"DSK" wrote in message
...
That's discouraging news. Even though the price of fuel is a relatively
minor consideration for many boaters- (as in if you're making $24,000 a
year in boat payments does it really matter if your summer fuel bill
goes from $2500 up to $3500?)- these unusually high fuel prices tend to
make people think twice or thrice about using their boats.


I hope that it makes more of the less curteous go-fast & show-off boaters
use their boats less.


NOYB wrote:
I put on 200 hours/year. If half of that is cruising, then my burn rate
is 23 gph. The other half is trolling/slow speed, burning 6 gph.

That's 2900 gallons/year.

2900 gallons*$3/gallon=$8700/year

2900 gallons*$5/gallon=$14,500/year

That's a wee-bit more than your example, eh Chuck?

Anybody want to buy a Grady White 30' Marlin? :-(


You might consider repowering for better efficiency, but then you'd have
to use the boat more to justify the expense of repower. Speed costs. A
lot!

A repower to four-strokes would drop the fuel burn to about 18.5 gph at
cruise, and 3 gph out troll/idle.

That means 2150 gallons/year...or 750 gallons/year savings.

At $3/gallon, it's a $2250 savings

At $5/gallon, it's a $3750 savings.

(I'd save a little in oil burn too)

But it would take anywhere from 8.5 to 14 years before I saved enough to pay
for the $32,000 worth of new engines that I'd need to buy.





For slow boats, fuel cost is negligible, but you don't cover as much
ground. Our cost to cruise might go up from $0.50/mile to $.065/mile (in
the absence of affecting wind & current of course). Since we're planning a
Great Loop which is approx 6,000 miles, that will still be a big expense
item. Still way less than fishing offshore from a fast 30 foot sportfisher
though.

My cost/mile runs about $2.75/mile. But I have more money than time at this
point in my life. When I retire, the opposite will be true...and I'll get a
diesel-powered displacement or semi-displacement hull.