Dingy Outboards

[Captain Smollett]

We are looking for an outboard for the dink.  With current equipment, I have two options.  A 6 HP long shaft or an 8 HP Extra Long Shaft.  Both are rather heavy, and both are to my mind, over powered.

I'm looking for something lighter and hopefully not too terribly expensive.  I've narrowed it down to a few under 4 HP.  The front runner right now is the Suzuki 2.5 HP.

The weight is great at 30 lbs (11 lb lighter than the 2.5/3.5 HP Tohatsu, 7 lbs lighter than the 2.5 HP Yamaha), and I found a good price on one at $550 brand new.

Questions:

What HP do you currently use on your dink?

What is the minimum HP you would use on your dink?

The boat will be operated with anywhere from one to four persons aboard, with or without gear.  We cruise in tidal waters with typical currents around 3 kts at full flow (some artificial cuts push that higher).

What opinions are there on if 2.5 HP is adequate to the task?  I have no illusions of being a speed demon with such a setup, but need to know we can get around as needed.

For reference, when I've had the 8 HP on the dink, with all four of us aboard, I barely cracked above idle and were SCOOTING.

[Lynx]

I don't remeber, What type of bottom does your dink have?
A Soft floor will eat up 3 hp. For hard floor you should not have a problem.

On my Pudgy (hard floor) I have the Honda 2 hp, Air cooled (no impeller) Takes me, 280 pounds, and my 130 pound dinghy to 5.5 mph with throtal to spair. I have put 2 other people and food at 5 mph.

The Honda 2 hp, long shaft is 28 pounds and gets 5 miles per quart (gas tank size). A bit more expensive than some of the other motors. 2 different types, Clutch and no clutch. Starts in gear, A little odd getting used to.

[AdriftAtSea]

Cap Smollett-

I use a Tohatsu 3.5 HP on my dinghy.  Use two different dinghies.  One is a Achilles LS2-RU, which is a 7' 6" long inflatable with wooden slat floor.  The other is a 12' 6" portaboat.  Works fine for both, will even get the LS2-RU to plane with two people in it... if you have the people positioned right.

[KenR]

We have a small Avon RIB, 7 1/2 ft with a Yamaha 4 hp four-stroke. Motor runs fine, starts easily but for for me is heavy (58 lbs). Doesn't sound like much except when you are trying to lower it down onto a bouncing, rocking, rolling dinghy and trying to keep yourself inside the dinghy at the same time.

Sooner or later one of us is going in....sure hope it's me.

[Captain Smollett]

Motor runs fine, starts easily but for for me is heavy (58 lbs). Doesn't sound like much except when you are trying to lower it down onto a bouncing, rocking, rolling dinghy and trying to keep yourself inside the dinghy at the same time.

Haha, Ken, I hear ya.  Last year in Charleston Harbor, I played that game with a 85 lb 8 HP while anchoraged off Shem Creek (it was a bit bouncy).  Not fun.

That's why I'm really liking the 30 lb spec on the 2.5....

[Captain Smollett]

The new outboard we ordered from Ed's Marine Superstore arrived yesterday.  They boast the best prices anywhere.

We got a 2.5 HP Suzuki 4 stroke; the price on their site ($550) plus $105 shipping still beat what I could get locally from a Suzuki OB dealer by $250 on this same engine, and that's without shipping!

I only had two complaints about dealing with them.  One was that they waited for the check to 'clear' before shipping the ob.  Fine, I understand their desire to get paid before they ship, but in this day and age of electronic check posting, this process should not take two weeks.  Our bank showed the check cashed on 16 June, so Ed's should have had the money a day or so after that. However, they did not ship until around the 27 of June.

They do, however, accept wire transfers which would avoid this delay.

The second 'complaint' is related - they did not communicate ANYTHING about my order to me during this wait.  I did not know the status for the nearly three weeks from the time I sent the check until the engine arrived.  On the 26th, I called them.  They seemed aggravated that I was calling to bother them.  All I knew at that point was that my bank had cashed the check, and the engine had not arrived.  I did not know if it had been shipped, it was on back order or what.  I simple email notification of my order status would have been very helpful.

Okay, on to the outboard itself.

I absolutely LOVE how light this thing is.  Spec'd at 30 lbs, handling it is a one hand operation, and climbing around on the dink with it in hand was easy, too.  I made a mess trying to fill it with oil, so note to self: get a suitable funnel.

My first trials were on flat water, no to little wind (0-3 kts or so) with myself and the two children aboard.  Both children together weight about 70 lbs.  Also aboard was a small cooler (with ice packs and some ice water) and a can with about 2 gallons of gasoline.

The gas tank is spec'd at .25 gallons.  This lasted 1 hour 55 minutes.  It's hard to put a number of how that was distributed because that was with various throttle settings, but about half of the time was half throttle and half was 1/3 or less.

The boat did not plane as we were loaded, and I noticed that half throttle represented the max rpm I could get out of it.  There was no increase from half throttle up.  I'm assuming that perhaps this is a prop issue, or maybe I just need some more weight forward to keep the bow down.

Idle speed on the engine pushed the boat to 2.0 kts.  Just a crack above idle, well below the "Start" indicator, was 3.0-3.3 kts.  About 1/3 throttle was 4.0 kts and half throttle got me to 4.5-4.6 kts.  I could definitely see the performance curve flatten out as the stern dug in.  In fact, once while going 4.3 kts, I shifted MY weight forward about a foot and picked up .3 kts just by flattening the boat a little.

It will be interesting to see what happens to these numbers with my wife aboard also.  Certainly the fore-aft trim will be improved.

A few times we got "waked" by some passing powerboats, and those "meeting' gave me the opportunity to see what happened to her speed.  From 4.0 kts, the most she dropped was to 3.7 kts; this is encouraging.  She should be able to stand up to 2-3 ft chop easily enough.

I only played in reverse (by turning the engine around) a tiny bit - just enough to see this will be adequate for backing out from between boats, etc.

All in all, I am pleased with this purchase.  I think this little outboard is going to suit my purpose just fine.  Light enough to handle, small enough to stow, fuel efficient enough to gunkhole/explore a bit and powerful enough to move the boat in just about any condition I'd care to be dinghying in.

[Lynx]

Cool, you might be supprised how manhy people are changing their biggerdinghy outboards to the smaller, 2 - 3 hp motors. Not big enough to get on plane but big enough to move at displacement speeds with a full load at 20 mpg.