Since I first got my first TI over 3 yrs ago I have never been able to go through any of the passes in Sarasota against the current which is 5-6mph. I had tried many times, and even both my wife and I pedaling and our old Island hopper outboard on full throttle I could not get through the passes (especially new pass which is much narrower and swifter).
I went out today with my new Honda outboard, and was able to get through the pass against the tide with a light wind at my back (around 5mph).
Here is a pic of the motor:
I've also posted a little about powersailing and the Honda on another thread powersailing the TI (
viewtopic.php?f=71&t=49014)
Here is a pic of my track for the day from Isailer:
Here is the actual GPS track record from my GPS:
Normally I only run the motor at 1/4 throttle and seem to get between 85 and 100 miles per gallon (still trying to nail that down closer). At quarter throttle it propels the TI at 3mph with no sails at all. Of course as usual I pedal lightly 100% of the time. As soon as I introduce either the wing jib or the mainsail my speed increases to 5mph. When applying all forces pedal, motor on 1/4 throttle, and both wing jib and mainsail working together the performance of the boat takes off like a rocket. As you can see from the GPS track the average speed was 5.7 mph with a max speed of 8.3 mph. Actually the average is a little low ( I think it should have been around 6.5mph) actually before trying to come into the pass on the north end of my track the moving average was 7mph. As soon as I hit the on rushing water the boat stopped and started going backwards, I had to increase the throttle to around 3/4 throttle to get in through the pass. since I had a very light tailwind (<5mph) the sails were limp ( I didn't try to open up my big spinnaker, going under the bridge would have been dangerous with the spinnaker up).
After going around Lido Key I decided to sail around Sarasota bay for a while, there was a regatta going on at Sarasota Sailing squadron and there were at least 300 or 400 sailboats out in Sarasota bay, of all different types (mostly small lasers, and sunfish's). I sailed around some of those regattas (trying to stay out of their way) and just watching (it looked they were all having fun).
I also came across another Hobie kayak out there, and Oasis with a standard kayak sail and an evolve system. So I sailed over to them just to say hi, saying that us Hobiecats were pretty outnumbered on this day. Well I ended up catching their fishing line and we ended up circling each other in the busy channel for about ten minutes trying to find where we were attached. It turned out he had hooked my AMA bungy, and it took a while to find, then a long while to get out of the bungy. It probably looked like a comedy of errors, us just circling each other.
In conclusion I am extremely happy with my TI now, it literally screams, my accidental discovery that by applying the tri power capability of the TI (motor, pedal, wing sail) gives the TI a huge edge over anything else out on the water.
I could just as easily be using an Evolve system (with solar, (wish I could afford one)) vs the Gas motor. However the main purpose of the motor is as an emergency backup for when we go far out scuba diving on the coral reefs down in the keys (typically 5-10 miles offshore). And the gas motor gives me the 100 mile range of reliable backup power I feel I need.
I think I had about 15 to 17 miles on the motor yesterday when I ran out of gas (1/3 of a gallon) so it appears using high throttle to get thru the pass consumed way more gas than normal (near double over previous tests), which I will have to take into consideration in the future.
Bob