I can't pull the rope on the Honda. As it is a new motor, I'd be wary of touching it. And THAT screws up everything. First estimate....6 wks out. Prime Time is coming fast. And that's just AFTER the tow vehicle went south. Maybe God is trying to tell me something and I'm too stubborn to listen. I'm telling ya, I'm gonna get me a motor boat. Well, let me rephrase that. I'm gonna FIX my motor boat (which is an ancient wooden Stauter skiff) and sell this blow boat to some fool and get RID of all her demands for attention. Jeeze.
Yeah, and if you believe that I've got YOU fooled! ;D
Man, I just can't bring myself to click the "like" button. So sorry... Like many others, I've grown to dislike outboards.
I feel for you. That truly does suck. If you weren't so far from me, I would loan one. I have a used older Honda 2hp I picked up about a year ago. I also picked up a E-lite (1.5 hp) by Epropulsion for my Scamp before the tariffs would kick in. I could capsize with it without doing it any harm. I can connect it to my 100Ah lithium battery to charge it for more range, and I have a 100W solar panel to help keep the charge up on the battery. It will push the Scamp at about 3 mph for 5 miles running on only its internal battery for a total of about 2 hours. I don't need to pull a rope to start it. I just push a button. Doesn't have the power or range of the little Honda, but I also have oars.
What I like about my sea kayak is I can paddle 3.5 to 4 mph for 25 miles. I can go 5 to 6 mph if I have too but not for that many miles. However, I can see the physical limits writing on the wall in the not-so-distant future and sailing with a small motor for backup has its appeal.
Thanks for the support. :) Sure I can sail w/o a motor. But I HAVE A BRAND NEW ONE!
Bah! Humbug! I guess that's just the way things go. The darts of the Enemy and all that. Such is Life, but that brings up that question of aux power again. I've gone back and forth with it, first using electric, then two stroke and finally four stroke gasoline. I much prefer the gasoline over anything else when it is DEPENDABLE. Other than that you have a boat bucks worth of scrap iron.
SO...being as life is finite, perhaps I should reconsider the electric alternative. I use the outboard to make a long run sometimes that the electric, even today's electric, won't do. The last trip to Bayou Cassotte was an example, where I motored through a congested shipping lane for several miles. And yes, back during the electric phase I was using a lead acid battery that acted as ballast and destroyed my neck bones. And the motor was on the smaller end of the scale. But there is Lithium now, and better motors, however overpriced.
Ideally I'd use oars but S R Cat is short and fat and I KNOW how well she'd row. And to top all that, she's wide TOO, so oars are perhaps not the BEST option.
We'll see how the story goes once the repair shop opens. I don't foresee great things but there is always that Hope. In the meantime I'll look at the various electric alternatives and consider having a BACK-UP for the BACK-UP. Triple redundancy!!! Call it a birthday present and let it go. Life is too short to be mad and stressed.
Riley, You're making me feel a little queasy about my boat choices, here. :(
Quote from: Riley Smith on Aug 31, 2025, 08:47 AMIdeally I'd use oars but S R Cat is short and fat and I KNOW how well she'd row.
And the SCAMP ISN'T short and fat?!? :o
(Best Scooby-Doo impression: ) "Ruh-Roh!!" :o
Quote from: Riley Smith on Aug 31, 2025, 08:47 AMAnd to top all that, she's wide TOO, so oars are perhaps not the BEST option.
Where was all this advice and experience, back when I was evaluating a SCAMP?!?!? >:(
Quote from: Riley Smith on Aug 31, 2025, 08:47 AMI use the outboard to make a long run sometimes that the electric, even today's electric, won't do.
(Gulp!) Way to make a guy go back and re-check all his arithmetic!! :o
I used a trolling motor on
Urchin for three years and also had to go back to gas motors, so I could go trolling in the Gulf Stream. But I have to say, those three years with a trolling motor made me a much better sailor. 8)
Using an under-powered form of propulsion, I learned that:
1) You don't turn the bow into the wind, the wind can push you back and stall you dead in your tracks. Instead, you turn the hull down wind, kind of a motorized "chicken gybe".
2) Hug the edges of cuts, inlets, passes, and rivers, where the current isn't as strong as it is, nearer the center.
Remember vividly, :o going backwards through Bakers Haulover Cut on an adverse tide, until I discovered I could get through if I hugged the rocks as close as I dared.
3) To answer the "you don't have enough hp to counter a strong current" folks:
If you have no winds, you can "tack" an adverse current, the same as you can tack an adverse wind heading
Bernoulli's Principle works as good in water, as it does in air. Your VMG through water will strongly resemble your VMG through air, under sail, but you WILL eventually get there! :D
Face the Physics: If your boat hull displacement design tops out at 4 or 5 knots and you get in a 6 knot tide, you're going BACKWARDS at 1 or 2 knots whether you're electric, gas or diesel.
Does 6 knots seem a little over the top? ???
Depending on the time of year and location, the Gulf Stream averages 2½ - 4 knots and can get to over 4.9 knots at the surface, with a little help from the wind. A high tide falling off the Finger Flats in south Biscayne Bay, can really zoom you through them if you catch the tide just right, or force you to anchor for three or four hours, if you don't. :'(
4) In Ye Olden Dayes, it was called "sailing under auxiliary" when you used the motor AND the sails. Motors were even LESS reliable then, than nowadays.
BUT!! Whenever those ancient motors WERE working, :P they helped push your apparent wind far enough forward, that you could achieve quite usable tack angles in very light winds, and a trolling motor can do the same thing.
And if you DON'T have very light winds and it's piping up a little, then why are you fooling around with a motor in the first place?? ???
It's called: SAILING!! ;D
I think a lot of guys waste a lot of watts, not doing all the things described above and that too, gives trolling motors a bad rap.
When you sit down and do the arithmetic, the combination of lithium chemistry batteries, brushless DC motors, PWM (Pulse Width Modulation) motor controllers, coupled with similar advances in photo-voltaic cells and solar charging controllers, will just about get you over the line, in range anxiety.
And I intend to put my money, where my mouth is.
My goal is to use a couple LiFePO4 batteries, backed up with a 100 watt solar array into a solar controller to drive an ordinary trolling motor (saving all the PWM and ESC gadgetry for now, in case I need it later), along with my tiller pilot, CPAP machine at night, running lights, and re-charging all the USB Toys to cruise for the length of say, a BEER Cruise, or a Florida 120, or a Columbus Day Cruising Regatta, or a Cedar Key Small Boat Meet. When I was using a gas motor, a single battery and small solar panel kept me in electrical equilibrium, in that I could replenish as much as I used electrically. That trolling motor is going to get the Lion's share of the watts, now, but with 200 A/Hr instead of 100 A/Hr and 100 watts instead of 30 watts, on the solar array.
I think I can get there.
We'll see.
If not, I'll be joining you and my son Chris, and Doug and Dale and all the rest of the Honda BF2.3 owners in cursing the Infernal Combustion Engine and invoking Brennan's Motor Dictum:
"
The Only Thing A Motor Does Reliably, Is Fail."
In the meantime, you might get online and find some Honda owners forums and search for problems similar to what you describe. I mean, you'd HATE to wait for an outboard mechanic if all you had to do, was to slap the motor on the cowl 2 inches up and 3 inches over from the logo, to get it to pull! ;D
One guy's opinion,
Charles Brennan
I do a lot of motor sailing. I once needed to get up the Severn River with some current and a 15 knot breeze coming right at me. I motor sailed with main alone, and made very good tacking angles without running the Tohatsu over about half throttle, and had easy tacks without having to handle the jib.
My Compac 19 is an outboard killer. Every o/b I've mounted on her quits working within days. As a last resort I mounted the short shaft propane o/b from my dingy, went sailing, and upon returning found all the propane had leaked out of a new canister. So now I have 3 outboards needing repair. I'm seriously contemplating an electric trolling motor for day sailing, but I would still need a gas o/b for longer trips.
Quote from: Charles Brennan on Aug 31, 2025, 10:34 AMRiley, You're making me feel a little queasy about my boat choices, here. :(
Quote from: Riley Smith on Aug 31, 2025, 08:47 AMIdeally I'd use oars but S R Cat is short and fat and I KNOW how well she'd row.
And the SCAMP ISN'T short and fat?!? :o
(Best Scooby-Doo impression: ) "Ruh-Roh!!" :o
I have rowed my Scamp, and she does OK. You won't win any races, but you will move along at a decent rate for a short fat boat.
2) Hug the edges of cuts, inlets, passes, and rivers, where the current isn't as strong as it is, nearer the center.
Remember vividly, :o going backwards through Bakers Haulover Cut on an adverse tide, until I discovered I could get through if I hugged the rocks as close as I dared.
When you paddle a canoe upstream or a kayak against the tidal flow in a marsh creek you learn this lesson pretty darn quickly.
Then there is sculling with a single oar. I intend to give this a try at some point and hope it doesn't sprain a wrist. :o
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZVeGWGFtmoU
Ah CB, different strokes and such. I didn't say that you couldn't row it, just that it wasn't the BEST solution. And of course, this is in MY operating envelope. I love the motor because I can be on the river 45 minutes from right now and be in a great place to sail. If I have to SAIL to get there, it could take anywhere up to an hour to get to that spot or even the possibility of not making it at all because of current, tide, and wind. SO, yes I do use the motor to its fullest capability. I'LL never forget firing up the two-stroke and feeling free from that damn battery! I'll agree that a wimpy motor with limited range makes a good sailor. Been there done that. All things considered though, I hope it isn't a serious problem with the little Honda. I really like it.
I gave up on my used 5hp Honda on my 19ft Mariner. Was going to buy a new Tohatsu, but wasn't sure that was going to be much better. Decided to take a chance on an Epropulsion Spirit, which after I sold the Honda for $600, only cost $100 more than than the Tohatsu.
Ran some speed/power trials. At 400 watts (3hrs on battery), I can get 4+kts for a range of 12+nm. At full throttle (1000 watts), I get 5.5kts for 1.25 hrs or 6.5nm range. If I slow to 300 watts, I get 3.5 kts for 14+nm range. With electric, the speed vs range really shows. So stop and smell the roses when motoring. Actually with the quiet and lack of vibration, motoring at 2-3 kts early in the morning up a creek while waiting for the wind is a special joy. Get to see fish jump, geese and ducks, turtles on cypress logs, and converse with fishermen in normal tones as I go by.
For cruising next year, I am equipping Sweet P with an LiFePO4 battery, probably 150AH. This will give me one full recharge (about 100AH) in about 20 hours - DC charger draws 6 amps. So I do have to plan a little in advance but going more than 12nm in one day under power is not my idea of sailing. We just don't have all day calms, especially for a couple of days in a row. The other step would be finding a 100 watt solar panel to fit the rear of the cockpit - which would give me 20-25AH on sunny days.
In the meantime, my shoulders and back thank me every day.
you pays your money, you make your choices
Fred W
ODay Mariner 19 Sweet P
Fred, Does your boat sport a Bimini top? I had a 30 watt panel on the top of my Bimini for about 25 years and it worked great, up there.
PICT0162_800x600.jpg
I attached some eye-straps to the underside of the Bimini top frame with pop rivets. Then I tied nylon line to the 4 corner grommets of the solar panel and tied small bronze snap hooks onto the ends. The bronze hooks snapped onto the eye straps. In the one corner where I had a bulkhead electrical connector, I plugged in the solar array to my charge controller.
Plenty of room up there for a 100 watt panel and it's never in the way and you're charging all the while, you're sailing. I hope to install a similar arrangement (with a 100 Watt panel) on a SCAMP I'm building.
Hope this helps,
Charles Brennan
Speaking of sucking at sailing, the learning curve on Urchin is really kicking my butt! I didn't think coming back to a monohull after years of trimaran sailing would be that big of a deal - I was wrong! Every time we have gone out on Urchin I've experienced a different problem - my fault of course. First time - topping lift too tight making a big bubble in main with little to no pointing/tacking; next time was frustration with no wind, tried everything including moving jib sheets inside stays, putting the weight on downwind side, and raising keel; today was 8kts of wind with gusts to 15 and boat would not tack or point with full sails - turned out I hadn't dropped the keel back down fully so tacking stalled halfway through. Figured that one out when we got back to the dock and I had time to assess the situation and checked the keel winch. Planning on a jib downhaul, lines led aft, and ensuring keel is all the way down, next weekend.
;D ;D ;D ;D
After reading that raising the cb would help on a downwind, I tried it. Didn't make a minutes difference and I ran right up into the marsh when I tried to tack at the end of the run. The rule for the catboat is leave the board down and it'll tell you when it gets too shallow and it won't matter any other time.
Ed, That blue line coming down from the top of the mast is:
1) Occasionally, a topping lift. More often, I use the Dyneema pigtail on the back stay, for topping lift chores at anchor, etc.
2) More frequently, an American flag halyard.
The flag is clipped onto the two snap hooks and hoisted 2/3rds up the back stay a la "Chapman's Seamanship and Small Boat Handling" and cleated off, on the back stay cleat, not the mast cleat.
3) Used as a sort of derrick, for various things like getting the scuba gear back aboard via the main sheet traveler shackle, so you don't break your back leaning over and lifting. Also used if necessary, to bring the outboard motor aboard for repairs without breaking backs or losing the motor.
4) The "top" trolling line for trolling offshore. This is when the line is cleated to a mast cleat. The outrigger clip, clips onto the snaps and the fishing line is held captive by the outrigger clip, until there is a strike on the fishing line.
Typically, one of the flag halyards on the spreaders is employed as the "middle" trolling line and finally the "lower" trolling line is simply lead off the stern. On occasion, we will also use a down rigger on the other side of the stern for a total of four lines in the water. The top line is led out long, the middle line is led out medium and the short line is close to the boat.
This way, (when viewed from the side) the lines form a triangle that keeps the trolled lines from snagging each other.
Works!! ;D
PICT0217_800x600.jpg
There's lots of seeming "quirks" on the boat, actually features that might not be appreciated, until understood.
For example:
The cockpit seat lockers have a ¼-inch tri-laid line led from the end of the inside of the locker, forward to a jam cleat on the main bulkhead. Allows the lockers to be "locked" so that people can not remove stuff from the locker, or get into the boat. (If they are limber enough!) This is a continuous loop line, in that it goes back to the other cockpit locker.
DCP_0018.JPG
To the un-initiated, it might LOOK like it's a little too short, but this is by design.
The length was chosen, so that only one locker at a time can be opened, in the cockpit. Might seem like a nuisance and the first impression would be to simply lengthen that line. But this is for safety, so that if you ever got pooped by a rogue wave, you wouldn't flood the stern of the boat, since both lockers wouldn't (couldn't!) be open at the same time. DAMHIKT :o
Another:
The swing keel pennant "volcano" originally came with a round wooden plug at the top and just below the swing keel winch, to keep water from splashing up the swing keel pennant and getting the bilge wet. Over the years, the hole in the plug hogged out and water splashed inside anyway. Got some black, hard rubber plugs (Spare plugs were delivered with your spares kit) and drilled a hole just big enough for the pennant to pass through. For good measure, I re-purposed some dive gear neoprene fabric and capped off the top of the volcano as a further impedance against water ingress.
20220414_155007 1024X768.jpg
That hose clamp at the top of the volcano has two purposes:
1) Holds everything snug.
2) Allows you to increase hose clamp tension periodically, as the hole in the rubber hogs out from usage. When you can no longer clamp it enough to keep water from coming through, you simply replace the plug with a spare. Based on my experience, the one currently installed, should be good for another half a dozen years.
One more:
You might have noticed some shackles and hooks on nylon line, attached to the Froli springs under the side berths.
This is for convenience, when day sailing. You can clip the springs up on hooks under the deck to hold the spring assembly against the side of the hull. Then the berth cushion is also leaned against the side of the hull.
This allows you to place (for example) an ice chest directly on the berth and not have it "sweat" on the cushion. This is especially useful for snorkeling trips and for fishing trips. Very little chance of someone wet, sitting on a berth cushion, or getting bait on a cushion. Greatly appreciated, when it's time to turn in.
Like so:
Berths_Hanging 1024X768.jpg
Notice the Froli spring shackle clipped onto a rod holder ring.
As always, feel free to query something that doesn't seem to look logical; the answers may surprise you.
Hope this helps,
Charles Brennan
Wazzat on the end of your line??? Curious minds want to know.
Riley, It was a small Blackfin Tuna, one of about three or four, we caught that day.
Quite tasty, too! ;D
IMG_20130210_173434_800x600.jpg
Hope this clarifies,
Charles Brennan
Oh yeah that clarifies. Good fight there. And almost as much clarity as me DRAINING SOME OIL and firing the motor right up. I had already taken your advice on searching for common problems before I even started moaning and drained a little oil to no effect. Then I got a LIGHT where I can actually SEE and saw it needed a bit more. There's a sight glass on the side that was designed by an idiot or at least one not used to dealing with blind people. That did the trick! I had thought it was a tiny bit low and added a little. Seems this baby is very finnicky on oil level and hard to get right. The handbook even mentions shaking the motor some to get it to level out. It couldn't have been more than three or four tablespoons. Anyway, we cooking now!!!!
Just in time for hot weather again. It was at least 90F today, although I didn't pay close attention. Mostly clear sky and ZERO wind. Guess I'll have to wait until another of those little bubbles comes through before not risking melting into a pile of bubbling fat in the bottom of the boat.
I will keep oil Level in mind with my 2hp Honda. I do need to run it some.
I agree with the oil level issue, I wish there was a dye I could add to the oil to make it more visible. When I first got mine, the previous owner had it slightly overfull, just above the sightglass. The oil was so clear it looked like there wasn't any in the sightglass. I added some, and added some, ultimately it did start but it smoked like crazy. Finally drained all of it and put in what the manual said, and if I looked veeeeery closely I could see the oil level. They should have had a different background in the sightglass to show the oil level, or have an old fashioned dipstick (another $.25 in plastic would have made a difference on the usability). Also, I hate how easily the cowling pops off when you pull the cord. Again, a slight change to the way the cowling attaches would go a long way. Besides the design flaws, also hate turning it 180 degrees to go in reverse, my next motor will have a true reverse.
Also, brief video from that fishing trip with the blackfin tuna. 4 to 6, occasional 8 footers. Trolling 2 lines. Would usually troll 3 or 4, but it was quite sporty out there!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nkf-gryletA