It's been a while, much to my shame, since I've been on the forum - a long story . . . but after about 4 years I finally one of my 40+'s back together after painting the tank and the flywheel. My sudden burst of enthusiasm was sparked by the purchase of an Inflatable dinghy for an upcoming trip with my Caravan to some huge lakes. This brings me to my question, with an 11' inflatable of the sports type (i.e. with the cone shaped tubes at the back) and an air floor giving a total weight of around 85lbs what sort of top speed and cruising speeds should I expect from one of my 40+'s and what speeds would my Seagull 90 give. It will only be me and my wife, I'm 16 stone my wife is only about 7 stone. Which of the two would you recommend to take on the trip? unfortunately I will not have time for a test run before leaving - perhaps I should take both Anyone with any experience of something similar? Many thanks in advance for any help/comments.
It will be nice to give the Seagulls a workout, usually they seem to go from sitting in my garage to sitting on the back of my 20 foot Motor boat as backups just in case of a breakdown - so far they have not been needed so they only get 15 minutes of glory once in a while just to make sure they are running and to keep thinks moving and lubed internally.
1975 Forty Plus L/S 30 hrs from new
1976 Forty Plus L/S 1 Gal. Long Range tank
1983 Silver Century 90 EFNR 32 hrs from new
Hi, I run a Forty Plus on an 8ft inflatable, generally I would say that we get about 3 knots without thrashing the engine too hard. The limit on our canals is 4 knots anyway so we never really worry too much about getting any more. We would have a bit more weight on as my wife is a bit heavier than yours Hope this helps. Tony
Thanks for the reply. I guessed on the 40 plus giving about 3-4 knots. I've noticed with inflatables, that with a motor that's not capable of getting it on the plane, that often a longer one will go a little quicker, all things being equal. I still can't decide how much faster the 90 will make it, if I could cruise at about 5 knots that would probably be sufficient for my needs. The lakes here are big, the one I'm going to is about 90 miles long and although relatively narrow, is still 1-5 miles wide. Also with a body of water that big it can get rough when the wind gets up, so it will have some conditions more like the sea. I think I will use the 90 for certain just to have as much in hand as possible, also the lake is at an altitude of 6,045 feet. I've yet to determine how much power this robs from an ancient 2 stroke motor, with the piston effectively sucking the air/fuel charge in through large ports as opposed to valves, this might be less than on the 4 stroke counterparts. Obviously I'm not planning to cruise around the whole lake, more a case of running along the shore and exploring the coves in the rocks near the areas where I'm staying. We can also throw the boat in the bed of the pickup and drive to somewhere else and launch there, if anything in particular catches our eye and when we get a better acquainted with the area in general.
1975 Forty Plus L/S 30 hrs from new
1976 Forty Plus L/S 1 Gal. Long Range tank
1983 Silver Century 90 EFNR 32 hrs from new
I thought I'd report back after my 10 day trip which was amazing fun, clear waters and bright sunshine that was only a reality in my dreams as a boy boating on the Welsh coast in the days when Seagull outboards could be seen and heard everywhere.
The 90 pushed the inflatable along with ease at a reasonable pace, it reminded me that the throttle on a Seagull is more like a Volume Control, than a throttle, as opening up wide makes for a lot of noise without much of a speed increase, it couldn't quite get the little inflatable on the plane. The motor never missed a beat and pushed us along through on one occasion into a 35+ mph wind, where at one point the tops of the waves were just blowing continuously into our faces like a hose rather than just splashing up as we bounced up and over them. We sat down on the air floor to reduce our windage and after a while we were actually laughing as we spent 30 minutes running in some pretty unpleasant /potentially scary conditions. Under these conditions full throttle, or close to, it really kept the craft planted in the water and on a straight course, we were doing over 5 knots straight into the wind - this was when the seagull most impressed me. With one person in the boat, it would run somewhere in the 6 knot range.
Over the course of the trip, a lot of continuous run time was put on the motor, due to the distances we covered, and it being the main motor rather than an auxiliary. I thought I'd list the pros and cons I discovered and there are some specific questions that arose that I will post in the appropriate sections. One point I wasn't sure of prior to the trip was fuel consumption, it turned out that fuel economy was way better than I imagined. My original thinking, and what I explained to my wife who, when she expressed concern over fuel range, was that if we set off on a full tank which is 1 UK gallon and ran until that ran low or out, the two US gallons(1.6 UK gallons) in the can we carried would always get us home. On our first serious outing, we ran and ran as I tried to explore the depths of the fuel tank. After over 3 hours of running, I decided to refuel anyway to avoid running out at an inopportune moment - after that I never worried again about our fuel realizing that the tank plus the fuel can could take us farther than we humans had the stamina for. In all we used less than 6 US gallons 4.8 UK gallons for the whole trip - impressive for such an old motor pushing an inflatable which is not the most efficient of hull designs.
Pros: Reliable, pushed the boat with authority, very economical, quick starting, no maintenance required, quick release from mounting bracket so that could remain on the boat,, reverse gear made getting off the beaches very easy.
Cons: Number one here has to be the oil from the exhaust that drips out after running, number 2 is noise it really barks out even at moderate throttle, the big prop made coming a shore and docking rather tricky as the boat was moving so fast even at idle (not the motors fault - just the application), 90 model a little heavy, with the bottom mount moved to it's farthest out position to adjust the trim, releasing to tilt and reconnecting to the motor is difficult as somehow the relationship with the rubber is different and in addition the tiller mount hits the mounting bracket when you turn to the left.
Despite any of the above, it was just plain fun and really did take me back to my childhood bobbing around in a 7' 6" Fibrocell dinghy on the Welsh coast exploring every inch of the estuary and reinforced what I've known for years that where boats are concerned size really doesn't matter and often fun is inversely proportional to the length of the craft.
1975 Forty Plus L/S 30 hrs from new
1976 Forty Plus L/S 1 Gal. Long Range tank
1983 Silver Century 90 EFNR 32 hrs from new
Anyone with any experience of something similar? Many thanks in advance for any help/comments.
Hope this helps. Tony