Using my old 22ft Catalina as the example, quite a bit of drag is felt with
the O/B in the water while sailing. The prop-driven recharge would produce
alot of drag, but as they say there's no such thing as a free lunch!

John

"Terry Spragg" wrote in message
...
John Cassara wrote:

Well whats wrong with a good electric blanket and a heavy comforter to
keep warm over night. That would be alot less taxing on an electrical
system. You still have to be able to recharge, but getting through the
night should be easy.

John

"Larry W4CSC" wrote in message
...

"Meindert Sprang" wrote in
:


It's already there. AFAIK all new VW marine diesels have a 42V system to
power the injectors.

Meindert




I think the Toyota Prius hybrid takes this even further with a 480VDC
system, doesn't it? A friend has one and it's quite impressive, once you
get used to NOT starting the engine to take off from the parking lot.
That's a bit unnerving, just turning it on and driving away...(c;


The eliica car seen recently on Discovery uses 8 each 100 brake horse
power electric motor regenerators built into the wheels, lithium ion
batteries, and would need high voltage and high variable frequency
switching I expect. It goes 350 KM and about 400 KPH and 0-100 in FOUR
seconds! Not all ot once, I expect.

Would not one such wheel motor be capable of driving a boat and
regenerating charge with the propellor providing the juice on a good day?
Why haul useless lead ballast if a keel was all batteries immune to sea
water / chlorine gas dangers?

A 5 horse genny could wait for an excuse for quite a while, if solar cells
were in the mix and harbour navigation was all that was really needed.
Even a long haul in doldrums would be tolerable at two or three knots,
using the genny if the batteries were flat. Relatively slow water
transport takes little energy, while a good sailing day would likely keep
batteries up unless you ran an air conditioner or heater.

Terry K