average cruising speed on all points of sail. x and m

[Jamie79]

I am wandering what everyone would say their average speed is cruising on a x and a m under sail, on all points of sail, I guess moderatly loaded in average conditions. I suppose 4 or 5kts ? My wife wants a power boat I want the peace and tranquility of a sailboat. Thanks for the help, I've been lurcking here for about 3yrs now, and trying to convince the admiral on a mac, we have only seen one on the trailer here in s.c. and I loved it from the outside byte she fell inove with my uncles 28ft bayliner. 3hrs and 15 gals of fuel not in my budget for every weekend fun. Thanks yall

[jschrade]

The 26M is a better sailor, some like the interior of the 26X better and its a lot cheaper.

You can cruise 6-6.5 knots easily off the wind and I have punched into the mid 7's but not sustained. To windward, you should expect 5-6 knots. My friends with keelboats (30' Catalina, 30' Morgan, 32' Morgan, 32' Bristol) eat my lunch on almost all points of sail with decent wind. My edge is very light winds which happens often in the summer evening can races.

Power you should expect 16-17 knots all out with the stock E-TEC 60 (highly recommended) it likes to cruise between 11-13.5 knots. If the engine is too small, it won't perform well (early 50HP's) and too big and it sucks fuel just like buying the powerboat. 4 strokes require much more maintenance and expense and are a real hassle if you intend to slip it.

Good luck. What's really nice about this boat are the options of sail or power. Christmas was gorgeous warm weather but little wind - so went fishing in powerboat mode with the kids. Better news is that I used very little gas (barely dented a 6 gallon running all day) - I love the ETEC 60.


Jim

[dlandersson]

Really depends on the weather - in anything reasonable I get 3-5 knots - and enjoy it.

I am wandering what everyone would say their average speed is cruising on a x and a m under sail, on all points of sail, I guess moderatly loaded in average conditions. I suppose 4 or 5kts ? My wife wants a power boat I want the peace and tranquility of a sailboat. Thanks for the help, I've been lurcking here for about 3yrs now, and trying to convince the admiral on a mac, we have only seen one on the trailer here in s.c. and I loved it from the outside byte she fell inove with my uncles 28ft bayliner. 3hrs and 15 gals of fuel not in my budget for every weekend fun. Thanks yall

[ronacarme]

Our 2001 X sails to windward and close reaches at 3-4 mph with little heel and at 5-6 mph with considerably more heel....some wives/small chidren may be heel-averse. Boat speed obviously depends on wind speed and sail area.
As to fuel consumption, our X is powered by a Honda 9.9 str. which averaged 13.3 mpg in 2011, 13.3 in 2010,.....at an average 4-5 (guess) mph with a small amount of motor sailing included.
Ron

[mastreb]

I average about 3.5 in light air in San Diego Bay. With wind I can really get it going to 6 knots but I rarely have that wind to work with unless I go out of Oceanside directly into the pacific.

If your wife likes powering, you might consider a larger 90hp ETEC.

[Seapup]

I am wandering what everyone would say their average speed is cruising on a x and a m under sail, on all points of sail, I guess moderatly loaded in average conditions. I suppose 4 or 5kts ?

For playing around sailing speeds can be a fair range as people posted. If you are concerned with covering distance from destination to destination don't expect to knock down huge days. Generally when we are out for a few relaxing days it will seem like we are sailing all day, but will only cover about 15-25 miles between destinations. Anything more and the engine ends up running.

[Tomfoolery]

My wife wants a power boat I want the peace and tranquility of a sailboat.

That's why I sold the 34 foot keelboat and bought an with 50 hp Honda. My younger son (18 years old) taught himself to wakeboard behind it, we can bop along at 16 mph at WOT, we can easily trailer and launch into the Erie Canal or the Finger Lakes (Thousand Islands planned for this summer), and of course I can sail all I want. I keep it in a slip so it's always ready for use.

It's not the best sailer (by a lot), nor is it the best power boat (by a lot), but it does a lot of stuff I wanted it to do, so even though I miss the big boat, I'm good for the time being.

Oh, and being able to work on it in my driveway is a major plus over a keelboat, and it's gigantic inside for a small sailboat. The enclosed head makes the admiral happy, and the lack of systems to maintain makes me happy.

No problems with the Honda, either. I'm going to try a 4-blade prop this spring and see if I can't squeeze another 1 mph out of her. Maybe a 90 hp is in the cards once the last one is done with college.

[Ixneigh]

I've been in the four to five knot range with up to six or better in the windy conditions here. It's a dry ride and with less heel they will still go three to four knots. I find it pleasent to sail if you are just out for fun. If all you want to do is be out on the water and you like to sail you can cruise around all day at three and a half knots and not smell exhaust or hear any engines. Or get wet. I've been a small boat sailor all my life and while these boats do have some issues over all I've been delighted with its performance.

Ixneigh

[coolchange]

3hrs and 15 gals of fuel not in my budget for every weekend fun

You would have to be anchored for 2 of those hours.

We got rid of a Bayliner 2855 with a 7.? engine...the boat was very comfortable and seaworthy...but I probably would have kept it if I could burn 5 gal per hour. On a good day, no current or wind, it might get 1.2 MPG. Ka-ching!

I had installed a floscan fuel flow meter as a gas guage but found it invaluable for staying close to a sweet spot in fuel consumption and I recall about 12-16 gph, and with fuel prices people with these tend to stay closer to home....speaking of which my mac is in the yard..not at a marina which is another huge expense.

[Jamie79]

I beleive it had a 305 or 350 and we were moving really slow, not sure how much we burned it was my uncles guess. 5 gals an hour wow scratch that idea. Thanks everyone for the info I was kinda figuring on about 5kts not a bad speed for wind power for cruising around.

[Kittiwake]

I beleive it had a 305 or 350 and we were moving really slow, not sure how much we burned it was my uncles guess. 5 gals an hour wow scratch that idea. Thanks everyone for the info I was kinda figuring on about 5kts not a bad speed for wind power for cruising around.

This summer as I was tying to a gas dock I overheard the owner of a small modern cabin cruiser comment to the pump guy that, he 'was thankful that his tank had only been 3/4 empty' because of the cost. Later I asked the pump guy how much the cruiser had put in: $700 worth ... which was after the gas dock's "bulk discount". I paid my $35 bill ... and they didn't offer me a bulk discount (sigh).

Kittiwake

[Mac26Mpaul]

Over the holidays we went out for 5 days and it was blowing 15 to 25 knots for most of the time. Having a wife that does not help with sailing at all (looks after the kids and not interested in pulling on "ropes"), if the wind pipes up, I tend to motor cruise, however I just went under jib a fair bit on this trip. I was amazed to find myself doing 5.2 knots under the standard jib (not Genny) and gaining on another TS and a keelboat! At the end of the day, she aint no racing boat, the racing types are never going to stop knocking her, but she is a perfectly acceptable sailing boat as a family cruiser (some people are a little too closeminded to understand that sailing fast is not the priority for all of us)

As to motor cruising, most of us only cruise at normal sailboat speeds of 5 - 7 knots as once ya get over that, you start to really chew the gas fast. If you want to blurt around at 16 knots, its going to cost ya!

Two very different boats you are talking about (and one of them involves a lot more money). I'd suggest you sit down and make a list up of exactly what you want out of your boating experience, and what is important in what order. Put your budget at the top of the list!

For us, above all else, we are trying to create happy family memories for our children first and foremost, above sailing and motoring, we wanted the most comfortable trailerable floating holiday home we could get on the budget we had. It had to have full head room or as close to as possible, it had to have as much internal volume as possible and it had to NOT have the head under a bunk (will never go back to that now either!). Then there is sailing which I enjoy, but the missus prefers to motor and would be happy if we just motorcruised (as long as it was economical). I knew from experience, that no matter what kind of sailboat we bought, we would be motor cruising more than sailing and the Mac is an infinately better motor cruiser than all those other trailer sailers. For what my family want, I dont think there is a better boat on the market. Dont get me wrong, there are a few things that annoy me about the boat, but I can live with them...

The Mac has certainly surprised me a few times and is ahell of a lot better alround boat than what a lot of internet experts tryed to tell me it was a few years back

[robbarnes1965]

I Echo what Mac26Mpaul said.

Two different boats and budgets. The initial purchase price of a similar vintage Bayliner will be likely double or more and the operating cost will be many more times the cost. I personally like the peace of sailing and , if I was committing to a the Bayliner budget, I would just get a bigger sailboat.

[EZ]

I sail in the sf bay with an '04 26m. I use a mainsail from a 26x and the standard 26m jib. In 10 to 15mph wind I generally achieve about 5 mph.

My boat has an etec 50 and at 4500 to 5000 rpm I burn about 3 gal per hour. Speed in this rpm range is about 10mph with a slack tide and sea swell less than 1ft.

Sea swell is something you should seriously consider. The boat handles it fine, but I was caught by surprise when I got drenched trying to power 12mph into 5' swells. The water that the boat displaced into the air was carried by the strong wind into the cockpit.

So if you think you are going to power fast mostly in wind speeds above 10mph with heavy swell, you may want to consider a dowsar or some other form of "protection"

[iredrider1177]

I just spent 30 nights in the florida keys with my 06M with a 60hp hi thrust yamaha. 17 days away from my rented slip. These are my observations. I used 19 gallons of rec fuel. 3-6 mph ave. On diff points of sail. 9-11mph. Seems ti be the sweet spot powering w this combo. I hit the 7s a few times reefed in heavier wind which it handled better than I thought. Spent some time motorsailing and enjoyed that very much. Lighter wind I was able to bungee the steering wheel...my autopilot.... for long periods of time. And on one occasion was able to help a sailor in. A keel boat hard aground in long key bight. Because of shallow draft and a 60 hp engine I noticed I didn't think twice about going where others couldn't. Once you learn the boat. Its a joy. On list next. A dodger. Powering between the gulfstream and reef is a very wet affair. Now with that said. There is a lot of cheap sh~t on these things. But they canbe replaced with what suits your needs.