I'm Happy with my Gori!
When I bought my C-30T, it had a 3 blade fixed prop. I soon took to calling that my 3 bladed sea anchor and replaced it after one season with a Martec folding prop. That worked well for me for 5 years until I sold the boat. The only problem that I had with the Martec was that occasionally, one of the blades wouldn't open when I put the boat in gear. My gosh, how the boat would vibrate and clatter! Whe I bought my C-320, I re-read the old article in Practical Sailor, and had the dealer install a Gori geared folding two blade prop. The gears force the blades to open and close in unison, thus, no possibility of having only one blade open. Martec now sells a similar geared prop as does at least one other manufacturer. (Sorry, I can't remember the name, but it also looked good when I saw it last year at the boat show). Folding / feathering props are definitely indicated if you care at all about sailing your boat. As for folding / feathering, two or three blades, you pays your money and takes your choice. However, there is a lot of mis-information out there on the advantages of one type of prop over another type. In particular, I read a lot about how their new super fantabulous prop increased their boat speed by 50% (an exageration, but only slightly so). The reality is that a proper sized and pitched prop from any of the major manufacturers (given sufficient horsepower) will reach hull speed at the recommended RPM independently of the blade count, mechanism of folding / feathering, or whatever in calm, flat water. The advantage of three blade over two blade props under power is primarily acceleration, that being, when the boat hits a wave and stops, the three blade prop will allow the boat to maintain a higher average speed than a boat with a two blade prop because the prop is able to put more of the motor power into the water as drive than is the two blade prop. As for feathering versus folding, look at the price. Feathering is nice, and seems to have several advantages, but golly, I'm not made of money.
