Our DIY solar powered yacht works!
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- Опубликовано: 7 ноя 2024
- After 4 months of pulling everything apart, and 8 months of rebuilding my 46 year old boat now has a modern interior and a really high tech propulsion system.
Since fitting the solar panels I've never plugged anything in, and we use power just like we would in a house. There's no thoughts on energy usage, no diesel, no petrol, no gas, everything is electric, including the dinghy motor!
nice one! Its great to see more projects up on youtube. we did our solar sail boat 4 years ago and haven't looked back, can't imagine having a clunky smelly diesel from now on
That's great! Do you have any details online anywhere? Would love to check it out.
Greetings from a fellow Saffa living in the UK and busy looking for a boat in the Ionian. Great content and so interesting to see what you've done.
Thanks, great to meet you. Weird timing, but I'm leaving Italy today for Greece, and will be in the Ionian from tomorrow. If I see a bargain I'll let you know :)
You've hit the nail on the head with your theory of panels vs batteries. The batteries are the buffer, the tank if you will, the panels are the supply. A lot of people don't understand this. If you can generate more than you use, particularly in the worst weather conditions, you'll never go without power. The regulators will take care of any excess, or you could spill off to a house bank in the future. As I have no doubt you're aware, the only time you'll come unstuck is when you're operating at a deficit, i.e your load is greater than your supply. [maybe at night or during prolonged periods of excessive foul weather] The main thing that will bring you unstuck with your system is the fact that your batteries may be floating on full charge a lot of the time, and this is an issue for Lithium as I'm sure you're aware. You'll add possibly another year to their life if you can keep them to 85% of full charge. [I just had a quick look at the specs for your batteries and the recommended SOC is 10 to 90%] Are you running a programmable regulator that enables you to do this? I'm assuming you are, based on the fact of your battery choice. Great to see and good luck with it all.
Thanks Alan, great comments. At the moment I'm charging to 3.4v per cell so I hope I'll have a long life with these batteries. I have the same cells in a 12v config for the house battery and the dingy battery (on a 2hp equivalent trolling motor). The trolling motor batteries will become my backup in case anything happens to a cell in the main pack, but I'm really hoping not to have issues by keeping between 3.2v and 3.4v
Great video, this is what I want to do with a catamaran. Not sure why the YT algorithm took so long to show me this video, it’s what I am constantly searching for. Look forward to seeing more of your content
Thanks for that. Yeah it's been a fun project and I think electric propulsion makes a lot of sense for catamarans with the amount of space they have for solar. We're back in the water this Friday in fact, so I'll be posting more videos soon!
Great job! Must be very satisfying after all the hard work. Love how quiet it is!
Satisfying and a huge relief that it didn't sink with all the money I spent on it 😂
Congrats Patrick, boat looks fantastic👍looking forward to a full tour now that the refit is complete. Time to sit back and relax and enjoy the fruits of your hard work 😎🙌
Thanks Johnny, it's nearly complete, I still have the bathroom to finish, and a watermaker to build plus a few more minor jobs, then I'll do a full tour.
What I've learned from installing solar panels on campervans and motorhomes and now my whole house is this. Your size of battery bank and solar bank is totally dependent on where you are in the world. Take for example where I live in the UK. From Jan to March, on average we probably get 6 hours of possible solar production from 9am to 3pm. During this time the maximum I have found possible is around 5% - 40% of my panels' full rating (my array is 8.7kW). The worst I would get on any given day is 5%. So my maximum production would be 8.7 x 6 x 0.3 = 15kWh. My worst would be 8.7 x 6 x 0.1 = 2.61kWh. The number of good days per month is possibly 5, with the majority lying somewhere between 2.61kWh and 15kWh.
Apr to June the maximum might be solar from 7am to 7pm or double the hours, with the intensity (the angle in the sky to panel) going up from 30% to 60%. The kWh produced may be as high as 8.7 x 12 x .6 = 62kWh per day. So where you are in the world (distance from the equator) affects your production much more than anything else. With the price of lithium (LiFePO4) batteries being the best price at the moment they have ever been (I can buy a 15kWh, 48V battery for under £2500), I think depending on weight (the battery I just quoted weights around 120Kg), there is no excuse for not stocking up on batteries. Again, it depends what kind of 'motoring' (sailing) you expect to do, and the range needed. I haven't watched any of your previous videos (but I will now) so I don't know what you installed on your boat. Good luck.
Thanks for that, it's really useful information to have! I've got a 14.4kwh pack. Financially doubling that isn't a big issue, as you say, the prices are looking pretty good right now, I just don't want to add another 100kg to the boat if I can get away without it. We plan to do mostly short hops, and ideally on sunny days. My sails aren't working yet, but hopefully I can have those rigged soon for days without sun. Speed isn't a huge concern for us when moving, but for safely that might differ, and I may consider a small genset or outboard to keep the boat moving for longer periods. I'll do one of those this winter, but I'm not sure which yet...
Absolutely awesome!! This is so cool to see your dream come alive. The world looks different from the water 🙂
Yeah, it's hard sometimes, but it's been fantastic. I'm looking forward to getting through all of Croatia and into Greece next year, but plans might change again like they did this year.
I've been working on the idea of converting a cat into a purely solar powered yatch. So, the ability to live very confortably, but also to go off shore - i.e. power through day/night, so to see what you are doing with so little power gives me hope that when i find the right Cat, my calculations will work. Would love to crunch the data of speed vs power consumption, and battery size to get through the night (I have the spreadsheets but based on assumed data and relationships). Very cool.
I'll try out together some more data when I have a windless day at a range of different power levels.
@@SailingElectra If you need an engineering nerd to do some number crunching - am happy to assist :)
Brilliant! So happy for you both and the pups too:-)
Solid advice on solar configuration. Kudos. #onemillionboaters
Thanks Bruno
when you pull into harbor at night, drop anchor and put up a couple vertical windmills and you can have full batteries all year.
A wind gen could be a nice addition, but I'd want something light and easy to put up
@@SailingElectra Oh of course. I would add one near the middle on a simple locking L joint for the 2 positions (up and down). Since it needs to be put away when you are underway or it will cause a lot of drag.
This is a very nice video, I'm searching for this kind of yacht and this is exactly my idea too.
In my opinion, I would say that you need the batteries for nights and emergency situations that's because it's a sailing vessel as well.
Yes, you are right, motor slowly on batteries at night, and faster during the day on solar.
Awesome build.
Thanks!
Is there a place that has your complete specs on your boat and electrical system? many thanks!
No, but I have 2 X 6kw motors, 3200w of solar, and a 14.4kwh 48v lifepo4 battery pack. Let me know what else you'd like to know.
@@SailingElectra Hey! I would love to know the type of boat and the general weight! This is a very cool project. I've got a 33ft 9,500lb cat on the hard right now, thinking of doing something similar and wondering what size Epropulsion motor I need.
@@CaptainShack it's probably around 10,000lb, and 30 foot long. I've got twin 6kW motors, but I never go over 3kW. For me the price between the 3kW and the 6kW was close enough that I thought I should just get the bigger in case. I may switch to the 6kW pod motors for ease of docking next season. We'll see.
@@SailingElectra I've done a little measuring for the pod motors and sadly if I were to install I never ran aground. I didn't pack the pods. You think a single six kilowatt would have been enough to push your boat comfortably?
have to change the beep into some other sound man !!! otherwise, its awesome !!! love it !!
Haha yeah it got old really fast. In the end we turned it off unless we were on long trips where traffic was rarer.
Nice project man!
Thanks, I'm just glad it was worth all the stress 😬
I just took my (motor)boat from London, across the channel, all the way through France, and then down passed Italy to Malta. Here is your problem, there's this thing called weather and it won't always be a nice day. There's also waves as soon as you have some waves it will slow you down a lot. And if there's a headwind you're going to have even more problems. You just don't have enough power. Your system will work on super calm days with bright-ish sunlight. Anything less than that and you're going to have major issues.
Hopefully we'll build up our sailing skills enough to cater for the bad weather, and you're right, steep waves slow us down a lot, fortunately we haven't been in a hurry so far, but yeah working sails are needed. If I didn't have those I would consider a petrol outboard or generator as a backup.
You can always add more solar panels later.
Very educational! I also am converting a similar sized catamaran to fully electric.
And I totally removed the sailing rig! I will use 5120 WattP solar (16 panels) with at least 30kWh of LiFePo4
‘At least’: I DIY my battery system (with years of experience), already have 30kWh (16s/2p) ready to use,
and am thinking of a seperate 15 kWh pack for redundancy. I totally agree on the battery remarks you made,
but I also think of all things I want to do electrically, like induction cooking, 1760 watt aircon, maybe even
electric floor heating! And, a DIY battery is much, much cheaper than commercial (but you definitely must know what you’re doing!)
Safety first !!!!
I also use 2 Navy Evo 6.0 outboards
Edit: I forgot to mention my 82LBS trolling motor in te middle between the two Evo’s:
Using it sideways, I can easily move the back of the boat sideways! The bow can already be moved sideways
easily by putting one Evo forward, and the other in reverse! So I have total manouvrebility with three motors.
and: Win win.. I can simply detach the trolling motor, and use it for my dingy..
But my cat is far from finished yet, I hope by te end of the year.
My cat is a 4,200kg 9mtr one off, out of 8mm marine grade aluminium, build for the CEO of a big ship yard in the late 70’s
It has numerous safety features build in, no fragile through hulls. The deck diesel has a outboard type sail drive.
I will keep that sail drive, for if I want to use an inboard (on deck) electric motor in the future.
Sounds like a great project. The only advice I would give is to mount the outboards as far apart as possible. I've steered cats with inboards before and you have a tank like drive, with my outboards so close together that's a real challenge. Funny I almost decided to lose the mast and go for more panels, especially when I saw the budget for the new rigging... But in the end I've kept it, and will hopefully get good use out of it sailing. I'm also planning to mount my (2hp equivalent) trolling motor between the two outboards, mostly it was meant to be as a backup in case something happened to the 48v system so I have a 12v motor to fall back on. I run it on the same type of batteries as my main bank, so it's 12.8v 280AH and should give me a couple of hours of motoring if needed. Try to keep your boat as light as possible, it makes catamarans safer and faster. Have you given any thoughts to splitting your 30kwh bank into 2 x 15kwh? With the huge amount of solar you have you'll almost always be running on sun, and probably wouldn't need a 30kwh and a 15kwh. Each 15kwh weighs 80kg-100kg depending on how it's put together.
Thanks for your very quick reaction Patrick. Yes, I know about that space between the motors, and am costantly in debate with myself:
Between the two hulls, I can mount them apart with some 1,37 meters between them, when I would mount them at the end of each hull, it will be 2,51 meters, a significant difference. Can you give me an estimate on how much your motors are apart? Between the hulls, they are better protected when you ‘park’ your boat backwards, mounted at the end of each hull, they are more exposed, but better protected during ‘motoring’ as the hull is likely to move away most of the stuff that can hurt the motors, like drifting wood and other stuff. I especially wanted outboards, easily removable or tiltable when something went wrong with the propeller, and I noticed you thinking the same way as I: no through hull mounts like with pod drives! On my boat, everything, like motors, saildrive, rudders, are in a ‘outboard’ situation, so no trough hulls for any of them! With the outboards between the hulls, they are more easily accessable, and I’m free to make an extra swim plateau and/or ladder on each hull, like your Cat already has. So, please Patrick, help me with making the best choice😂😊
And.. you mentioned ‘tank like drive’, before my retirement (60) last year, i worked as an optical engineer for the Dutch Navy, and also found myself close to tanks on a regular basis, as I also worked for the army and air force. Oh, and I so much like that bath tub inside your boat !
Edit: My boat did have a lot of ballast in the front of the hulls, to keep it level, that is thrown out, along with all sailing stuff, the 40hp diesel is going, with that very heavy sail drive.. The placement of the 180kg of 30kWh pack, will be quite central, under the couch, and the spare bank (90kg) will be placed when the boat is in the water
I did some measurements on a screenshot I took from your video (hopefully with your approval😂), giving me an estimate of 99.4 cm between your motors, is that somewhat correct Patrick?
@@HighDefDude yes basically a metre. I can still shift the bow left and right, but it takes a fair amount more throttle than I would like.
More and more, I’m realizing how valuable you are to my project, as you are quite a big step ahead in testing a setup which only few have tried before!
You are the first who has a situation quite similar as mine, with the same ingredients, batteries, boat size and boat weight.
I can only hope my setup will be finished and working next year april.
My important questions for now: What brand BMS and App do you use for your battry bank? And, do you have important reasons for it?
I have two Daly BMS (350 A each) for my battery banks, but have ears for a better solution if aviable.
In fact, I’m quite curious how you did your complete battery setup, maybe I can learn something..
I already have about 10 months of experience with a DIY, ‘portable’ battery, which is 7.1 kWh LiFePo4, with a 250A Daly BMS.
It is a complete (quite heavy) battery on wheels, with everything included. A 8s 280 EVE pack poweres a Victron 12V 35A converter, and a 3000W 230V inverter. It has 3 USB-A charge sockets, and 3 USB-C sockets, and 2 of the well known sigarette car charge sockets. A Victron Smartsolar 150/35 MPPT charger completes the chargability on solar panels
The only thing I ever noticed with the Daly BMS, is a slight mismatch in calculated average Cell voltage in the app, which only was some 0.004 volts.
I know that Daly does a very poor job in balancing, with only some 30 milliamps, but I decided to make every cell reachable from the outside, and am going to do the same on my boat, which means 17 electrical points directly accessable, to be able to hook up any active balancer when needed, without opening hatches and stuff.
Greetings..
I am impressed. What’s the weight of this boat? What can you increase the motor speed to without draining the batteries? 8kn and no battery usage.
Thanks!
With no wind around 5 knots. The power draw goes up exponentially, so you either need loads of batteries, or to be happy with 4-5 knots.
Hi, I am new to your channel! Congratulations on electric conversion ❤⛵️ do you have an electric windlass? Windlass, heavy amperage use, heavy load, how does your setup handle it? Haven’t watched your other videos yet, brand new to your channel, so haven’t had a chance to hear yet your total battery bank amp hours capacity and your solar capacity?
Hi Taylan, thanks! Yes we have an electric windlass. It's connected to the 12v lifepo4 house bank and works flawlessly. That gets charged by the 48v battery that's also a lifepo4 pack. It uses 16 Eve280K cells while the 12v pack uses just 4.
Nice work! Have you thought about regen? Supposedly regen will only work with an epropulsion battery. Haven’t tried yet, but I’m betting just one small epropulsion battery in the system will allow regen. Epropulsion engineering says it won’t work but I think it will.
I wish they allowed it on any battery (and honestly they should). Not sure I'll buy one of their batteries to get it, they're really expensive compared to the DIY packs.
Did you ever suggest putting a windmill on the roof of a Tesla? .
@@StephenJPaynewhile a wind turbine in a telsa won’t work, a giant sail would. The telsa would regen as is blew down the street just like a sailboat can regen through they prop when it’s pushed by the wind.
Awesome boat and people; work needed on your sound/mike quality; Good luck.
Thanks for the tip, yeah we need to invest in some equipment.
The test will be in a serious blow with a ripping current. Also on winter days when no sun is coming through
What kind of panels? How many? How many watts each. What are their physical dimensions? What kind of motors at 300watts each? What do you have for a battery bank? If you’re primarily running off solar does that mean you don’t plan on motoring at night or days with heavy cloud cover?
16 eve280k cells in series for the 48v battery pack. Panels are 8 x Sunpower maxeon 3 400w panels. The motors can do 6kw each, but around 1kw each gets me near 5 knots. If I run at 300w per motor I can motor for 20 hours without sunlight at 2.5ish knots.
Very helpful, thank you. I wish I could incorporate that much solar on the monohull I’ll be converting. But maybe I can do half. Fair winds
Love it - enjoy!
how much the total cost of electrics for solar and motors?
Around EUR12k for the motors, panels and batteries. If I bill my time spent then a mountain more. I also spent a lot on mounting motors and panels and new rigging, none of which I thought would be anywhere near that cost!
What is the manufacturer and year of the boat?
1976 Catalac 9M
You should really be thinking that the batteries as the critical element when motoring and the solar panels as the possible source of re-fuel. It would be no different than setting of in a car knowing how much petrol you had in the tank and then wondering where the next petrol station would be along the road - and if it is open!
@@marviwilson1853 it's been two years and a couple of d thousand miles. I do think slightly differently now about my batteries. I now consider them my reserve tank. I know how far and at what speeds I can do on reserve.
My fuel source is still solar, so when motoring, like I am right now, my goal is to fill the reserve tank and then motor as fast as possible on only solar power. So at the moment I'm using 1000W total power to motor at 3.5 knots (7 knot headwind) and I'm charging my batteries at 600W. They'll be full soon, then I can go faster until the sun gets lower then I'll slow down to make sure I don't draw into my reserve as long as possible!
@@SailingElectra What you have done is fantastic and it is to your credit. All boats are designed for a mission and you are clearly happy with the spec level you have and the boating you do. Most chose multi hulls for this conversion but mono hulls are also feasible. They benefit from their abundance and variety and therefore cheaper price. Buy one with broken winches, worn out diesel, sails and ropes for best value. Solar panels are thin and light so a full length, full beam roof is possible. Build a layered roof with athwartships extensions to increase generating capacity at anchor or motoring in calm conditions. Use a properly marinized 2nd use EV lithium phosphate battery. Much cheaper. The business model must surely exist for such a boat in sunny climes. Built for "solars" not sailors who put out the panels when the sun shines as opposed to putting out the sails when the wind blows. Perfect for summer Island hopping in the Med where winds are often light and variable and sailing a pain. All that power allows all the home appliances for a comfortable stay onboard including air con. 100kWhr battery, 40-50kWhr per day from a 10kW array. Now we are cooking with gas!
@@marviwilson1853 thanks for the compliment, and yeah I completely agree, a 10kw array and 100kwh battery would be insanely good! I suspect faster than an equivalent sailboat too!
Is that Pula?
Yeah it's where the boat was when I bought it.
There is also 'too much' PV capacity. If, at any instant, the system doesn't draw off EVERYTHING the panels are providing, the panels will overheat and life expectancy will drop.
Matching battery bank size to PV capacity and electrical consumption enables the panels to stay cooler.
Otherwise, the excess PV production needs to be immediately dumped into a large consumer (propulsion motors, etc...) to prevent over voltage and over heating.
Interesting, I suspect this will be quite common to most electric boats, when size the system for the motors you have so much excess power on days you're not motoring. I'll have to find ways to use more power 😁
Pretty well pointless information with the price of solar panels today and lifespan/ warranty.
oh no i've ( possibly/worst case) reduced my panels lifespan from 25 years down to 20 years, over 20 years... because they got slightly hotter than they already do every day all day sitting in the baking sun.
@@SailingElectra Out on passage, it's probably not a problem. Simply GO FAST AAHHHHHH!
In harbour on a sunny day AC is likely a good option. Get a unit with a dehumidifying setting and it will make life pleasant on cool damp days too.😎
No it will not! Panels are 15-20% efficiënt The rest will warm up the panel. The environment will cool them down again. Effiency will go down whith higher tempo but that is full reversible....
Far too much camera movement, had to stop watching. Vertical videos barely show anything.
Very true, I'll hopefully get better over time.
Good in theory, poor in practice.
Well it did work very well for the whole summer of 2023, including motoring in late October and early November, so I would say that's pretty successful practice 😊
Depends on your definition of successful. Simply working for a few hours at a time certainly doesn't meet my requirement. This form of propulsion is a long way off being real world useful for actual 'cruising' boaties. Up the coast for me is 600nm to my favourite stop over, non stop around 50 hours run time.@@SailingElectra
Future here. Silent yachts got next level and went around the world using no sail or fuel. More powerful panels and the battery advances makes EV launch my chosen retirement vessel
@@bobbuilder5362when you burn 1 gallon per mile that's 600 gallons or 3000 dollars a trip. This will make the same at 100 hours for free