Certainly, kudos to your friends for their accomplishment! They are clearly sailors! But I have to point out (my nature) that they might have accomplished the same w/o “auxiliary”, diesel or electric. Also, a small yacht making thousands miles passages probably could not, or would not, carry enough diesel fuel for the yacht to make much motor distance in windless conditions far from services. So, the crew would likely be just as conservative, or nearly so, with diesel auxiliary power use. And not to diminish in any way, but only to note, a largely down-wind route much of which is at tropical (warm) latitudes. No diesel-fired heat needed. So, I can’t see how the adventure adds much about the effiacacy of electric auxiliary, given that the auxiliary itself would be of limited need.While my comment is only from reading about other sailors' success .....
We do have a young couple posting regularly on the Ericson owners site that repowered their (restored) 35-2, and went cruising. They built out their own system, and do seem to be pretty technical and handy. Starting from Seattle, they sailed down to SoCal, and then to the South Pacific. Now they are in NZ ....
(quarantining near some other sailers that we know -- it's good to be in paradise during a pandemic.)
They deliberately chose a boat that sails very well in light air, and indeed they do sail a lot. (!)
They always maintain some reserve power for getting into harbors.
They are making this system work in the 'real world'.
While my own sailing and cruising plans do require a diesel aux, at least this is one actual data point for an example of long distance cruising with only electric power.
Worth noting that they are now completing a new hard bimini with added solar cells on top, also.
Sailing is a thousands year old activity; whereas, auxiliary power, other than human, for sailing craft is less than 250 years old, even for the military. Sailors basically do not need it much at all!! So an accomplishment with one versus another type of largely unneeded thing says little in support of the preferred, or “justified” use of either of them in this example.
Last edited:
