Bill,
Personally I think your approaching this from the wrong direction so I’ll ask a few questions.
| I admit I haven’t read every post on this/your subject. I’ll also admit I’m no expert but I’m trying to get to a level of proficiency that I feel comfortable. Your boat is unlike 90% of the boats on this site do to size and power requirements. In most cases the guys here have boats in the 16’ to 30’ range and their needs are much different than yours. In addition most of the boats here are sailboats, wind is our main mode of power. You’re depending on electricity alone to move your boat and I think I remember somewhere reading that you’re going to be mostly in canals and waterways. I have a 41’x 25’ Hybrid catamaran with all the bells and whistles. I have 2-9kw motors and a 16kw genset (80 amps @144v) that will allow me to motor all day and night (until the fuel runs out) and fully charge the batteries while maintaining about 6 knots. Slightly more if I’m in a canal with no wind or major wave action. My Cat is going to be more hull efficient than your house boat. I have no solar or wind generator (yet). Side note I think wind is the way to go because I can charge in the middle of the night on the hook. My genset does about 1.2 gph and I have 110 gal on board on a trip. Normally I carry at the most ½ of that to conserve weight on the bay. I can motor 3 to 4 hours under battery to 50% DOD depending on the conditions at 6 knots. MAX speed is 10 knots but no charging is going to happen, the full output of the genset is used for propulsion. My bank for Propulsion only is 12-12v AGM’s giving me 144v. I also have 3-12v batteries for house and 2-12v batteries for genset start and the windless. Questions: I don’t remember seeing any specs on the requirements for the power usage on board while at anchor. In other words how much power are you going to need to live in the house let alone move it? Your boat only has 1 prop now right? Is the roof clear and allows for the solar panels? What size is the area? What is the hull configuration? Forgive me if these have been answered before. I believe you need to run a Hybrid on this boat. A direct drive with a minimum 12hp electric motor. http://www.ikanostech.com/index.php/electric-motor-drives Ikonos use to be Solomons Tech, the system I’m using and they are developing a larger motor. You will also need as big of a genset as you can fit, hopefully a minimum of 20 Kw, larger is better http://www.polardcmarine.com/cms/ . You did say you have plenty of engine room space. This will allow you to have all the power you need in the house while on the hook and charge the batteries quickly. This gives you unlimited distance and at a much reduced fuel consumption over a straight ICE system. The big savings is in maintenance. Wind resistance using wind power is nominal since your basically powering a bread box through the water anyway. In most cases solar and wind power is used for House bank replenishment not Propulsion banks on a boat system this size. Batteries... 36v is fine for smaller systems but I believe you’re better off with a 144v System. Cost… probably more than you want to spend, I’d guess around $30k and up. This is all down and dirty but it seemed like you were trying to configure your system based on a scale that was unrealistic for the size boat and could be a maintenance nightmare. Just some food for thought. Steve in Solomons MD Hello again Myles, |
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