Fuel consumption for a 26ft boat

[on-one]

Hi All,

I've been looking for an older 26ft boat like a Mariner pacer, Savage Lancer, or Randell 26 (Pete - haven't gone off the sharkcat idea but there's not many about) and they all seem to be powered by either a petrol v8 or a 165/200 hp volvo diesel. I'm trying to work out whether it's worth paying the price premium for the diesel boats but the information on fuel use out of the dealers is a bit vague (for example this morning I was told a 26 randell with a 7.4l mercruiser would use 60litres per hour at 16 knots or maybe 40 which is a failry big range. Can anyone give me cruising speed/fuel consumption for similar sized boats?

[ken4159]

on-one, had a 25' fly-bridge once which used 4 gallons per hour per motor (twin 165 merc inboards) thats around 65lit p/h.

Ken

[on-one]

thanks Ken, at what sort of speed?

[Grand_Marlin]

G'day Sean,

Lee put some helpful stats on my sharkcat post:

Hi Grand Marlin,

Had one of these donks (200hp turbo volvo) and duo prop in a 26ft Glass Marksply, would cruise all day at 22knots and burn around 30lt per hour.
You may find the cat will chew a tad more but should ride alot better.
Also had a 328 Powercat with twin 165hp Volvo AQAD40, this used around 50-60lt per hour depending on conditions.

Lee


Goanna, mate are your calcs / conversions right?
Not being picky, but 4 gal per hour each motor = 8 gal per hr total on 2 motors.
8 gal multiplied by 4.5 litres per gallon = 36 litres per hour?

Cheers

Pete

ps there is a 23 flybridge sharky for sale on boatpoint with twin 175 evinrudes on it for 32 grand on trailer... looks like a reasonable boat. Negotiate a price and eventually stick a couple of 200hp 4 strokes on it.

The VMR sandgate has one with 225 hp suzuki 4 strokes. They tell me that they can run to Tangalooma and back on 60 litres of fuel, which id correct, is pretty darn good for a big boat.

[on-one]

Thanks Pete, I did see the boat on boatpoint doesn't look too bad but I'm not too keen on outboards and my wife's one stipulation is a seperate shower and toilet, by the time I did the engines, changed the layout and put covers on it it'd cost me a lot more than it's worth. Think I'm just going to have to be patient and wait till one with the bigger diesel shows up

[michael_k]

i had a 24ft huntsman flybridge with a 5.7L mercruiser,it cruised at 22knt and used 32l/hr.before i bought that boat i was trying to work out the deisel/petrol thing.i opted for petrol as the price of petrol to deisel off the wharf is about the same,consumption between them in smaller boats(under 30ft)is close,but the biggest thing was i totally rebuilt my motor for $3000 approx and to do this to a deisel it would have been 3 times that price.i hope this is of some help
cheers mick

[on-one]

Thanks Mick, exactly the thoughts that are going through my head. I'm not sure I'm going to do the hours to justify the extra expense of buying and maintaining a diesel (and it wouldn't be a new engine so there's always the risk of a big failure). Compared to paying a lot less for the boat, a little more for fuel and knowing that if it needs a new engine I can easily afford it.

[23-sharkcat]

I took my My 23' sharkcat to tangalooma on Friday and then shot up to Bulwer for a look.

We put the boat in at Schultz canal which on my GPS said we had done 82.6klm's.

When I got back to the workshop I done a test of the amount of fuel we used and it was 70-80 litres.

Cruising at 25knt's (52klm's) and short bursts to 40knt's (73klm's) that great fuel economy.

Twin 3.7ltr 4 cylinder mercruisers. They are aluminium blocks and are modeled on the Ford 460 big block motors. I beleive these were the only motors that Mercruiser ever built from scratch.

I do my test of fuel used by dipping a aluminium rod into the tanks when the boat is at rest on the trailer and the front of the trailer is jacked up with a support that I built.

[gilbo]

Bit of a late response but with clapped out twin mercruiser 470s on my 25' bertram I would use about 22 litres an hour per engine at a cruise of 20 knots. Hopefully this should improve a little after the rebuilds.

[ahoj]

My 5 meter cat uses close to 08 l/h = 10 / l per 8 hour day @ from trawling --25 KM /h

Ohhh what a feeling --------------- 6 hp yamaha-------------

and can use Minn Kota all day on 120amp/h deep cycle---contemplating to install 2 x85w solar panels to keep me going all day I got the petrol cost beat.... Up the Arabs

Time to wake up and go smaller Just as much fun

Ahoj

[ahoj]

Petrol In Europe cost almost 3$ a liter and as consumption rises in India and China
and world ecconomies are doing well-- Australia can face 3$ per/l as well there will be no option but to downsize or park the big landcruiser and the guzzling boat
Now will be the time to get rid of the big units but its getting close to no return.

Doomsdayer-- No -- being involved in stock market the analysis are correct...Contrary to some believe-oil exploratons companies are finding more duds then flowing oil.. why is Argerntina's petrol 0.16 cents a liter?? because it don't depend on middle east oil... when will we learn who care since we will have no water for radiators anyway joke?
Ahoj

[on-one]

Gilbo, not late at all it'll take me much more than a week to work out what I want, 23-s are the motors you have 470s?

[23-sharkcat]

Twin 470's

http://s66.photobucket.com/albums/h258/rxv3000/?action=view&current=DSC02622.jpg

http://s66.photobucket.com/albums/h258/rxv3000/?action=view&current=DSC02609.jpg