Petrol vs Diesel

Bigplumbs said:
Where I boat there are several petrol outboard boats and many diesel boats on swing moorings and no petrol or diesel for miles on the water how do you think they fill up some people need to get real and understand about boating away from the solent
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Can you not apply the same logic to your opinions/advice?
 
A case Study. Pt1.

Most folks who are looking to buy a small"ish " day boat,where most of us start out, are usually a bit strapped for cash and need to buy a as much boat as they can for the money.
Most also start with a very optimistic view of just how much boat their boat fund will buy.
Running costs tend not to feature quite so much. ...eek:
The amount of money you desperately need to spend usually increases exponentially with each viewing as does size and range ambition.
Boat and size will probably double before cold hard facts finally take control.
Suspect that very few entering in this price/size bracket will have the funds to ignore the petrol option and simply plump for diesel .
My first boats were all petrol outboard boats followed by an awful nasty jerry built Regal 23 made out of MDF, held together with sticky back plastic and contact adhesive and sometimes able to move via 2 x raw water cooled Mercruisers.
This was replaced PDQ with little loverly little Princess 25 with a VP V6 petrol , a proper well put togther boat that would get you there and back again.
It was fine for local work and took us from one end of the Medway to the other before its one short coming became pretty obvious , getting fuel into the tank.
Eventually one does become less keen on hoping that the attendant at the supermarket kiosk does not notice /object to you filling 3 or more old 20 litre old plastic old drums and heaving them into the back of your car in order to get high on the fumes during the drive back to the boat.
Dragging them out to boat and the attempt to get most of the fuel into the boat tank with a funnel is always entertaining and several goes in the washing machine will eventually get rid of the stink on you and your clothes
.The reek in car boot you will have to live with.
As for topping up while underway in any sort of sea.:ROFLMAO:

By now having lost all sense of the value of money and proportion (why squander money on new kitchen etc ) the urge to travel further, stay away longer and discovering new ways scare yourself silly will become your only goal.
Find that diesel powered boat and a whole new set of problems will hove into view.
Any marina or boatyard will have a choice of immaculate and hardly used very low hours petrol boats at amazingly low prices.
There is very good reason for this.
Good advice is great for those with money, most just got on with learning the hard way :)



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Whaup367 said:
If I read it correctly, as a private user (different regs for commercial) you can carry up to 240l, in containers of up to 60l, however portable containers must be under 10l (plastic), 20l (metal) or 30l (demountable fuel tanks), so the nominal 60l maximum size is probably of limited use to most.
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How many containers can be filled at a petrol station ?

The regulations do not specify the number of suitable portable containers that can be filled at a petrol filling station. (From gov.uk Web site)
 
Rappey said:
How many containers can be filled at a petrol station ?
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As above, that's at the discretion of the station.
The regulations do not specify the number of suitable portable containers that can be filled at a petrol filling station. (From gov.uk Web site)
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Yes, so if the station is happy to let you, you can fill up the dozen 20l jerrycans in the back of your pickup and off you go (post #45). I think oldgit is bang on when he points out how quickly this stops being fun, though :).
Mind you, I'm primarily a raggie and never found it that much fun, My rib is sitting in the drive growing moss and the only water it's seen in years has come from above rather than below.... I really ought to sell it.
 
Rappey said:
How many containers can be filled at a petrol station ?
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At 99p at litre from your local Tesco (remember when everyone was going to give up driving if it ever went over £1.00) ....as many as you could could fit in the back of your car with the rear seat folded down and perhaps one more wobbling on the passenger for good measure.
Good idea to drive with the windows down and the car fan going full blast to avoid suffocation as well.
Doubt if any of my drums had a decent seal in the cap,☠
 
I've been there, done that, with petrol cans too. Traipsing backwards and forwards to the petrol station, lugging cans up and down to the marina berth in trolleys, car stinking of petrol fumes for days afterwards.

Never again, if I couldn't have a diesel boat (or the wherewithal to fill a petrol boat at a dockside pump) then I probably wouldn't bother.
 
6m Ex Marines Dory with Johnson 70hp V4 two stroke, 9 g/h at WOT, 4 20l jerry cans plus 25l fuel tank gave about 1 hour running to get there and an hour back with a little in reserve, that was the calculation we did when going out in the boat, actual speed depended on number of persons onboard, I have taken out 8 divers (including self) and all the gear to go diving on wrecks on the north east coast around Wick, the boat would struggle to get on the plane with that load - no trim tabs or power tilt on the engine, just body placement - large lad on the bow helped ;) .

Never had any problems getting fuel in the cans from the local garages, no petrol in the two harbours I used (Wick and Staxigeo), red diesel was by appointment with the tanker lorry from Scrabster and in bulk delivery only.
 
I bought a rapid fill fuel jug doing the maths that 7 fills would pay for the jug based on the difference in marina fuel and fuel at the garage.
manages 2 fills before giving up and paying marina prices
 
I have been filling my V8 petrol boat using cans from the garage for the last 20 years, I have only ever bought fuel on the water once. The boat has a 90 gallon tank that I start to top up from about 1/4 full. If we are spending a weekend away then I might make 3 trips of it over 3 successive days, all easily done if I plan a midweek trip down to the boat for a bit of boat-fixing/cleaning/ drink coffee/beer.

I use 4x 20 Litre ex NATO Jerrycans;- pop the lids while they are stood up in a row in the boot at the garage, filling is quick and easy, then leave the bootlid open for the fumes to fall away while you pay. On arrival at the boat they are easy to carry two at a time and with the right funnel are quick to dump into the tank. They don't leak and don't splash if you handle them properly.

It's a significant cost saving and adds about 15mins to a days boating, no more than queuing at the fuel berth.

Just do it right. Not like OldGit's leaky old oil drums method.
 
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I don’t boat in the U.K. but did Charter a rib in the Solent. That was petrol and I filled it up on my return.

How difficult is Petrol to purchase in the U.K. ? I
fill up my Williams rib every 3-4 days of use in the med and that is some 40 litres. Lugging that back and forward would be a major issue without a rental car. The kids take it to the fuel dock with my card. Likewise jet skis and ribs. I am surprised that petrol is so limited.
 
jrudge said:
I don’t boat in the U.K. but did Charter a rib in the Solent. That was petrol and I filled it up on my return.

How difficult is Petrol to purchase in the U.K. ? I
fill up my Williams rib every 3-4 days of use in the med and that is some 40 litres. Lugging that back and forward would be a major issue without a rental car. The kids take it to the fuel dock with my card. Likewise jet skis and ribs. I am surprised that petrol is so limited.
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I assume that back in the day when red diesel was so cheap it drove petrol out of the boat market
 
Availability is Patchy.

I used to boat from Cobbs Quay in Poole, availability was great - they had a pump but it was twice the road fuel price. In Weymouth there was no petrol at all (that may have changed or I may not have know where to get it).

In Plymouth a couple of large marina's had petrol, but most didnt - but again was massively over the forecourt price and because they dispensed so little, I think it sat around a LOT.

With the popularity of the 150+ HP outboard, I would hope availability is improving as I wouldn't want to run a pair of 200's off jerry cans it would be absurd.

Once when I was going from Poole to Plymouth I got lower than I would have liked (boat ran on LPG and it ran out very much quicker than I expected. I put into West Bay hoping to find some petrol. Ended up having to take a barrow normally used for bringing your stuff from the car park to the boat and walking 4 miles to a garage..... even buying 4 x 5 litre cans and adding them to the stock I had, it was still 5 x trips to the garage with 8 cans to get 200 litres which was just under 3 hrs run time on a carb V8...... I needed 3 hours running......

I did not enjoy that days boating....
 
On the navigable Medway from above the lock Allington down to Sheerness there are only three places shoreside with petrol.
Average price around £2.20 per litre.
EA claim around 400 boats registered on the upper Medway.
The tidal section must have several thousand boats but perhaps not that many with petrol engines , between the lock and Garrison Pt, not counting the marinas and boatyards in the Swale.
Doubt that the petrol situation is going to get any better.
Suspect a majority of petrol boats are being topped up via a supermarket fuel forecourt.
 
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