ampair or duogen

[c_roff]

In July of this year I'm setting sail, with my wife, from the UK for New Zealand in our 35ft long keel GRP ketch. We intend to purchase either an Ampair or a Duogen water generator to keep our batteries charged. Does anyone have FIRST HAND experience (please no armchair opinions) of using either of these generators? If so can you recommend either of them? Both systems can be converted into a wind generator mode when at anchor. I'm also interested to know how easy and practical this conversion is.

Many thanks

Chris Roff.

whistler

 

[Stingo]

Have sold my Ampair and am about to buy a Duogen for many reasons:
1. The weight is below deck level.
2. Convertion from water to air mode requires no tools and is quick.
3. Pulling the turbine in when underway in heavy weather is a nightmare and incredibly difficult.

My reservations about Duogen are:
1. It's a new and fairly untested product (only three trans-atlantics and all three had problems - apparently now solved)
2. I am suspect about the durability of the construction.
3. Getting spares anywhere in the world might not be as easy as spares for Ampair (they already have the infrastructure stepup to send spares)


<A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.stingo.co.uk>http://www.stingo.co.uk</A> - now showing at a computer near you

 

[JerryHawkins]

I have a DuoGen (that's my Fisher 25 on DuoGen's web site!) and I'm very pleased with it.

Have had it nearly a year and have worked closely with Pete Anderson on improving the original design with a small tweaks here and there.

Being a fairly new and very small concern at the moment they are very keen to ensure that ALL their customers are happy and will go out of their way to sort out any problems you may have. I've no doubt that they'd arrange shipping of parts to anywhere required should it be necessaey.

PM me if you have any specific questions.

Cheers,

Jerry

 

[alex_rogers]

We used an ampair for an atlantic circuit. It produced a good six-seven amps continuously at around six-seven knots and gave no problems electrically.

Pulling in the propeller at speed is VERY hard work although I've heard of people letting a split funnel slide down the line to cover it. You really have to heave to whilst you pull it out. We left it out is very light winds once and ended up with it around the propeller after the helmsman got confused and sailed backwards for a while during the night!

Although we had the kit, we didn't bother converting it for wind power as we were moving around a great deal. It does require bolting together the wind vane and isn't a one minute job.

That said I think it works very well, is very compact and can be taken off and stored below easily. I have a Vancouver 28 and would consider using one for a long passage. The duogen seems a good compromise but looks pretty ugly and I don't think I'd want all that stuff on the back of the boat as well as the self steering.

Alex Rogers
<A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.YachtsAtSea.com> www.YachtsAtSea.com </A><P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1>Edited by alex_rogers on 29/01/2003 12:51 (server time).</FONT></P>

 

[HaraldS]

I'm using an LVM, which I think is quite similar to an ampair. Towed it a couple thousand miles this summer and it worked ok. Gives an average of about 100W, which helps stretch out the intervals of running the diesel genny. Our consumption is more like 250W on average, so it can't cover what we use, with freezers, instruments and laptops.
One day it stopped spinning and I thought we had lost the prop, but pulling it in we found that a plastic bag had been caught, which stopped the spinning and made it possible to pull it in at 7 knots. Since then we have a new retrieval method without heaving to.
What I dislike is that I like to also tow a fishing line, and I'm worried to get them entangled.
I think with the duo-gen you wouldn't have any of these problems.

<A target="_blank" HREF=http://www.taniwani.de>http://www.taniwani.de</A>