Sailing or Cheating/Motorsailing?

[thelifenomadik]

"Motorsailig is the norm today, I read someplace, because of the wind, the current, and lots of other reasons " ,blah, blah, blah.

We are sailing, tacking like crazy, reefing, covering 3 times the distance, taking our time, but we don't use the engines unless it is a life-and-death situations (happened too).

How many of you out there, sailors, actually sail?


p.s. in the attached picture is Ivo pulling the boat with the kayak when there was no wind

Happy holidays everyone!

[Ocean Girl]

Love that pic. love your blog. I'm sure you have been to the cave that has the inner waterfalls?
Have fun, keep blogging, great writing.
Erika

PS
I hate the motor, hate the noise, hate the smell. But I reach for it more than my hubby, I'm always the first to break and say " for cry-n-out-loud, let's stop drifting and just get there". Not proud of that, but true. I am definitely becoming more patient, more satisfied with just drifting. Anyways, happy adventures.

[Hydra]

I use the engine when I can't sail: in constrained waters (harbours) or when there isn't enough wind with respect to the waves and the sails don't fill. I don't consider motoring as cheating (there are no rules), I just don't like the sound of the engine: it makes me feel at work.

I made some computations from the logbook for last summer 6-week coastal cruise: I motored approximately 10percent of the total time underway, including harbour manoeuvres. I managed a few days without running the engine at all, leaving the anchorage under sail in the morning and anchoring again under sail in the evening.

Alain

[Cheechako]

anywhere below 3.5 knots and I'm motorsailing. It's just a tool. I used to love passing big mono's with my cat motorsailing. I'd turn on the lee engine at idle, it allowed me to point up an extra 15 degrees and you couldnt tell it was on... haha
I'm just trying to get from point A to point B.. sometimes before darkness sets in for landfall....

[Jimbo485]

Last year was about 9000 miles and 250 litres of fuel.

This year was about 200 miles and almost 150 litres.

In 2000, it was 2000 miles and 20 litres for the dinghy and nothing for the yacht.

It all depends...

[reefhunter]

When we circumnavigated, it was 28000 miles and 500 gals of D2. Two years ago, it was 5000 miles and 1000 gals D2. It all depends on the weather. Three knots or less, we turn on the port engine for a few hours; shut if off and try sailing for a while. When that doesn't work, turn on the starboard engine for a few hours. Repeat as needed. and so on. On a large vessel like the gulet - four to six hours of power is the norm, even when chartering in the Med.

[thinwater]

Honestly, some folks would have less fuel troubles if they ran the motor a bit more, at least enough to burn one tank each year. The stuff doesn't keep forever.

Yeah, we all hate the noise. But when exploring winding rivers or the wind flat dies for 36 hours....

[zeehag]

hehehehe i burn many tanks every winter. i motor when i have fuel and i drift when i am short. i am also re arranging my tankage so i have more fuel tankage.
people motor sail because they are impatient. they wanna go where sailing vessels werent made to go . onlyest way to do that is with engine on and comfort level adjusted.
and the guy wonders why the gal dislikes cruising. the not into wind points of sail are much more comfortable.
pacific coast i sailed much of way south. wind and current are with the southbound sailor. most of time. plan weather windows accordingly.

[Hudson Force]

I do as I please,- sometimes I sail, sometimes I motor and sometimes both. Anyone who makes judgements of this is navigating at risk to their honor.

[familycruisers]

Seems that 3-4 knot window is pretty common. Might sail more now that we are in Florida, but the trip down was a mission to stay infront of the cold.

[Tayana42]

If the apparent wind is down to 5k my boat speed is around 2 or so k. Some times we enjoy the slow life. But if we have 20 or 30 miles to go to get to port that would take 10 or 15 hours. If I turn on the engine and motor sail at 7k I'm in port in 3 to 4 hours. Sometimes we just want to get there.

[sww914]

If there's any bad weather coming within 24 hours of where/when we'll be and we're making less than 5 knots, we run that loud bastard. I don't care at all about making the harbor before nightfall unless I'm really hungry and I can smell food 30 miles out!

[Cotemar]

2.5 knots over ground speed is my lower limit.
Start one engine and cruise at 7.5 knots 2,400 rpm

[Dennis.G]

Two cases for motorsailing:

Last week coming from an island with just 20 miles to cover. Winds were low but enough to move along at 3 kts. Would have been happy with that, but my batteries were low, so motorsailed. Could not see running the engine in neutral to charge engine and sailing at only 3 kts.

Other is when low wind and swell result in sails crashing about. Many times motoring increases the apparent wind up enough to keep the sails full and things nice a quite (excepting the engine noise). Lesser of evils in that case.

[senormechanico]

We don't live aboard, nor sail all year long, but DO sail a lot in the spring/summer/fall.
2 knots over the ground is usually about my limit, depending on water conditions but our boat is the first to sail and the last to motor when we look at other boats around us.
We make exceptions due to current and reasonable time to our intended anchorage.

Most of the time when I mention boat speed, I mean through the water but around here with a lot of current it's often a chess game.

We never need to run the engine for charging, thanks to Aerogel insulated fridge, LED's etc.
To keep the boat reasonably fast and weatherly, I go through every compartment a couple of times a year and say, "Do we REALLY need this?" I think it helps.

I change engine oil every 100 hours.
Last change was 3/2012.