Electric Motor Sailing

One of the huge advantages of the electric motor is that it can help you keep moving in very light winds. Having a fixed blade propeller is nice because you can use the regeneration feature of the motor to charge the battery bank as you sail due to the propeller spinning as it is dragged through the water. The downside to this is when sailing in light winds, you end up dragging a large 3 blade propeller through the water. 

I have found that by having the motor on just a smidge, it helps turn the propeller slowly so that it can pass through the water more easily. It isn't really pushing the boat along, rather it is gliding through the water instead of causing a lot of drag. 

While a feathering propeller is nice to have since the blades can turn to be blind to the passing water, it wouldn't allow the propeller to serve the regen function. By slowly turning the propeller, it practically reduces the drag from the prop, effectively giving the same advantages as the feathers prop. 

For example, we were sailing in very light winds with the Mainsail (522 sq ft), Staysail (180 sq ft), and Drifter (766 sq ft) flying. This gave us a total of 1468 square feet of sail area and a sail SA/D of 23.4. This is a rather large amount of sail area to have up, but in winds of 4kn or less, we were not moving very quickly due to the drag on the propeller. 

When the prop was dragging, we were only moving along at 1kn. When we put it just a touch into gear, the propeller stopped being drag and we picked up speed to 1.9kn. 

The motor is running along at just under 600 RPM and consuming minimal power, and we can make a bit more headway without dragging the large three blade propeller through the water.

We have an incredibly small battery bank since we hardly use the motor, so we can only do this little trick for about 16 hours; but that 16.5 hours moving at 1.9kn would give us a range of 31.4 nautical miles. If we were in the ocean, we wouldn't care about the added speed, because we plan plenty of time for the light air days. On the other hand, in the bay, we do like to make it to the anchorage or back to port that night, so we are willing to give it a little nudge to help improve our speed over ground. 

Why buy a sailboat

It's nice to cast off the dock lines and set off on a trip without spending a ton on fuel, if you take advantage of the wind and use your sails. I understand that most people prefer to furl their sails and crank on the iron genoa when going to windward as tacking can be tedious and time consuming. But when sailing along on a beam reach, you never need to tack and you will be able to achieve really good speeds through the water.

Another feature of flying the sails is they help steady the boat as the waves are typically also going to be striking the hull on the beam. With the sails down, the vessel will begin to roll as it is repeatedly struck by waves on the beam. With the sails set, the vessel will fall into a groove and hold steady as it punches through the waves and rides steadily and comfortably towards your destination

While sailing on the Chesapeake, I came across and subsequently passed this fellow motoring along while being tossed around. 

He was motoring along when he could be sailing on a beam reach. We were under sail and passed him as he was being tossed around by the seas since he had no sails up to steady him Full story at www.riggingdoctor.com

Summer Cruise Day 2

We raised anchor in the early morning and made our way South towards South River where we were to meet up with my parents boat. 

This was the only day when we had a destination with a time set on it. We were to meet with them for the afternoon and raft overnight for us to set sail the following morning.

We made good time during the morning, arriving at the mouth of South River by 2pm. That's when the wind died and we slowly made our way towards the river. We were there for so long that the tide actually changed and we were just barely able to keep our position under sail. We were slowly sailing forward in water that was pushing us backwards. Around 4pm, after 2 hours of sitting, we decided that we needed to motor up the river.

While under full sail and with a little push from the motor, we began moving along at 1 to 2 knots over ground. We finally arrived at our destination around 8pm, 6 hours after reaching the river! Maddie and I agreed that we would have simply anchored outside of the river rather than fighting our way in if we did not have a meeting time set up already. 

We met up with with my dad at the mouth of Harness Creek and went in together. 

The electric motor was able to power us up the river to this point, but it was too much motoring for the small battery bank, we burned the batteries down to 42% while struggling up South River against the tide.

It was all worth it though, we anchored and my dad rafted up to us for the night. My sister and her boyfriend made a delicious dinner for us to prepare for our big departure.

While we were rafted, I plugged Wisdom into my dads generator to recharge the batteries. Our new departure time was "As soon as the batteries are recharged!" This ended up being a long time since we were plugged into an outlet on my dads boat, only charging at 15 amps AC.

While rafted the next morning, we got had the perfect opportunity for a photo op.

Yes, we are a family of dentists! 

My boat is Wisdom, because of the wisdom that I have acquired while living and working on her. The dinghy is Tooth, because then it turns the whole name into what I do for a living, pulling wisdom teeth. Eggstraction, my dads boat, is an Egg Harbor.

The question is, should we get another boat and name it Bloody, and put it all the way to the left?

Summer Cruise Day 1

We set out on a long sailing trip heading South. We have no set point to where we will arrive, simply sailing South for 2 weeks and then turning around and making our way back to Fells Point.

Our first day started rather un-eventfully, we took longer than expected to leave the pier, so that put us on a later start than planned, but it didn't matter because we had no time cards to punch! 

We left the Inner Harbor of Baltimore in very light winds heading out of the Patapsco River towards the Chesapeake Bay. The sun was getting low on the horizon as we approached the Key Bridge when a squall hit us. We had reefed the sails already as the clouds approaching looked ominous, but this was rather strong for our first day. 
 

I was up at the fore peak preparing to drop the anchor for the night when it hit. Maddie was at the helm on her 6th sailing trip, so when it hit, she was alone in the cockpit. I don't know what went through her mind as the wind picked up speed instantly heeling the boat over as the wind shifted onto our beam, but I don't think it was happy thoughts. The wind was ripping the tops of waves off and sending the water flying through the air as visibility was quickly diminishing.  Through all of the noise and confusion, she let out the mainsheet which righted the vessel instantly. I was very glad that she did this as I was clinging to the bow rail waiting for her to rectify the situation. What probably occurred in a few seconds felt like an eternity as I was holding on. 

In a few minutes, the squall passed and the seas flattened as the dead calm air hung over us. It was a bit nerve wracking to think this happened in our own back yard as we made our way to the ocean. I had only been crew on a sailboat for 4 days in the Atlantic from Key West, FL to Charleston, SC, and Maddie had only been sailing a few times in the Patapsco River. We didn't have a ton of practical experience between us, but we did have the will and knowledge to make the trip. 

We anchored for the night and slept well as we prepared for our next day of sailing.