T-Pain Is On A Boat: Re: [Electric Boats] I am thinking about considering building an E-Boat

Sunday, October 31, 2010

Re: [Electric Boats] I am thinking about considering building an E-Boat

I think you have a good start. Sailboats are easily driven hulls and removing the rig and ballast keel will offset most or all of the weight of the batteries. I use a 2 x 6v battery system on a 18' canoe, it gets me 20+ mi with a MinnKota 40. I'm not familiar with a Rainbow, but you might want a 24v system as you can use a bigger trolling motor.

I'm guessing you'll have to create your own spreadsheet.
A "kill-a-watt" meter can be used to determine how much AC power it takes to recharge your batteries. Plug your battery charger into it and it'll give you total power watt-hrs used, and other stuff. About $25.
A battery monitor such as a Link or Trimetric will monitor your battery consumption for you.

Good Luck!!!

Willie

--- On Sun, 10/31/10, Bill Spires <spiresac@yahoo.com> wrote:

From: Bill Spires <spiresac@yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: [Electric Boats] I am thinking about considering building an E-Boat
To: electricboats@yahoogroups.com
Date: Sunday, October 31, 2010, 1:41 AM

I am thinking about building an electric boat and that is why I joined the group. I think I have found the perfect hull for me. An old Rainbow sailboat. It is currently a complete sailboat but I plan to convert it to an E-boat only with no mast or keel. I have a 36 volt golf cart motor but I think I will start off with just a trolling motor. The lake I live on is approximately 7 mile s wide and 20 miles long with about 600 miles of shoreline. I need about 10-12 miles of range at about 4 knots. I think a 2 battery setup with an electric trolling motor will give me what I am looking for. I will carry a small generator to run the blender and provide a supplemental charge. I will re-charge the batteries from shore power after a cruise and I am planning to put at least on solar panel on with a diode just to keep the batteries topped.

Any thoughts o the above?

I would like to instrument the boat so that I can know exactly how efficient it is. If I go for a little sunset cruise how can I tell how many kilowatts it will take to recharge the batteries? A spreadsheet that we could just plugs some numbers into would be nice,,, and a computer programmed to do all the calculations while we are out cruising would also be nice. Tie in the GPS as an auto pilot and I can concentrate on running the blender.

Are we having fun yet?

Capt. Bill
From the Palmetto State