Yearly check to maintain performance

[BB marine]

Last winter as many know we did some extensive cruising. With more gear, clothes, supplies, food, always keeping the water fuel tank full our performance suffered. The WOT rpm just making 4000 rpm with reduced cup in the prop and the WOT speed just over 17kts the little D3 220 hp Volvo is working hard. When our trip ended we started unloading the boat. I found many items on board we never used. I then started looking at all the extra, dishes, bowls, pots and pans, silverware, clothes, tools, gadgets, cleaning supplies....... I began to inventory everything stored in the boat. Being a small boat everything needs a place. I had found places to store everything over the last few years and some of the stuff was "out of site out of mind" I never used it and forgot it was onboard!!! My tool bag that once was easy to lift and carry now felt like a big bag of bricks. I took every tool out of that bag and went through it. Half of the tools I never used and properly never would. When it comes to tools I always use the theory "you never know I may need this" most of the tools I never did need them in 5 years of cruising. After a careful assessment of all on board I removed the never used items and some of the items that were used but we had duplicates of. There was approximately 200 lbs of stuff that was not needed. I then started to access all extra food that we keep on board as we are cruising. We usually go to a marina at least every third day to fill the water tank and take a walk on land and socialize. It seems that we always get some provisions. Why have all the extra supplies on board? I mention all this because the boats we cruise in are small narrow beam, short water line boats, that performance is greatly effected by adding weight to them.

Why I bring this up. Recently we listed Our C26 for sale. After removing all the unused stuff I started to unload all the gear on board I filled many plastic bins and I was amazed again at how much was onboard. I unloaded and just left the fenders, lines , throwable devise, 4 life jackets and all necessary equipment to safely operated the boat. The Boat had a 1/2 tank of fuel in the main tank and 1/2 tank in the auxiliary tank 50 gallons of fuel, the water tank was 3/4 full, waste tank empty, 2 passengers on board (My wife and I) I had also taken the prop to AIR Marine to scan the prop and add the cup back to original .105 .
We had just launched the boat to prepare for a sea trial to the perspective buyers who were do to fly into Chicago the next day. This possibly was our last boat ride.I preceded out of the harbor and advanced the throttle to my normal low cruise RPM of 2250 rpm I looked at the GPS speed and fuel burn and saw .4gph less burn and an increase of 3/4kts. Not much differance but in the big picture that is significant. I then advance the throttle to WOT. I was amazed!!! I looked at my wife. I'm not selling this thing!!!! It did something I have not experienced before. With the larger tabs placed at about 50% tab the boat jumped up on a full plane 21.5 kts was shone on the Volvo EVC and The Garmin was showing 24.5mph. This boat a month ago WOT was 17kts. I backed the throttle down to 3400 rpm added a little more tab and the boat cruised nicely at 15 kts a month ago this was 12kts.

Moral to the story keep the boats light.

 

[S. Todd]

I second this analysis. When we had our R25SC that fit in the garage in the backyard everything came out over the winter and each specific trip was packed with what we really believed we would need or want to use on that trip. When we traveled with other Ranger Tugs we found ours easily outperformed the other similar boats, even with a kayak and paddle board on the roof where they generated wind drag. Even with an eye to keeping things light, I cannot think of a trip we ever took where we did not unload clean cloths and some food items that would have allowed us to stay another few days.
Hopefully, retirement will mean that in the future we stay those few extra days (once we get a few pending family obligations fulfilled).