Engine controls

Both of my boats have single lever engine controls. Looking at trawlers on Yachtworld I see that almost all trawlers have two lever controls. What I am wondering is why not go with single lever controls, particularly on a boat with twin engines. It seems to that it would be easier to handle the engine on a twin engine boat with two single lever controls rather than separate shifter and throttle controls. It can't be a quality issue since makers like Kobelt make very high quality single lever controls.

I find that when you're in close, you're usually just shifting gears at or near idle speed. When I have to throttle up a bit.one way or another, it's not a big deal to switch to the throttle. O. Single.levers, im.often tepted to use more throttle than I really need

Lutarious said:

I find that when you're in close, you're usually just shifting gears at or near idle speed. When I have to throttle up a bit.one way or another, it's not a big deal to switch to the throttle. O. Single.levers, im.often tepted to use more throttle than I really need

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Exactly!

I like single levers for both twin engine boats and single. For my single I often do quick power bursts of throttle and reverse to prop walk. On the sportfishing boat I run occasionally I mostly don't need to use throttle but it's nice to know its there.

My sporty has dual controlls. I much prefer the singles, and have a couple of sets of them, just to lazy to swap them out.

I like duals. I keep my engine idled down to around 500 rpm so I can make very little wake. When maneuvering around docks, I kick it up to 650 to get some bite, and leave it there while shifting. Can't do that with a single lever.

Also hard to slam shift with a dual. Clutch is engaged by the time you get your hand off one stick and on to the other to juice it. Single lever it is easy to advance throttle before clutch engages... then BANG.

The best thing I ever did on Volunteer was to dump the Morse twin controls and change single Micro commander controls..wish I had those on the current Ocean Alexander... (the micro commander has adjustable lag time to prevent slam shifting )

Hollywood

Most of the single or dual controls are cable operated.

Folks going crusing might want to take a page from the motorcycle crowd.

Slip a new cable down next to the existing throttle or shift cable and tape it in place.

Extra clevis pins would not hurt.

When its replacement time you are ready.

Remember if the cable path is not very tight larger more robust (series 43 , not 33) cables cost little more but last longer.

For dual station installations dual lever controls are easier and cheaper to rig. There is no good way to rig mechanical single lever controls for dual or more stations.
With electronic controls this is no problem, and as we see more of them and the prices come down I believe they will eventually replace mechanical controls on dual station (or more) boats

Keysdisease said:

For dual station installations dual lever controls are easier and cheaper to rig. There is no good way to rig mechanical single lever controls for dual or more stations.

With electronic controls this is no problem, and as we see more of them and the prices come down I believe they will eventually replace mechanical controls on dual station (or more) boats

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I sure hope electronic controls get a "fail safe" feature built in (maybe some brands all ready do).

Over the years I've read several bad situations where the electronics malfunctioned for different reasons and in different levels of breakdown. Of course breakdown can happen to mechanical controls too... but turning a wrench for onboard repairs is easier for me than trying to figure out which part of an electrical computer-chip system is at fault. Besides... having correct chip aboard for repair is unlikely. I do have a full set of duplicate cables, if need be.


That said: I hear the electronic systems provide very smooth, seemless operations when correctly functioning.

I grew up on sailboats and all had single controls. I have had twins on a catamaran with singles and they maneuvered just fine. My current trawler has a single.

But I have used duals and they take a few minutes to get used to and longer to respond properly in a "panic' situation. But time heals all wounds. I certainly appreciate Ski's point about limitations on "slamming" with duals.

And FWIW my experiences with electronic controls have been abysmal. The ZF/Mathers MicroCommander control would trip out randomly and drop into idle/neutral. Resetting power cleared it until the next time. Some say that this was caused by an installation relay problem, others feel it is inherent in the control.

I do understand that Kobelt makes a more bulletproof system.

David

Keysdisease said:

There is no good way to rig mechanical single lever controls for dual or more stations.

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I think you will find that Kobelt makes a superb single-lever, dual-station control system. It is smooth as silk and rugged as can be. It is, however a little pricy.

I finally got fed-up with juggling a 5-turn wheel with dual lever controls on my single-engine boat from a pilothouse. The addition of this Kobelt control system and a bow thruster eliminated the drama.

This is how I spell relief!

We have ZF MM and haven't had any problems. If they do give us problems , out they go and in go an electronic kobelt system.

A lot of what is said above does not take the apples vs oranges concept into account. Not all engine control units single or double are created equal and comparing a modern electronic system to a older mechanical unit may be misleading. I have had boats with both types of units and find the electronic unit either with the primary Glendenning single levers or when used with a wireless remote to be free of fault regarding use while docking. No doubt the arguments about reliability and repair will pop up they always do when new technology is applied to mechanical units.

Lutarious said:

I find that when you're in close, you're usually just shifting gears at or near idle speed........ Single.levers, I'm often tempted to use more throttle than I really need

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That's been my experience. I don't like the "lag" time that the Micro Commanders have either. They take some getting used to when operating in tight places.

I stand corrected. The usual problem with this scenario is the "throttle up in neutral" feature. Kobelt gets around this by only having this feature at the "master" control.

In the past Morse offered a "station changer" that was very complex and had lots of friction from all the cables. No longer available.

Kobelt is good stuff, didn't know they had this unit

LarryM said:

I think you will find that Kobelt makes a superb single-lever, dual-station control system. It is smooth as silk and rugged as can be. It is, however a little pricy.

I finally got fed-up with juggling a 5-turn wheel with dual lever controls on my single-engine boat from a pilothouse. The addition of this Kobelt control system and a bow thruster eliminated the drama.

This is how I spell relief!

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We have Glendinning controls, swapped from standard cable controls, and love them. The flybridge station has mechanical backups- so we have the best of both.

We used Mathers/ZF MicroCommander on almost all the trawlers at Great Harbour. In tens of thousands of hours of use, we found it to be a very robust, reliable system that allows a myriad of easy adjustments (lag time being just one) and the excellent, built-in synchronizer was an added bonus.

However, nothing is perfect in this world - and there was one owner who had a very serious issue with his expensive Mathers controls. As you might know, although these are indeed "electronic controls", the MicroCommander control units are located in the engine room and are actually connected to the (non-electronic) Yanmars' transmissions and throttle linkages via short lengths of typical, mechanical cable. Well, in this case, while underway in the ICW, the bolt that secures the end of the cable sheath to one of the transmissions loosened up enough to release the cable sheath. So, unbeknownst to our intrepid captain, the shifter was having zero effect other than just moving the cable in and out of the housing. With a standard, mechanical, cable-operated clutch, you would "feel" the lack of resistance when trying to shift out of forward gear and immediately realize there was an issue (and hopefully have the presence of mind to simply shut down that engine.) However, the electronic controls offer no such direct connection. In fact, regardless of whether the cables are attached properly or not, they feel just like always, since the captain is, in effect, just moving a potentiometer that sends an electronic signal to the MicroCommander control head. Which, in turn, simply pulls or pushes on the cable and doesn't really "care" if the cable is even connected to anything

So, when the captain pulled both engines out of gear to come to a stop and wait for a bridge, one engine did not shift to neutral, so the boat kept moving forward. This seemed odd and, since he was getting close to the bridge, the captain pulled both engines into reverse. This had the effect of putting one engine in reverse, while leaving the other in forward (since the cable moved some more, but it was still doing nothing to control the actual shift lever on the side of the transmission.) By now the boat was starting to pirouette and getting ever closer to the bridge - leaving the captain completely dumbfounded as to why the boat would not stop. Panic was setting in, so he left both engine levers in the reverse position and simply poured on more throttle. Since props are much more effective in forward than reverse, and since one of the engines was still actually in forward gear, this had the effect of exponentially speeding up the boat's progress towards the opening bridge until finally, the out of control vessel slammed into the bridge, causing many thousands of dollars damage to the boat.

From that point on, as part of the new boat training, I always told my buyers (and bareboat charterers) to give the throttle and clutch cables a sharp tug as part of their morning engine room checks - along with a retelling of this story to illustrate the importance.

So, would I have Mathers/ZF controls on my boat? You bet. In a heartbeat. SO many features and benefits. But you can be sure that I would check the connections religiously!

ERIC

Last year my dock mate had his 50 footer T boned by a Mikelson that had a Mathers malfunction.

BTW, what would be the cost all in to have a pro install a set of Kobelts at two stations?

This is an interesting thread to me. I have a single engine with separate throttle and transmission controls. I have only used a single shifter once and found it a little harder to be sure I was in neutral - but maybe it was just something I'd get used to. I really like being able to just shift without moving the throttle - for close quarters maneuvering and mentioned before.

My controls are Hynautic hydraulic ones - my mechanic told me to get rid of them and replace them with electric. He had to clean them out and service them for me when they became clogged. Apparently this is a problem with them - though there are many still in use. I'll have to see where this is on my long list of priorities!

Richard

TDunn said:

Both of my boats have single lever engine controls. Looking at trawlers on Yachtworld I see that almost all trawlers have two lever controls. .

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I think you'll find that newer cruisers tend to have single lever controls, be they single or twin engine.

Our PNW boat is a 1973 with two engines. As was typical back then, the boat has dual lever controls (Morse) with the throttles paired on one quadrant and the shift levers paired on another quadrant.

Our other two boats have single-lever controls. Personally, it's six of one, half dozen of the other. For maneuvering we use opposed thrust, rudder, and differential power all the time. We don't find it any different doing this with the dual-lever controls on the one boat and the single-lever controls on the other multi-engine boat (the third boat is a single-engine outboard fishing boat).

We don't find that the single-lever controls tend to make us use more power. We use additional power a lot in maneuvering anyway. The only difference is that it takes fewer hand movements to maneuver with the single-lever controls, but not so much that it makes the dual lever control boat seem more clunky or difficult to maneuver.

We try to make as few shifts as possible while maneuvering anyway, so it's not like we're dancing all over the place with the controls. On the two cruising boats we've timed how long it takes a shaft to stop spinning when its transmission is shifted from in gear to neutral at idle rpm. Pausing in neutral that amount of time while shifting from one gear to the other when maneuvering is equally easy with single or dual lever controls.

Bottom line is we have no preference, and we don't feel one system offers any significant advantages over the other. They both work equally well during maneuvering in our opinions and experience. However we know people who swear by one or the other and have strong opinions about their preferences.

Actually my favorite system, simply because it's so much fun to work, is the traditional system on the traditional-style narrow boat we use in the UK (photo). The shifting is done with a long lever with a D-shaped handle on it that is connected to the transmission in the engine room forward of the boatman's cabin. You push the handle forward for forward, put in the middle position for neutral, and pull it aft for reverse.

The throttle is a brass wheel called a speedwheel. Rotating it rotates a long rod that also runs forward into the engine room. A threaded section of the rod moves a vertical rod back and forth which in turn is attached to the throttle arm of the big three-cylinder, air-cooled Lister diesel. Rotating the wheel clockwise increases the power, counterclockwise decreases it until it hits the stop which is idle.

The system is a hoot to use and makes maneuvering this 60' long, 20-ton boat a lot of fun. Most of the modern narrowboats use single-lever controls. Very boring compared to the traditional speedwheel controls.

Kobelt controls with cablecraft "Green" cables are bullet proof and relatively inexpensive. Morse controls were/are made by SATAN. Morse 43 series cables are ok.

We ordered single lever controls for our trawler from HopCar but have not had time to install them yet.

Art said:

I sure hope electronic controls get a "fail safe" feature built in (maybe some brands all ready do).

Over the years I've read several bad situations where the electronics malfunctioned for different reasons and in different levels of breakdown. Of course breakdown can happen to mechanical controls too... but turning a wrench for onboard repairs is easier for me than trying to figure out which part of an electrical computer-chip system is at fault. Besides... having correct chip aboard for repair is unlikely. I do have a full set of duplicate cables, if need be.


That said: I hear the electronic systems provide very smooth, seemless operations when correctly functioning.

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Major mistake was to install electronic controls for my auxiliary engine. Several electronic issues over the years and then the manufacturer declared the unit obsolete after 11 years and I couldn't replace a $2 belt. Told to buy the modern version.

bay pelican said:

major mistake was to install electronic controls for my auxiliary engine. Several electronic issues over the years and then the manufacturer declared the unit obsolete after 11 years and i couldn't replace a $2 belt. Told to buy the modern version.

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Bummer!

Bay Pelican said:

Major mistake was to install electronic controls for my auxiliary engine. Several electronic issues over the years and then the manufacturer declared the unit obsolete after 11 years and I couldn't replace a $2 belt. Told to buy the modern version.

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I've had just the opposite experience with Glendinning. The system I installed is from the late 90s- I called Glendinning, and they not only know the system, the built me cables and an EEPROM update to bring the system current.

Pau Hana said:

We have Glendinning controls, swapped from standard cable controls, and love them. The flybridge station has mechanical backups- so we have the best of both.

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We just started playing with our Glendinning synchronizer. Seems to work great. I engage it after clearing the dock and then only need one throttle stick to control both engines.

Got a little scared when I tried to use slave engine throttle after shutting off the synchronizer and got no response. Then I remembered it had to be put all the way back to slow before it would reengage.

I think it's a pretty cool system.