Electric Motors in Lagoons

[geozeck]

About 15 years ago when we were searching for a catamaran to buy, the guys at 2 Hulls were steering us to new Lagoons with electric motors. This according to our hot shot salesmen was the newest, latest and greatest thing to ever sail the seven seas. We like the Lagoon brand but anything that radical scared us. The little bit I followed , the engines were a failure and Lagoon compensated the buyers. Does anyone remembers how this story ended?

[Yihang]

https://www.yachtandboat.com/lagoon-420-hybrid-review/

Interesting. Lead acid batteries probably killed it. They say the system is designed to drain the batteries down to 20%, that sounds like a bad idea. Also charging lead acid is slower and doesn't scale as nicely as Lithium.

So probably a lot of battery issues.

[BigBeakie]

I met the developer of the system, and got the inside scoop.

The short story was the prototype/test boat that was setup according to the designers specs, worked OK considering the batteries at the time. I believe it is still being used.

Then Lagoon thought they could do it better, cut the designer out of the deal, poached all his ideas & IP, and proceeded to screw it up royally. It was a disaster, caused both Lagoon and EP reputational damage, and Lagoon replaced the electrics with diesels to try and save face and avoid court cases.

Lagoon got what they deserved, IMO.

[Jeannius]

geozeck... I think the main problem with that boat, the Lagoon 420, was that most of them went into charter fleets and the system was way too complicated to survive in the hands of the average charterer.

I know of two boats, both owner operated, that were very happy with the system. One guy (user name Octopus) still has the boat and the original system after something like 13 years. You can search for his posts.

I met another guy with a 420 while we were both doing circumnavigations and he was also happy with the system. Sadly he became ill and is no longer with us but if you search for username Dignity, his posts may still be around.