Hey Mark F -- SolidNav???

I saw in another thread that Mark F was putting a SolidNav electric motor on his boat. Wonder if that has happened, or if anyone knows more about using electric as auxillary propulsion. Info on the internet is still a bit sparse, especially in the way of independent reviews.

Thanks

Paul
E29 "Bear"

Paul, I've put my project on hold for at least one more season. I'd be starting from scratch on an E23, shaft and all. I did get a quote from OZ and the price was scary:eek~6k for the works). Anyway, this thread has links to all the major players. There's also an Electric Boat site on Yahoo(haven't been keeping up at all).

http://www.ericsonyachts.org/infoexchange/showthread.php?t=5453

Hi Paul,
Yes I did get a SolidNav Explorer. It's installed and providing my access (pre sail hoist to the open ocean from the Santa Cruz Harbor. It's a great unit, well thought-out, well built with plenty of power. I've started out with the prop I had on my E27 which is undersized for the e motor and just 4 group 27 12 volt batteries for power. The plan is to replace the small prop and add another bank of group 31's for extended run time but I wanted to see what the unit would do with the existing prop and how much increase in performance I get from the proper prop. I'll get some photos and add some more performance numbers later.

Steve, I'll have around $6000 into the repower by the time I get the next set of batteries and a new prop. It's been a real learning experience figuring out all the particulars - but the next one....!!! would be a piece of cake.

Thanks for the feedback guys. I'll continue to get educated on the possibilities of going electric. Mark, as you get acquainted with the motor and new prop I'd be interested in your take on its regeneration capabilities under sail and what kind of boat speed you need to have to make it work.

Paul
E29 "Bear"

Ericson 27 repower to electric

I have an E27 that I pulled the A4 last month and have installed the solid nav explorer 48v electric motor. After reprop, I have plenty of power but not sure of my range yet. Having to work out the details on a monitoring system and also, some kind of back up so I can do some cruising. Currently we do mostly day sailing on Lake Michigan. This is working well for in and out of port, but I would not want to get to far from home and lose wind or have a problem and feel that I need to motor 10-20 miles. I have 4 new group 27 westmarine agms powering the system. I have reproped with a CDI two blade 13inch 10pitch prop. This made a world of difference in power, but I have no regen. I have been told that I will need a three blade with the highest pitch poss to get decent regen. Just want to know what others are doing with monitoring and set up. Mark F appears to be the only other person that I have been able to track down in different forums so far. Mark- would love to hear how things are going and what I could do to improve my boat- "the sonnet" but thinking of changing to "the socket" Thanks.

Hey Brian,

I got your Private Message and responded to it before seeing this post. Hope you don't mind me posting it here (I added some stuff after reading your post here). One other thing, how much clearance do you have with the 13" prop?

Mark

Hi Brian,

I'm using a PakTrakr monitor. It's pretty good but does not really give me the correct state of charge (SOC) readings. The batteries I'm using are AGM's and the AGM setting on the PakTrakr is a bit off from my batteries (reads too low % SOC). If you order a PakTrakr you can have the manufacturer set the SOC 100% - 0% exactly for your batteries. ***(100% -12.9 & 0% 11.8 for your Sea Volt 27's)***

I got the current sensor also, it's great to see the rate of amps going out. You can really save some amp hours by checking the amp usage.

I have a 11x10 fixed prop right now which gives me 4.8 knots at full throttle, the prop is too small, but I knew that going in. I plan on buying a Campbell 12x10 three blade fixed soon.

Not sure about range, I only have 4 - 92 AH batteries and haven't had any issues with running low. I don't motor very far. That said I have 4 - 110AH batteries ordered to add to the mix.

It seems my controller is putting out about 64 amps in full forward and 92 amps in full reverse. Solidnav has a fix for it and will fix it next time they're in town (Santa Cruz CA)***(factory support is fantastic)***. Having a current sensor is a must. I wouldn't have known that I wasn't getting full power in forward without it.

Not sure about regen yet as I have to set up my current sensor differently. With my setup I'm only getting motor draw.

Lots of interesting new stuff this electric propulsion!

All in all I'm happy with the unit and enjoy the tinkering aspect!

How did your existing control cables work for you?

What kind of performance readings are you getting?

Any photos?

Thanks, Mark

Solid Nav electric motor

Mark- The prop I had existing was a two blade 9" and barely got me moving 3 knots. I was actually nervous trying to make it out the channel a few times into 3-4ft waves and head wind. I reproped experimentally with a CDI (plastic prop) two blade 13/10 which cuts it close on clearance (1 3/4"=10%). This made a tremendous change in proformance. I can power through just about anything and making around 6.5-7 mph (5.5-6kts). There is a lot of vibration noise from prop wash at full throttle, but if you back off to around 4.5 knots it is fairly quiet. No question even at FT still much more pleasant then the old A4. THERE IS NO REGEN WITH THE TWO BLADE. I believe the prop goes vertical because of the keel and reduces drag. I am likely going to change to either a 12/10 or 13/10 three blade. Would like to see how yours works out. I definitely want to make sure I have the power first, Regen second. Gauges, I ordered a Sevcon gauge that Jason reccomended, but turned out that it did not work with the current motor controller. Jason had ordered a Paktrkr to try out and just sent it on to me as a trade for the Sevcon gauge. The unit that I received did not seem to work correct from the get go and had a blown fuse. Talk about Cust Service, Jason actually drove all the way from the west coast (to scope the area for dealers to carry his product) and stopped by to check on my install. He helped a ton and got the Paktrkr to work, but the SOC was the same as you explained, always read lower than what I thought. Not sure how far down you can safely run those AGMs before you hurt them. Jason said down to 40v which did not seem right to me, but I was on average burning about 1v per use, which was in out of slip/channel and messing around a little, but likely less than 30min use of FT. The Paktrkr 2 weeks ago, just stopped working and I have sent it back to the company and awaiting there resolution. I did order the amp meter as well to come back out with the new/fixed unit. The push pull cables worked fine for me, but the gear cable I have is oversized for the old A4 and I had to do some modification to get it to work. I would prefer to just have one lever, forward/reverse then the seperate, but suppose for regen you my need them seperate. Using the Duopro 4 bank charger and works great. Couple things I like especially about this system is that it is always on. No turning over a motor or having it stall. Although, last week we were motoring in for about a 10 min stretch and suddenly nothing. Wasn't sure at the time what happened, but after some trouble shooting, I deduced it to a connection that likely dropped the volts and caused the motor to shut down. Jason mentioned that if volts drop to a certain amount, the system will shut down as a safty measure. If you turn it off and back on, it will reset provided volts aren't still depressed. That was the case and I have had no issues since. I like the fact that you can be sailing say through the channel and lose the wind and just touch the throttle ever so lightly to get through the becalmed areas. No one knows that you have used the motor, probably could become a race issue if more people start using this tech. Like you, I enjoy the newness and the tinkering aspect. Keep exchanging notes so we can tweek our riggs.
Brian

Thank you guys very much for your input!

I am glad that you are enjoying your motors and data collection on nearly identical hulls with different prop dimensions has been invaluable. I own a 27 and have found them to be some of the finest built production boats on the market. It's a good sailing hull that will still be on the water when many other production boats will be under it. I am excited to see more Ericsons powered with our systems. If you send us your performance, we will send back a really nice graph that will give you real-word performance information (I can post on here if the group would like as well.)

All we need is Amp Draw @ knts per hours and I will send back the time and miles possible @ capacity in a useful format. We have developed them for other common hulls and Ericsons should not be an exception.


Thanks again for your support and let us know if we can help!
-Jason

http://www.ozmarine.se/OZecoDrive/Eng/IndexOZecoDriveEng.html

Anyone tried a motor from this vendor?

LB

Electric Propulsion

I just found your thread. In the interest of full disclosure, I am a distributor of Electric Yacht systems. Now to my thoughts, I recently installed a 180A system in my newport 30 (removed an Atomic 4) and will likely do the same for my Ericson 27 (it has a very strong universal m25 in it now). The prop is a key to these electric drive systems - bigger is better and three blade is a must for regeneration.
I am interested in promoting electric propulsion and am interested in what others have done. I have purchased a very popular website to run independently of my business (it will have a link to me at the bottom but will include all interested users) that will have stories of boaters who have re-powered regardless of who they used or if they did it with their own design. The site is to promote electric sailing.
http://www.electric-sailboat.com/page1/page1.html
I am also planing of have a gathering of as many electric propelled sailboats join me at the Dana Point Boat Show and Green Expo in June 9 to 12 in Dana Point California:
http://www.danaboatshow.com/
If these ideas are of interest to you and if you would like to share your story, please contact me. I will include other manufactures contact information on the site so that users can get the most information.
Regards,
Mike Gunning
electricyachtssocal.com

Hey Mike,

Welcome to electric propulsion. I am more than satisfied with my SolidNav unit. You are right about prop size, bigger is better. What kind of numbers are you getting current draw, top speed and cruise? Truth be told an electric propulsion system in your sailboat gets pretty boring, if you like working on your motor, not much to do once it's installed.

What are you using for battery monitoring? Batteries? Size of your propulsion bank (s)?

SolidNav has been quite lately, I hope they survive. Electric Yacht seems to be doing great with 90 units sold and more orders coming in. They are a great company, very helpful and make a good product.

Electric Propulsion

Mark,
The numbers are raw. The displacement is 10,000#s plus and we are seeing the following:
2 knots 8amps
3 knots 11amps
4 knots 30amps
5 knots 55amps
The boat has 8 6v AGM Lifeline batteries, 300AH each, and was set up to do the 40 mile Long Beach to Catalina run and back on one charge. The 180ibl is larger than I needed as it puts out 9HP. The computer is telling me that I am going to get there and about 2/3 the way back at 4 knots and all the way at 3.5 knots. We are still tuning the boat and expect to improve it as we complete that. The boat was not abused but in need of a lot of retrofit and cleaning.
I hope you and others take to heart my offer to host the electric sailboat site as a site to encourage others to go the route we have taken. I think that Boat Show and rendezvous could make a lot of sense and can be done by others around the US.
Mike
www.electricyachtssocal.com

Hi Mike,

The unit in the Electric Sailboat site that you bought was the prototype for the SolidNav Explorer. I did see that it was for sale, congratulations. I will definitely contribute to the Electric Sailboat site when you get it up and running. Your website looks good.

Are you going to be at the Strictly Sail in Oakland? I've had some communication with Scott and Bill at Electric Yachts recently and they were not sure they would attend. I'm thinking about sailing up from Santa Cruz for the show. I'd like to get a group of E-Sailboats to go to the Oakland show.

There is going to be a small gathering of San Francisco Bay Electric Sailboat owners and interested prospective converts this Sunday at Treasure Island. It would be nice to sail up for that but I'm not going to be able to pull that off. I will go (boat-less) to check out what people have.

300 amp hrs... nice!

E27 Electric Yacht System

This is all great information. I am installing an Electric Yacht System 180i in my E27. I will post pictures of the refit.

Welcome bblakesley,

Good choice with the Electric Yacht unit. I'm sure you are getting help from Scott and Bill at EY but if you have any Ericson 27 specific questions don't hesitate to ask.

My boat is currently 200 miles away and I need to know what size three blade prop I can put on the original shaft. I am trying to save myself the drive. I need this information so I can get the correct set-up from EY. If anyone could help me with that I would be oh so very grateful.

Thanks

Hi bblakesly,

I have a 12x10 fixed three blade. I have heard of other E27's with 13" props but I think that is pushing it. I would like to try a 12x11 or 12x12 three blade on my boat as that might give me a bit more regen capability. With the 12x10 I get 4 knots at 20 amps and 5.7 knots at 80 amps. Pretty good numbers.

There are two others on this site with E27's that have converted to Electric Propulsion, maybe they will chime in.... Brian, Don?

Anyone know where I could find a new 3 blade 12x10 prop for my E27 and what is the shaft size?

Try this company

Talk to the guys who do your hull cleaning and they will know the shaft as they put the zinks on. Also contact the following:
performance.props@verizon.net
I have not spoken to them yet, but we believe that they may have the may have a very good solution with composite props.
Regards,
Mike

Hi bblakesley,

The shaft on my 1976 E27 with an Atomic 4 gasoline engine was/is 3/4". I'd guess that's what you have but you never know for sure until you measure it.

Like Mike wrote, the CDI (Performance Propellers) work well (see Brian's post above) but they only make two blade props so you might not get regeneration. I wish they still made three blade props.