I am about to buy my first electric outboard, mainly for use on Chew and Blagdon and other West Country reservoirs.
My boat partner is a hefty 21 stone and I am wondering what size of engine would get us around without using up too much juice.
I'm looking at a 40 lb. thrust engine - is this Ok or could I get away with something smaller?
Thanks everybody
Andrew

Hi and welcome Andrew. As you can see I'm also new to the Forum.

If I can give you my tuppence worth, I would go for the bigger thrust you can afford. Simple reason is the weight of the person becomes irrelevant once the boat is moving. Its the power (Thrust) that you will need, especially when theres a head wind. You can allways turn it down, but difficult to do the opposite when theres nothing there.

I found that, that was the main factor in a larger "engine". Same goes with the battery go as much as you can on the capacity / amps, it'll run longer.

Hope this helps some what.

Get the 40 and a 110amp/hr battery, It should be ok, A wee trick is always go to the top of the wind 1st, Then work your way back to the lodge downwind.

Jim

__________________
The Fishermans Friend is the Flirty Fly,Fickle Food for Fleeting Fish.

I have a Min Kota 5o thrust and as ji says if you get the right battery it will do a great job.

OO

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Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch'intrate
YOU DONT NEED EYES TO SEE YOU NEED VISION

You won't need it on Chew but at Blagdon you can hire one at http://www.blagdon-lake.net/
Usual rule applies. If you can, try before you buy.

O, And don't forget,It has to be a Leisure battery.

Jim

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The Fishermans Friend is the Flirty Fly,Fickle Food for Fleeting Fish.

I would go for the largest you can afford. as stated in an earlier post, you can always run on part throttle and have the extra thrust in reserve if and when required

With electric outboards, my thinking and experience has been to buy right and buy once. Otherwise, you'll be buying 2 or 3 times.

As others have already said, don't buy what you can get away with, buy as much thrust as you can afford. No one ever regretted having too much power, but plenty have regretted having too little and they ended up buying twice because they tried to get away with what they thought was the minimum.

This is especially true if the electric is your primary method of power. If a wind comes up, you want to make sure you have more than enough power to safely make it back to the pier.

To give you an example of performance, on my small fishing boat is a 16 foot aluminum v-hull and I have a 42 pound Minnkota bow mount. With a 25 HP outboard, fuel, gear, battery, and 2 guys fishing, there is a point at about 15-odd mph wind where the boat can't make effective headway even at full power.

Also, take heed of the advice on batteries, this is at least as important as the outboard. Personally, I think a 100 amp hour deep cycle marine battery is the absolute minimum for reliable power and for frequent full-day trips where the electric provides all the propulsion, I'd say 120 ahr would be a good investment.

Finally, make sure you buy a proper charger that's capable of handling the charging requirements.

Grouse

you wont go far wrong with one of these mate, i know a lot of guys who use these and have heard no negative feedback. I will be purchasing one of them myself before the season starts as my old one is kinda past its sell by date now. http://www.lakelandboatcentre.co.uk/...6nbsp%3BMotors

They are around about £160.00 Delivered

Robbie

Thanks very much to all your replies.
As a new member I wasn't sure what sort of response I would get from the Forum, but it has been fantastic - really useful and informed.
I'll be back1
Andrew