Exactly... and no way am I buying the White Album again.You are right but it's like entertainment is still available but the delivery systems have changed. Video tape, cassette tape, CD's on the way out...
CNG tank fill or exchange... PNW... Anacortes, Port Townsend???
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Agreed.... CNG is still available at marine based fuel docks in California, and from what I gather, parts of the east coast. Up here in the PNW, not so much. Turns out I CAN order CNG, in tanks, from certain welding gas suppliers... they just have a week long order/process time. And Sure Marine in Seattle will still fill tanks... but probably not for long. I may just go that route until I eventually convert to propane, or sell the boat to someone in CA.
BTW my comments on CNG "being dead" have to do with the fact that CNG IS still available for transportation needs... but filling tanks for cooking needs was apparently just never well handled as a market. CNG is out there. Filling portable tanks is not. Apparently using CNG around airports for shuttle buses is a big thing... so there is a market for the stuff.
Hi. New here. My 1980 S2 still has the original equipment stove (CNG) in it and I was afraid I would not be able to find gas, (other than sneaking into the filling station at the airport for buses...) but I was happy to find today that my town's local ship store still does tank exchanges. My boat was owned by a little old lady who basically did nothing but drink cocktails on her mooring by her yacht club for the last 39 years, so it is basically brand new. Psyched that I can keep using it for a while yet. For anybody in my area, the ship store is Marblehead Trading.
http://www.marbleheadtrading.com
http://www.marbleheadtrading.com
He used to have a sailboat years ago but the kids weren’t interested. Used to wintwrize it in his yard. Kids now out of college and he now has a trailerable sport fisher of some kind. Grady White I think. He used to have a mooring but not sure if he was able to keep it..
Mooring. Yeah..the wait in MHD harbor is 20 years right now. On the CNG thing I was certain I was going to have to replace that stove and figure something out. No place for a propane locker on a 9.2 a really. Was glad to find out today that CNG is still here, at least for a while. I know people like to diss it, but when that is gone, I will likely go alcohol.
Don't listen to people who diss alcohol stoves--or at least the non-pressurized variety. (The pressurized ones are an altogether different animal.) I love my non-pressurized alcohol stove. It's one of the few things on my boat that needs zero maintenance and is essentially indestructible. The performance is great. I replaced a Force 10 propane cook top with it and have not missed the propane one bit. I can tell no significant difference in cooking with it in any real world application.
I am glad to hear this. I have been eyeing alcohol as a stove for a bit now. I like very much that it is super simple and there are no pressurized tanks to deal with.
Admittedly, propane has some advantages. Propane is cheaper, which would make a practical difference if you were living aboard and cooking every single day. For the general cruising I do (semi-regular trips to Catalina) the cost to keep my alcohol stove running is negligible. I recently just bought a 5 gallon container of denatured alcohol online and it will last me for a long, long time.
On my previous boat I had CNG. The stove and oven worked quite well, so no complaints there. (My buddies and I made some dandy garlic bread in it.) But the costs of swapping out the bottles was quite high, and there were a dwindling number of places that would do it. Plus, lugging the cylinders was a pain.
safety at sea, cng is the winner. and for me the cheapest. ng is lighter than air. very safe. end of story for me. last time i had my tanks filled i paid $7.00 per tank. i just pay for the fuel. no exchange.
there is an expense to having your tanks tested.
there is an expense to having your tanks tested.
About $80 these days in Camden Maine for an exchange bottle of CNG. Mass. the exchange is less than half that.
That's the nature of Maine at the end of the country, most things that are shipped here, cost more.
One 20 hour burn bottle lasts us all season these days. We grill a lot as well and that makes a difference.
That's the nature of Maine at the end of the country, most things that are shipped here, cost more.
One 20 hour burn bottle lasts us all season these days. We grill a lot as well and that makes a difference.
i do not exchange. the marinas do rip your head off. i found a school bus district that has all converted busses. i then went and befriended the people running the bus depot. i own 4 tanks. it's a 2 hr ride through northern wis to get them filled.
"ALL problems can be fixed with proper lubrication"
a toledo fill site was closing years ago, i took their last fill up. the owner gave me 3 tanks and wished me good luck.
"ALL problems can be fixed with proper lubrication"
a toledo fill site was closing years ago, i took their last fill up. the owner gave me 3 tanks and wished me good luck.
We have no natural gas up here, unfortunately. The nearest CNG filling area is in Mass.
Corp Bros (Mass) fill the exchange tanks there and incur the expense of testing, painting and discarding and replacing the bottles.
You can swap it at Corp Bros. for 30 or 35. They send a truck to Maine once a week I believe.
So figure the shipping costs and then add a profit for the marina. It adds up pretty fast but I doubt there is a lot of profit in it along the way. Sounds like a loser for everybody.
The exchange program is expensive (I think) to get in to, buying their tanks. My boat came with 2 tanks so I didn't have to buy them. No added charge after that though. I've been using the exchange for 20 years and just paying the outrageous gas price.
Just one of those boats costs,....Outside of the cost, it is nice having a volatile fuel onboard that is lighter than air.
I agree completely with the alcohol. Our previous boat (Cal 31) had an Origo 2-burner with oven and worked great. Our current boat which we have had for 18 years now (yikes I'm getting old-er) came with propane. All in all I liked the alcohol better. It heated the water at least as quickly as our propane. The only think I did notice with the alcohol is when we had a pot over the flame there was something about the combustion that caused my eyes to sting a little bit if I didn't remember to crack open the hatch in the winter.
So, I tried to get my now empty CNG tank out of the boat and could not budge the nut(s) that hold the regulator on. I am now thinking maybe they are a left handed thread??? Ugh.
