the other engine have to work just a little harder to make up for it. What Rick is saying is that you can't make back the loss.

In a hybrid car, the situation is different. LOST energy is only collected under braking when the resistance (read: drag) can be used to your advantage to both generate and slow the vehicle down.

markpierce · Dec 26, 2012

bfloyd4445 said:
not a fantasy that has been done. I believe there are on the market devices that do just what you describe. here is a link to one such device Cruising hydro generator

This hydro-generator would make sense if one was anchored in a 3+ knot current or one was sailing (with sails) without an engine working, but not if one was using fuel to move one's boat through the water. The device would create drag, increasing fuel consumption if moving under power.

Art · Dec 26, 2012

"Energy-Loss-Transfer" must occur, simple as that! If energy is created by petrol engine and transferred by any means directly to electric engine, or for even more energy loss factors stored in battery first and then transferred to electric engine, the overall efficiency values as compared to energy directly from petrol engine to prop-shaft must be diminished. The only way I can see there being increased overall efficiency via marine electric motor propulsion would be if "free" solar energy could be captured in enough quanity to upset/sufficiently-supplement the general physics property of "energy-loss-transfer".

It seems clear to me: If it can be figured out how to get increased energy (as compared to power produced via fuel burning engine) from the electric motor to the prop shaft without including solar energy as an offset to overcome "energy-loss-transfer" then the basics of perpetual motion has been established... wherein all "extra energy" needs should be able to be accomplished in utility scale. :popcorn:

Soon, Happy New Year!

Marin · Dec 26, 2012

Art said:
Marin, I'm sure that using untreated fuel (gas or diesel or kerosene) within a year’s time span is in general advisable.

Art--- The advice we have been given by both the aforementioned Honda repair shop and the Yamaha dealer we use in Seattle is that non-ethonol fuel, treated with some sort of stabilizer, is good for sure for a year. After that it's anybody's guess.

However, they say that ethanol-mixed gasoline on its own is good only for a month or so before it can start to cause problems in outboards and small equipment engines like lawn mowers and generators. They said that four-stroke engines suffer more than two-stroke engines because the jet orifices in a four-stroke are smaller. (It's conceivable I have that backwards as it was some months ago that we were given the information.)

The Yamaha dealer says they have observed ethanol-mixed fuel "breakdown," gumming, etc. after a month in tests they have run in their shop to satisfy their own curiosity. Adding a stabilizer, they say, will extend that time to a degree. But if the stabilizer contains alcohol this creates the water problem I described earlier. And they both said ethanol-mixed fuel will not last a year, even with a stabilizer in it.

Anyway, FWIW that's what we've learned this past year after dealing with some fuel issues in some of our equipment, including a 90hp 2-stroke outboard and a 3500 watt 4-stroke generator.

Art · Dec 26, 2012

Marin said:
Anyway, FWIW that's what we've learned this past year after dealing with some fuel issues in some of our equipment, including a 90hp 2-stroke outboard and a 3500 watt 4-stroke generator.

From my experience Soltron and SeaFoam work well in maintaining and/or salvaging both ethanol and straight gasoline; as well as for keeping internal fuel containers and fuel lines and carbs/injectors clean. :popcorn:

Best luck with all your fuel-use endeavors!

Marin · Dec 26, 2012

Art said:
From my experience Soltron and SeaFoam work well in maintaining and/or salvaging both ethanol and straight gasoline; as well as for keeping internal fuel containers and fuel lines and carbs/injectors clean.

We've used Stabil for years but as it's one of the stabilizers we were told have alcohol as a component I'm happy to try the Soltron or Seafoam product.

SomeSailor · Dec 26, 2012

RickB said:
Why are you even in this discussion? You obviously have no experience or knowledge about the subject but seem intent on making a fight of it ...

That's the beauty of this world. We're all welcome to participate in it.

I have no intent of making a fight. We started talking about diesel-electrics, and you summarily dismissed it.

You fail to address what I was describing. Someone else mentioned a hybrid and posted a link. I'm not so hard-headed I couldn't be curious.

They had one at the Miami Boat Show, and it used a series-hybrid just as I was trying to describe to you. You seem to like to be king-of-the-heap here more than discuss anything I suppose.

While I don't think series-hybrid boats will have any real market until the price of crude gets ridiculous and the infrastructure gets in place, it's pretty cool stuff.

I drove to Seattle and back the other day in a Chevy Volt. A couple of years ago, folks swore that would never happen, and I would have agreed with them. We traveled some 75 miles or so round trip, and while it's not technically a series hybrid, it's the closest I've been around in a car.

Anyhow... sorry you have all the bitterness in your life. That must really eat at ya over time. Not sure how old you are Rick, but it'll take it's toll on ya eventually.

SomeSailor · Dec 26, 2012

Art said:
"Energy-Loss-Transfer" must occur, simple as that! If energy is created by petrol engine and transferred by any means directly to electric engine, or for even more energy loss factors stored in battery first and then transferred to electric engine, the overall efficiency values as compared to energy directly from petrol engine to prop-shaft must be diminished.

No one is saying free. What you're missing is you leave the dock with XXX KW of stored energy. You spend that along the way and eventually need to switch to diesel. The efficiency is in the fact that you can recharge either at the dock or on the hook, or both.

It's the basic theory behind a series hybrid (think Chevy Volt). The Prius is a Parallel Hybrid, and the Volt is a Series Hybrid (sort of). A boat would likely need to be a series hybrid to get any range and could take advantage of dockside recharges.

BruceK · Dec 27, 2012

sunchaser said:
For a nice Christmas present bflloyd, check this out.
Greenline Hybrid

The 33 was at the Sydney 2012 BoatShow.
There is a popular annual race from Darwin to Alice Springs for solar powered cars. They are usually built by Universities or Tertiary Colleges, look abominably cramped and hot, have an entire roof of panels, but built light go like the clappers, especially if the sun holds, as it usually does there, on very straight roads which until recently had absolutely no speed limit. Entries come from overseas as well as local. The racing is intended to promote solar powering research.

Art · Dec 27, 2012

SomeSailor said:
No one is saying free. What you're missing is you leave the dock with XXX KW of stored energy. You spend that along the way and eventually need to switch to diesel. The efficiency is in the fact that you can recharge either at the dock or on the hook, or both.

It's the basic theory behind a series hybrid (think Chevy Volt). The Prius is a Parallel Hybrid, and the Volt is a Series Hybrid (sort of). A boat would likely need to be a series hybrid to get any range and could take advantage of dockside recharges.

[/FONT][/COLOR]

You are speaking of recharging an expensive, big, and very heavy weight battery bank at dock, “... or on the hook” (BTW: By what fast or slow energy producing system’s means on the hook do you refer... hydrocarbon powered gen set, alternator on hydrocarbon fueled main engine, small arrangement of expensive low kWh producing PV solar panels, small kWh producing wind prop generator, or minor kWh tidal-current-capturing prop in water?). What you are missing in the broad (i.e. global) scope of things is that “... [for] you [to] leave the dock with XXX KW of stored energy” you have sapped that energy from the regional electric power grid, whose power is derived primarily from hydrocarbon (coal or nat-gas) fired and/or nuclear powered electric plants. Additionally, the “Energy-Loss-Transfer” factor from said power plants’ utility scale electricity manufacturing facilities to your boat, or car, or home is substantial. Therefore... when the majority of cars, trucks, boats, motorcycles and other vehicle types begin relying on the regional, national, and even international power grids for an enormous new load of charging their huge battery banks the overall pollution created by the electric power grid’s hydrocarbon fired and nuclear powerd plants will go right off the charts. To combat that occurrence the cost per kWh will experience dramatic increases for all customers’, i.e. consumers’ residential, boating, or commercial accounts. Again, there is no free-trade-off coming in forseable future for any type of power that has enough clout to motivate the over 1.5 billion existing vehicles (of all types) currently on this planet. Hydrocarbon-fuel and nuclear-reaction powered electric plants are the most efficient electric energy producers now in existence. Solar plants (of any type), wind powered plants, wave powered plants, geothermal plants, damed-water generators and other “non-polluting” sources of utility scale GW electricity production are minimal in scope to the “main-scope” of electric power manufacturing plants comprised of hydrocarbon and nuclear sources.

Additionally: The pollution content of the types of battery banks that could currently be produced to power hundreds of millions of vehicles would not only tax the resources needed for such an undertaking but upon each banks’ demise (which they will do) the efforts needed to stop pollution therein created would be nearly insurmountable to handle. So... better battery bank types need to be devised if we are to globally follow this power storage/usage path.

What this world needs is an atmospherically recyclable hydrocarbon feedstock source of fuels that is globally available and can be refined into the three main hydrocarbon fuel types, i.e. diesel, gasoline and jet fuel that are drop-in fungible with refined crude oil fuels. This technique is now being thoroughly worked toward via atmospheric separation of Carbon Dioxide that can be developed into Syngas and then refined into the three main fuel types. All portions of the complex CO2 atmospheric separation apparatus I’m engaged in developing are solar powered. Its technical function is known as Direct Air Capture (DAC). My Corporation along with many other corps as well a Sandia National Labs and several universities have been cooperatively heading toward this objective for some time. The complete recycling object is that CO2 feedstock separated from atmosphere and then turned into liquid hydrocarbon fuels go right back into atmosphere upon combustion engine use for ongoing recycling purposes. It can be done, we have working models. In global scales it can be made considerably affordable, we have proof-in-principal calculations. Detramental headwinds we are encountering are ample funding to push our system into utility scale development and national/international push back from Big Oil companies.

Alemao · Dec 27, 2012

Very good. Lets find a miracle

)

Gas v/s diesel for trawlers

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