My first electric yacht was a 26' Fiberglass Folkboat that I use to power with an electric trolling motor as an auxiliary. I sailed all over the Chesapeake with that boat!!
I use to teach at the Annapolis Sailing School so I know the Rainbow very well, and frankly it would not be a good choice for conversion to an electric powerboat for a variety of reasons. The relatively deep draft and heavy ballast would make for a very slow boat that would quickly drain batteries. Add to this the very large wetted surface area and you might end up with a very frustrating boat with limited range and difficult maneuverability. A light power boat would be faster, and have more range ... and besides part of dies at the thought of of one of the lovely old Rainbows dis-masted and turned into a powerboat.
Skip
Bill, I agree with Dan. That Rainbow hull is round and once you take the fin keel off it is going to be pretty tippy. You will need weight in the bilge area to offset that, but it still may not be enough to keep it as stable as you may like.
SallyOn Sun, Oct 31, 2010 at 10:58 AM, danbollinger <no_reply@yahoogroups.com> wrote:
Bill, A word of caution about using sailboats as motorboats. Most sailboats are designed to have poor initial stability, but very good ultimate stability when heeled over. Motor boats are the opposite.
The 1120 pound ballast/keel is half of the boat's 2250 pound displacement , and is partially there to resist the forces of the wind on the sails and provide lift, they are there to stabilize the hull.
Even if you move the ballast inside by using batteries, it might not be enough to make a safe boat. This may or may not be an issue, considering you are using this on protected waters.
The Rainbow hull sketch does seem like an easily driven hull, and there seems to be room to slide batteries under the cockpit.
> 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
>
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