Legs verses shafts

C

claire

New Member
Joined
14 Jan 2010
Messages
13
Location
Suffolk
Visit site
Hi
We looking to buy a small sports cruiser with an outdrive but dont know if we should go for a shaft boat. We are told that shafts do not have the performance of legs but are not as expensive on repair bills. Can anyone comment please?
 
claire said:
Hi
We looking to buy a small sports cruiser with an outdrive but dont know if we should go for a shaft boat. We are told that shafts do not have the performance of legs but are not as expensive on repair bills. Can anyone comment please?
Click to expand...

Hi Claire

Outdrives are absolutely fine. Assuming you have a planing hull you will get better performance per Hp and probably about 1/3 better economy from the outdrive.
BUT
You must keep it properly serviced and look after it. This comes at a cost and roughly speaking, the saving you made on fuel will be spent in additional servicing.
Little things... If you use it for fishing, do everything to avoid getting line around it. If you do, clear it immediately before it winds it's way into the drive. This can be costly!

There are other things to consider though.
You say you want a small "Sports Cruiser". This normally means moderate to pretty good performance and a planing hull which, 9 times out of 10 mean an outdrive anyway.
Knock ten knots off the performance, add a small keel to create a semi planing hull profile and put a shaft on the boat with the engine midships and you now have a slower, but very sea worthy cruiser. Driven well, it will take you through nearly anything.

There's far more to it than that, but in essence, you need to decide what you want from your boat. Cruising the coast on perfect weekends? A spot of fishing offshore? Day trips? Over night stops? Picnics? Watersports?

NB
 
you have pretty much asked and answered your own question there, out drives are made from aluminium are almost totally immersed in water and contain all manner of bearings and whirly bits which dont like water particulary sea water.
 
Dont be put off by sterndrives. You have to look after them, but only as you should any mechanical bit of kit. A single sterndrive will be much easier to manouver for a beginner than a single shaft drive boat. Twin shafts are a different thing, but a single shaft can be a bugger as on a 25ft boat its unlikely you will have room for a bow thruster.

Fuel economy will be much better, at leat 30% better and in relaity as mist small shaft drive boats dont fully plane its more likely to be closer to 50% better.

Servicing on a single leg varies depending on who you get to do the work. If you are buying a new boat, then you are lmited to authorised repairers in the first two years to keep the warranty up to date, but outside of the warranty period there are loads of very good independant mechanics who can help seriously reduce your service bills. A full service on a Volovo leg from a volvo dealer will likely be around £800, while an independant using the same genuine parts will likely be close to half that, at around £500. This should be done every two year, with an inspection and oil change done in the interim year which is a fairly staright forward DIY job if required.

The other consideration is optiong to only consider shaft drive will seriously limit your boat options to the Peche-Promanard type from Beneteau, Jeanneau, Ocquateu and Arvor. Nothing wrong with these they are great boats, but if you want a sports boat you will have to opt for a stern drive.

One more thing, if buying second hand, for all the reasons listed above, get a full mechanical survey on the drive. You dont want to be repairing other peoples lack of care and servicing...
 
"We looking to buy a small sports cruiser with an outdrive but dont know if we should go for a shaft boat. We are told that shafts do not have the performance of legs but are not as expensive on repair bills. Can anyone comment please !"

If it helps...................
If your proposed "new to you" boat is fairly newish say up to 5/10 years old with a modern single outdrive,you will probably have bought it before anybody else has had a chance to buuger it up through lack of attention.
However even the odd modern leg has been known to have problems,one in particular suffered from failure due to over heating and another well known make quietly corrodes away (alledgedly) due to poor paint choice.
Buying one of these particular outdrives is not a good thing.

But on the whole you should not have any real problems.

If it is older and bigger or even worse a twin set up,then be very very careful about your purchase.
In theory any 20 year old boat with twin outdrives "should" have been serviced every year with a major service every other year.Thats 20 small services @ £200 and 10 big ones say @ £500.00 + the cost of a lift out/in everytime lets call it £9K,plus the lift out at an additional £3K that excludes stuff that WILL wear out due to the complexity of the blimming things.
The temptation to skip a service is hard to resist.

Your average shaft boat owner will have that money tucked away in his bank account :)
One other point,if most of your boating be inland or on rivers the savings on fuel will marginable as the real fuel savings with legs come at speeds where lots of fuel is being guzzled also worth noting a shaft driven boat is far less skittish (blown off course) in confined waters at low speeds.
 
Last edited:
I spent the first fifteen years of my boating life with outdrives and the last ten years with shafts so I feel I can comment on this with a certain amount of experience! I must first confess that speed has never been the issue for me! I am just happy messing about with boats so I am not interested in 30 knot speeds, but if you are outdrives are probably better.

Basically the outdrive owner is hanging his gearbox in the water all the time unless you have a small boat which is pulled out onto a trailer. There are of course many areas of your outdrive that have holes in it! i.e. gear shift, oil top up, seals behind props and of course bellows. All these areas are likely to have ingress of water at some time or other and can lead to a lot of damage. I was always spending money on outdrive repairs! loads of money! The outdrive case is usually made of ally and this also suffers in the water, it gets eaten by electrolosis. So be prepared to have a fair budget every year for maintenance.

On the other hand are shafts! I have never had a single problem with my shaft boat, the only thing I have had to do in ten years is replace the cutlass bearings which I did myself, the bearings are really quite inexpensive.

I would never go back to outdrives!

All the best

Barry
 
As an engineer in this trade id back up pretty much everything above my post.

To add.

If you are thinking of buying something like a targa 33 of early 90s vintage, unless in recent years the legs and drives have either been replaced or seriously overhauled be prepared to be paying out big money on either re engineing/ and new drives at some point.

Its really the luck of the draw.

One friend and forumite/client of mine ran a draco with yamaha engines and drives which he kept for a good number of years, I maintained them for him and apart from 1 major overhaul which was concentrated around the transom shields and steering that was it in a good number of years apart from routine servicing, I know there will be replies to the contary regarding yamaha drives but honestly there were never any failures on this 1994 boat.

He then swapped to volvo kad 300s and in the first few months on this 2000 plus year boat had 2 major drive failures, and some engine work required that the good old yamahas never needed.

Just beware that a good looking targaa might have al sorts of nasties beneath the hatch and behind!.

Get a mechanical survey form a good volvo engineer.
 
outdrives???

I have had both, and would not now have a an outdrive boat as a gift. Take a look round the boat yards and note the numbers of boats with big empty holes in the transom.
 
In my experience: Started on small fishing boat with shaft no BT - it was a bu**er at close qtrs - never had any trouble in 250hrs of use. So next one a bit bigger sports cruiser and went for outdrive - better steering at very slow speeds esp astern, but like has been said, it cost me a fortune in maintenance and repairs and lost season time through failures anything from the rams failing to the bellows leaking and the cables seizing up - never again. And, according to its service records, everything had been done on time and in full!

Now got shafts again and all is well so far!
 
Brings back memories err nightmares actually.

"it cost me a fortune in maintenance and repairs and lost season time through failures anything from the rams failing to the bellows leaking "

Totally forgot the about the P**y rams and their delightful habit of quietly corroding and the seals leaking,plus of course the lift pumps not working due to relays and electrical problems,while the angle indicators always malfunctioning is not even worth a mention.
Lets also not forget the steering fork seals weeping,the props being very prone to strike damage and trying to clean the transom castings in order the get a good coat of anti foul in all the nooks and crannys.When a shaft boat comes out its a quick blast with the jet wash and coat of A/F and back in,fettling outdrives takes time ashore,thats more money.

The horrid things were spawned to save time ie. dosh for the boat builder.Just cut big hole in stern and 4 bolts...bingo, transfer time saved by builder into constant never ending maintaince to any following owners

On reflection if you have a weeny boat that does not actually get used much,praaps lives on a trailer,you have pots of money to pay someone else to do work then buy a boat with legs,everyone else avoid. ?
 
oldgit said:
"it cost me a fortune in maintenance and repairs and lost season time through failures anything from the rams failing to the bellows leaking "

Totally forgot the about the P**y rams and their delightful habit of quietly corroding and the seals leaking,plus of course the lift pumps not working due to relays and electrical problems,while the angle indicators always malfunctioning is not even worth a mention.
Lets also not forget the steering fork seals weeping,the props being very prone to strike damage and trying to clean the transom castings in order the get a good coat of anti foul in all the nooks and crannys.When a shaft boat comes out its a quick blast with the jet wash and coat of A/F and back in,fettling outdrives takes time ashore,thats more money.

The horrid things were spawned to save time ie. dosh for the boat builder.Just cut big hole in stern and 4 bolts...bingo, transfer time saved by builder into constant never ending maintaince to any following owners

On reflection if you have a weeny boat that does not actually get used much,praaps lives on a trailer,you have pots of money to pay someone else to do work then buy a boat with legs,everyone else avoid. ?
Click to expand...

you have hit the nail on the head, for myself I just could bring myself back to remember the horrors of it all, let alone describe them!! suffice to say "NEVER AGAIN"
 
My feeling is that, if the boat is to be kept in the water, then legs are bad news. Endless maintenance, anodes, bellows, hydraulics etc., etc.

I have a leg, but boat is kept out of the water, maintenance is modest. After 4 seasons use,

Props.jpg
 
Geoffs said:
My feeling is that, if the boat is to be kept in the water, then legs are bad news. Endless maintenance, anodes, bellows, hydraulics etc., etc.

I have a leg, but boat is kept out of the water, maintenance is modest. After 4 seasons use,

Props.jpg
Click to expand...

all that time and not even a chip!!
 
mainshiptom said:
Since we sit on the mud and do not want to pull the boat out for extra service !

It is shafts for me !

Tom
Click to expand...

So are shafts really better to dry out than legs then? That suprises me, cos you can lift legs. Though I suppose leaving legs lifted is probably bad cos it exposes part of the ram that is better left covered. We have losts of places in our vicinity that we would like to visit but haven't cos we don't want to dry out. But then I keep hearing about boats that do and am never sure what the story is.
 
another vote here for shafts having had 5 years with each.
With legs - my 5 years maintenance and repairs, admittedly on a 15 year old boat, some years cost me more than my annual mooring and countless lost or spoilt trips. A total pain. My number one criteria for the new boat was - absolutely nothing considered if it had outdrives.
With Shafts - as somebody above reported - one pair of cheap cutlass bearings in 5 years.
No contest
 
One more observation - being in the hunt for a sea going boat I was well and truly warned off outdrives very early on, largely by people with first hand experience of maintenance costs. However, there are hundreds of boats on the inland waterways which have the old enfield or "Z" outdrive which seem to go on forever with modest maintenance costs. I've seen some offshore boats with Z drives but I think the problem is they are only good for engines up to about 50hp. When you hear about all the problems folk have with outdrives you wonder if the concept has reached the point where the engineering weaknesses are too great to overcom. I was reading about a bloke with a brand new Botnia Targa - a much lauded boat - having had major -and recurring - problems with his drives.
They do seem to like them in the 'states though don't they?
 
Oh plenty of them, if you look carefully you can see a couple of nicks on the leading edge of skeg. Touched up as needed, but ok for 600hrs use, including a trip up the Thames from sea to Oxford, when I found the bottom many times!
 
Nealo said:
They do seem to like them in the 'states though don't they?
Click to expand...

A fair bit of their boating is done in fresh water. I remember an old Mercruiser manual from about 20 years ago saying, "if at any stage the drive is used in salt water"................
It is also the trailer-boating capital of the world!
 
AndieMac said:
A fair bit of their boating is done in fresh water. I remember an old Mercruiser manual from about 20 years ago saying, "if at any stage the drive is used in salt water"................
!
Click to expand...
A volvo penta dealer a few years back 0n the River Severn refused to stand by his warranty on the new seals and bellows he'd fitted to my VP270 legs which failed after one month's use because i had "exposed the outdrives to a hostile environment" i.e. I'd had the audacity to put to sea. I was told a few grains of sand or even some seaweed would have caused the seals to fail again. I took it eventually to Volvo themselves and he was told in no uncertain terms to cough up for my emergency repairs or lose his VP agency. Cheque in the post next morning.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Share this page

Top