Annie Hill wrote:
My Nissan 6hp is the same engine and now that it understands that pulling that bit of string is a subtle hint that it should go chugga-chugga-chugga-chug, we have been the best of friends.
I don't want to turn my boat into a generating station and it is interesting to speculate on whether a rarely-used, second-hand, four-stroke is doing more or less.damagw than brand new, solar panels,motor and batteries that are also little used.
In my view the question of electric contra petrol/diesel propulsion has several aspects:
- · Cost to buy and install: On boats like Weaverbird, Ingeborg and FanShi, some sort of outboard engine would be the choice. In either case, the electric engines are a lot more expensive than petrol engines. You can burn petrol ‘forever’ to reach the initial costs of the electric plant, at least on a sailboat where the engine is used sparsely.
- · Reliability: The outboards made a jump in reliability when changing from 2- to 4-stroke. I dumped my last 2-stroke in 1984, and have never looked back. In spring 2018 I replaced the sparkplug in Ingeborg’s Tohatsu, which turned out to be covered in soot after 3-4 seasons. My use of the engine; 20-50 starts each season, and short runs at low speed, was a sure way of asking for trouble. Early this month I removed that ‘new’ plug from 2018: It looked like new, and was refitted. I believe the reason for this is that I exclusively have been using Alkylate petrol since 2018. Its clean burning has ensured easy starts and sweet running since then.
- · Green feel-good factor: The fuel consumption on my Tohatsu is 2-4 litre a year, including 2-3 winter-starts. In comparison; if I visit my harbour 50 times a year, my little car drives about 750km and burns about 35-40 litre of petrol. If I want to boost my green factor, I’d rather invest in a little 2-, 3- or 4-wheeled vehicle - preferably one that doesn’t send me to hospital...
Preliminary conclusion: I bet the batteries and solar panels will improve and the price of electric motors will drop in the coming years, but for now, I stick with my 4-stroke engine running on Alkylate petrol.
For the science, I hope to retrieve that soot-covered sparkplug from 2018. I will then just rinse the tip of it enough to start the engine. Then I will run it for an hour, and see how the sparkplug looks after that. I would not be surprised if it has been cleaned up.
Arne
