Seeking advice on which style of Merc 9.9 to put on Catalina 27

[Sailor Scotty]

Hello, and thank you for your time. Im new to this site and am excited to be here.
I was hoping someone would be kind enough to offer me advice about choosing an outbaord motor for my 1978 Catalina 27. I've narrowed it down to most likely purchasing a new Mercury 9.9 4 stroke. My problem is that Ive been told by 3 different "professionals" to use 3 different types of motor. Mercury makes a 9.9, a 9.9 "kicker, and the 9.9 "bigfoot". The big foot has a lower gear ratio and a bigger prop, so I was leaning towards this model but its also more expensive than the standard 9.9.
Also Im unsure if I should get a long shaft at 20 inches or an extra long shaft at 25 inches?
My main sailing grounds are on the Columbia river between Astoria and Hood river. Any advice you could share on this topic would be greatly appreciated.
Thank you so much and happy sailing!!

~Scotty
ladylucksailing@yahoo.com

 

[SailorSam]

We just put a new Yamaha 9.9 on our 1985 Catalina 25. We did not go with the large prop option. Reason: too much torque. It's not necessary. A simple long shaft works good, but if you find yourself in deep, short trough conditions often you may want to consider the 25 inch to keep the prop in the water.

We had the stock Honda long shaft which is a bit longer than a standard long. It worked fine.

Two considerations with the 25in.: If you are in a slip, you may be increasing your length just trying to keep it out of the water when docked. When sailing, you gotta kick it up more to keep it from dragging.

We sail out of Santa Cruz Harbor on the left coast and often have choppy conditions exiting the jetty, both wind wave chop and boat wakes. We seldom experience prop runup due to it getting air while raising sails into the wind.

 

[Sailor Scotty]

Thank you so much for your time!!!

 

[Brian D]

I too use a Yamaha 9.9 on my Lancer 27. I believe it is the extra long shaft but I am not 100% sure. I solve the problem of short slips by leaving my motor in the water. But not a bare naked motor. I will place the shaft in a heavy duty industrial trash bag then lower the motor. This keep the motor "out of the water". It has been very successful so far.

Yes, sometimes it is difficult the get the shaft in the bag if I go bow first into the slip, but backing in I have zero issues.

Good luck.

 

[Joe]

Catalina 27's have an unusually large, swept back rudder. Ther extra long shaft may interfere with the it... something a Cat 25 owner would not be aware of... so just get the long shaft.

I would recommend getting a lightweight Tohatsu 9.9 4 stroke with electric start and remote. Tohatsu makes Mercury and Nissan. The convenience of electric start and remote is unbelievably beneficial to your boating inexperience.

The opening in the transom is too small to allow the motor to kick up. The motor mount system on the Cat 27 was designed for the old, low profile, 2 stroke Johnson Sailmaster 10 and 15 hp., and are of course, no longer in production. Here's a used one for sale I found on the internet... priced at $1295. Perfect fot the C27, notice the low profile powerhead. http://www.smalloutboards.com/j9901elr.htm

Over the years I've seen project pages where owners have modified the opening to allow the higher profile modern motors to be kicked up. I have often thought of tackling the project myself... however... as time went by I found that leaving the motor down while sailing was extremely convenient, with very little drop in performance. If you have RC and electric start... it's just like having an inboard... so I've pretty much forgotten about the conversion.

When I do kick the motor up, at the dock after a nice day, for example, I simply remove the cowling and cover the exposed motor with a canvas bonnet. No problem... except the hatch will not close... so I removed the hinges to give it more room.

I don't know of any current model outboard 4 stroke over 9.8 hp that will fit the opening correctly... maybe an 8 hp will... but I like more power. I've heard of some owners simply closing off the hole and mounting the motor on a bracket. There are a lot of ways to deal with the issue... my way, as mentioned before, was just to remove the cowling when I wanted to kick up the motor.

As suggested earlier, I recomend the remote control over the tiller arm.. I just steer with the boat's rudder and use the prop walk to help me manuever in tight spots. It's a pain to mess with a tiller arm when the motor is in the well... and a real pain if you put it on a bracket off the transom... almost impossible.

Spend the bucks and get the remote control, electric start option. If you buy online you'll still be required to have it installed by a dealer.

Finally..... you can always change the prop to a high thrust (lower pitch) if you feel it's necessary. So I wouldn't pay for anything you may or may not need... that said.. let local knowledge prevail.. Go around the docks and ask other C27 owner's what they're using. Good luck. Here's my ideal motor for a C27. http://www.internetoutboards.com/partdetail.asp?id=84

or the 15 hp for a few bucks more and it has POWER TRIM... cool!
http://www.internetoutboards.com/partdetail.asp?id=30

 

[Sailor Scotty]

Joe, thank you so much for your help. Its amazing how friendly and helpful fellow sailors are on this site. I truly appreciate your insights regarding this issue.
~~_/)_~~

 

[Rick Webb]

I'd Go With the Bigfoot

8hp is probably enough power but the 9.9 is not too big just a little extra.

The bigfoot is designed just for this type of application.

While I am not familiar with the issues of mounting it on your particular model boat I'd definitly lean towards the Mercury 25" XL Bigfoot which also comes with the elactric start and charging system I believe.

You may be able to save a few bucks on a Tohatsu but if there is not a dealer around parts and service can be an issue.

Just to compare:

http://www.onlineoutboards.com/Tohatsu-9-8-hp-Outboards.html

 

[walt]

Ive never used a big foot on a sailboat - but I dd buy a 9.8 Nissan XL shaft electric start late last winter and I think its completely adequate for the sailboat application (in my case, a 1990 Mac 26S).

What I wanted to point out is my experience with a couple different props. The Nissan XL shaft 9.8 comes standard with a four blade 5 pitch prop. 5 pitch means the prop will turn faster for a given thrust than a higher pitch prop will - and can allow higher rpm's and hence higher horse power output. What this prop did REALLY well was maneuver when your coming into a dock. I could put the outboard in reverse, apply lots of throttle and pretty much immediately stop the boat. In the picture, you can see that the blades on the 4 blade prop are symmetrical - ie, they work pretty much the same in forward or reverse.

However.. if I was motoring for any distance at all at a reasonable speed (not really pushing things at all), the five pitch prop required fairly high RPM and both the noise and vibration go way up.

After a few weeks using the 5 pitch 4 blade prop, I got tired of the noise and vibration and tried a more conventional 3 blade 8.5 pitch prop. The first thing I noticed about this prop is that it works MUCH worse in reverse than the 4 blade 5 pitch did - and you can see that the "angle of attack profile" of this prop is much different between forward and reverse. It almost feels like its cavitating in reverse compared to the symmetrical four blade prop. The three blade prop blade shape is optimized for the forward direction - and apparently is somewhat poor in the reverse direction. The three blade prop still "works fine" in the reverse direction, just very noticeably worse than the symmetrical four blade prop.

The three blade 8.5 pitch blade is in my opinion way nicer if your motoring for any distance as it efficiency works at a lower rpm - less noise, less vibration, probably better gas mileage. Ive ended up preferring the three blade 8.5 pitch prop because its just way more pleasant for any sort of motoring with the boat. But the reverse stop of the four blade prop sure was nice if coming into the dock on a windy day.

Anyhow, I don't think you really need the big foot - you can do all the "adjusting" you need just by changing prop styles with the standard outboard.

 

[SailorSam]

The sweep of the rudder is an interesting issue. I'd be interested if the pivot point of the blade is in the middle of the blade or forward. This would have some bearing on "clearance" of the 25 inch shaft, but I seriously doubt if they would interfere with each other. Though I could be wrong, but ....

 

[Rick Webb]

Rudder and Prop Interference

There was an issue on my boat with the rudder and prop if I turned the rudder too far when the motor was down. What I did after I conjured up all sorts of ideas was to put a set of fins on the motor. The kind that advertises you'll plane faster and at a slower speed. Of course I am never going to get up on plane but these things are made exactly for where I wanted to use them. At first I was going to use just one but it looked silly so I installed the other one. Worked great at keeping the rudder and prop separated and as a bonus made the motor much quieter. The exhaust is through the prop and it creates a barrier between it probably not so much of an issue with a 4 stroke but it made a difference on my 2 stroke.

 

[Sailor Scotty]

Thank you all for your time and help! May the wind always be in your sails~~_/)_~~