Planing hull into FD

It's not black or white.

Sure I wish I had sprint speed..but I'd be tempted every time I wanted to get some place sooner.

With a lot of cruising...that could be a lot of fuel.

So it boils down to budget and a lot of what ifs and what can I live with and without.

Weather not so much on the East Coast of the US/Bahamas...the only thing really hard to predict in the course of a single day is a pop up thunderstorm that you just deal with at any speed...most fast boats if they definitely can't outrun it wind up slowing down anyhow. That's for typical coastal/ICW cruising. Even just a few knots may really help when trvelling offshore.

I do now remember one time I wish I had a faster boat.

It was the middle of winter in SE Alaska and we were trying to get to Petersburg from Thorne Bay. Not really that far but we figured we could make it in two days. Wrong.

Forecast was bad for late in the day. We ran our FD Willard on stern seas starting out at 2 or 3'. Seas were building all day and when we arrived at Coffman Cove it was nearly dark and the stern seas were at least 7'. We turned and took the seas on the beam w the expected rolling and headed up the channel by nav and town lights. Was blow'in 40 as we tied up to a big aluminum fish boat as the harbor was small and full. Heavy rain and 50 knot winds all night long.

The next leg was even shorter to St John's Bay near the entrance to the so end of Wrangell Narrows leading to Petersburg. But the tide was wrong and we could see we couldn't make it to Petersburg in daylight bucking the tide in the narrows. We probably could have done it in the dark but we bailed out and went home the next day in beautiful weather.

For us the only problem that kept us from lots of winter cruising was the lack of daylight. That and a 6 knot boat. But that was the only time our 6 knot boat kept us from what we wanted to do because she only made 6 knots.

Some say they need extra power to outrun weather. That's redulous as weather moves faster than boats and having better seaworthyness is of greater bennifit.

The only real reason to have extra power is because you think you need it. And you don't. And speed is not essential either. You just don't go as far in a given amount of time. This is pleasure boating and there's no need to get to most any given place. Just go to a place closer if you lack the speed. The idea is to have fun ......... not to get to any given place.

. . . . This is pleasure boating and there's no need to get to most any given place. Just go to a place closer if you lack the speed. The idea is to have fun ......... not to get to any given place.

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Well said sir.

Sadly, we all would acknowledge that one persons fun is another's aggravation. Life's position ultimately determining at what pace we move about. At sea or on land.

Personally, I like to stop and smell the roses. Or in this case, the salt air...

Twidget said:

Noobe question here. It looks like the cost of operation (Fuel) is the major deciding factor in most people's choice of hull type.
Thanks
Tom

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Not for this recreational boater! Fuel is less than 20% of our annual cost, at about 5 gph. Now for those who don't pay moorage, tie up at nice marinas, buy dinner at the shore side fish house, have no insurance or do any maintenance or upgrades, fuel is a big cost.

Tom:
You don't drive your carat 100 mph all the time do you? Likewise with boat speed. Use it if you want . Amazing to see people defend small engines by admitting they can't control themselves.

Typical day trip for us is a four-hour run, costing between $24 and $32 in fuel. At three outings a month, is much more affordable than spending $80 to $100 which would approach the cost of marina berthage.

OK I can understand the economy of a FD hull. But is the savings that much more than running a SD hull at the same speed, say 6kts?

Twidget said:

OK I can understand the economy of a FD hull. But is the savings that much more than running a SD hull at the same speed, say 6kts?

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I'll try again......At any given speed, weight (displacement) and length (on the waterline) are more important to efficiency than whether you have a semi-displacement or full displacement boat. Want more speed at the same RPM? Put some stuff on the dock. If you only go out for 3 hours don't carry 400 gallons of fuel and 200 of water, get a lighter dinghy with a smaller outboard, etc.

Twidget said:

OK I can understand the economy of a FD hull. But is the savings that much more than running a SD hull at the same speed, say 6kts?

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Most likely little difference, but you're possibly/likely under-loading the engine(s).

I love threads like this where some people tell you how to get to your goal with YOUR boat or one you would like to have

....and others tell you how mistaken you are and what you should have bought and powered with and what a boater should be thinking when boating....

manyboats said:

This is pleasure boating and there's no need to get to most any given place. Just go to a place closer if you lack the speed. The idea is to have fun ......... not to get to any given place.

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The last time I looked up "pleasure" the definition did not exclude going fast. Some people, including me, enjoy going fast on the water regardless of the size of the boat. It's still "recreational boating" and it's still "fun." We like going long distances fast. Where is it written that the idea of fun boating is "not to get to any given place?"

Speed, at least to a degree, is something I want in my boating. Which is why we are going from an 8 knot boat to a 25 knot boat.

You can live by whatever set of guidelines you want in terms of your definition of fun, recreational boating. But don't go defining or condemning my or anyone else's definition of fun, recreational boating. We will define that for ourselves.

OK Marin OK,
I'm just say'in it works if you want it to.

And you proved my earlier point by basically say'in speed is something you want and not something you need. And did you read what I really want is a 12 knot boat? I can have that in a twenty footer ... but not a 30'.

Yea speed is great but on the water it's usually a rough ride.

TAD,
"At any given speed" ..... One could actually compare efficiency if the speed/length ratio was used. For newbies that's a percentage of the hull speed that is dependent on the water line length. Compare a 50' at 12 knots to a 25' at 6 knots. But one could'nt compare efficiency of my 30' boat to a 50' boat at 12 knots. The problem I have w length now TAD is moorage!

bayview said:

Tom:
You don't drive your carat 100 mph all the time do you? Likewise with boat speed. Use it if you want . Amazing to see people defend small engines by admitting they can't control themselves.

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Cars go up hills otherwise they'd only need 10 or 20hp.

I don't want anyone telling me how to have fun.

The tricky part comes when your fun frightens or disrupts someone else having fun. Like the kids on jet-skis who who love to do tight doughnuts around small becalmed sailboats, or those that run their generator most of the night in a quiet anchorage. Does that extend to social responsibility? Do we have a responsibility not to burn up all our grand-children's fuel oil?

Back to the topic...

A full displacement Krogen 42 will burn about 2.5 gph at 8 knots. A semi-displacement Atlantic 44 will burn 5 gph at 7.5 knots and 6.5 gph at 9 knots. Though their weights are probably close, the Atlantic has about 3 times the installed HP of the Krogen and (at a guess) about twice the accommodation space. It's difficult to compare apples and oranges.

The old Grand Banks 50 (full displacement) burned 7.3 gph at 8.1 knots, with the same 210 HP Cats as the Atlantic 44 above. And a Midnight Lace 44 burns 4.5 gph at 10 knots, it also has the smallest interor of the four boats.

Marin said:

There isn't one if that's all the faster you can go.

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It's quite obvious that Mark could buy and operate any number of boats that go much faster than 6 knots.

TAD well said.

manyboats said:

And you proved my earlier point by basically say'in speed is something you want and not something you need.

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No, speed is also something we need. Given my work and travel schedule, which will continue for another few years, we don't have a lot of time for cruising. But we have lots of places we like to go, particularly in BC. In our current boat, it takes us three days if the weather cooperates to get to Desolation Sound. In the boat that will be replacing our current boat, we'll be able to get there in less than a day, weather permitting.

This makes much better use of our time, and incidentally is why manufactures like Grand Banks began putting bigger and bigger engines into their boats, which have semi-planing hulls. More and more buyers, with busy work schedules and limited vacation time, wanted to get somewhere fairly fast, and then spend their vacation leisurely cruising the area, and then get home fairly fast. That's what a big chunk of Grand Banks' market wants and can afford, so that's what they gave them.

The fact that you may not want to cruise this way is, to the people who do, irrelevant.

Do I want to do a two-day round trip to Sausalito or do it in one day? Do I want a four-day round trip to Sacramento or do it in two days? If the main reason was to do something at those destinations, I could drive the car to them within an hour. If the voyage itself was important, a slow boat works for me, especially being retired.

Speed is a matter of perception. Six knots in the Coot seems like 21 knots in a cruise ship.

One thing I dislike of high-speed train travel: one can't appreciate the sights.

As a sea kayaker, it still makes me giggle to rip along at 7 knots

Someone once asked what the most important technique or piece of equipment was needed for a long sea kayak expedition. My answer was, "Knowing when to get to shore, or when to stay on shore".

Point being, you don't need speed if you don't put yourself in a position where it's needed to get your ass out of a dangerous situation. Sometimes it's better to let it go and try another day, like Eric did.

Thinking other people should live their lives like you is a very dangerous concept to what most people here I bet value in boating to begin with.

psneeld said:

Thinking other people should live their lives like you is a very dangerous concept to what most people here I bet value in boating to begin with.

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What you smokin' there, Bozo?

markpierce said:

One thing I dislike of high-speed train travel: one can't appreciate the sights.

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When we are running at 25-30 knots in the small boat we see everything we see in the big boat at 8 knots. Eagles in the trees, whales, porpoises, a funky float house tucked in along the shore, you name it. And if we see something we want to watch or explore, guess what? The throttle moves backwards, too!

The difference is, when we want to simply get somewhere, the throttle moves way forward.

I like having options. In our replacement boat we'll be able to loaf along all day on one engine at 8 or 6 or whatever knots if the mood strikes. But when we want to get somewhere, we can go 25 knots on all the engines.

On our current cruiser, we're limited to just one speed-- slow. Sometimes that's fine. But other times, like this weekend when we're joining friends out in the islands but I only have three days and we would like to maximize our time with them, 8 knots is very limiting. Or when the area we want to cruise and explore is a couple hundred miles away and we only have two or three weeks to do it, we don't want to spend half that time plodding through waters we already know like the backs of our hands.

We want the option to do what we need to do, and a slow boat doesn't provide them.

Thanks for the education guys. It seems to boil down to getting a boat that fits YOUR type of boating. For me the speed is not what is important it is the operation of the boat. I love to navigate and drive and all the other things involved with moving through the water at whatever speed. If I am on the hook or tied to a pier I am board and can't wait to be moving again. But that is just me. As someone else here said YMMV.

Marin said:

...
The difference is, when we want to simply get somewhere, the throttle moves way forward.
... we can go 25 knots on all the engines.
...

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Watch out for stuff in the water!

I would say it DOES somewhat fit your budget. For the last several ears and next several...the fuel tab and "calander tab" for me are in conflict.

I wish I had more time down south to tool around and the Bahamas so a faster boat and a bigger fuel budget would have been nice...but not in the budget and eventually the calendar issues will become less important so the 6.3 knot and possibly 6 knot speed towing a big dingy will be more OK.

Operation is operation, 5, 10, 35 knots...sure it's fun at any speed versus sitting in nowhere'sville, but after droning around a 6 knots when you want to get places for all kinds of reasons....even 8 knots is 33.33% faster.

I sometimes push the Coot to 7.3 knots (top speed), especially when going against a strong current, doubling the fuel consumption rate.

Boy Mark, I bet the wind really does a number on your hairdo at that speed

markpierce said:

Watch out for stuff in the water!

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Absolutely correct on that, Mark, no question. On the other hand, hitting a deadhead at 8 knots has the potential to ruin your day every bit as much as hitting it at 25 knots (unless you've got a steel hull on your 8 knot boat)

We've been running our small boat for 27 years so far in these waters at 25-30 mph (not knots as I wrote previously), so we have both gotten real good at spotting stuff in the water out ahead of us.

CPseudonym said:

Boy Mark, I bet the wind really does a number on your hairdo at that speed

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Winds are frequently strong in the SF estuary. Perla often complains of the state of my hair, but I respond "that's what sailors look like."

markpierce said:

Winds are frequently strong in the SF estuary. Perla often complains of the state of my hair, but I respond "that's what sailors look like."

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Aptly named as that fine lady is a gem.

.......... even planning hulls with big engines get very good fuel economy numbers when going slow enough...

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Yes, most do but the boat is more costly to buy and in many cases has less interior room. Also, some planing hulls do not handle well at slow speed. They tend to wander.

In the end, like everything in life, you pays your money and you takes your choice. My boat is described as "semi planing". Well, it will go nearly twice hull speed but it takes far more fuel to do so it so I'll only ramp it up when absolutely necessary. To catch a bridge opening without waiting another hour comes to mind.