Desert Pirate wrote:
Thanks to Conch and Valera (Ray) for your replies. Ray, does your boat have a two, or three bladed prop. the one I looked at has a three bladed prop and its prop walk to port is, to say the least, very pronounced. FYI, when the crane lifted the T38 out of the water it registered at 19,400 lbs. We did 5.25 kts to weather in 8.5 kts of breeze, but could only manage a little over 4 sailing on a reach. This surprised me.
My boat has a 3 bladed feathering prop that is fully adjustable in forward and reverse (Autostream sold by Martec). As I recall this increased my sailing speed by .6kt over the two bladed overpitched Michigan prop that came with the boat It can be set to back straight astern when the reverse pitch is set low, but I like a bit of walk a bit to sidle up to the dock and the faster stop afforded by overpitching it in in reverse--pitch forward is set to give me 6.4 kt of speed at 80% RPM. I don't know too many folks that have a fixed three blade and would not recommend it but your speeds sound incredibly low even with that drag--sure the speedometer is right? GPS?. I have sailed 7 knots in a 7 knot beam reach in flat water with a 135% and have video to prove it. My boat is a deep keel but has a standard mast. I would not be suprised if the boat weighs more than the listed amount--most production boats do. But consider that they are weighed dry at half load of fuel and water and probably some fudging on that number by Tartan as by most manufacturers. Also, I would not bet my life on the scales on a travelift or crane--I think most of these are questionable as well. I think my boat was weighed once at about 17200 with more fuel and most of my cruising junk on board (I have almost 500 lbs of anchoring gear and probably had full fuel at the time which would do that) and I might think that was close to being accurate.