{"id":18543,"date":"2019-11-21T10:25:40","date_gmt":"2019-11-21T08:25:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.victronenergy.com\/blog\/?p=18543"},"modified":"2023-01-23T18:56:26","modified_gmt":"2023-01-23T16:56:26","slug":"start-with-a-solar-canoe-end-up-with-a-solar-cat-or-two","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.victronenergy.com\/blog\/2019\/11\/21\/start-with-a-solar-canoe-end-up-with-a-solar-cat-or-two\/","title":{"rendered":"Start with a Solar Canoe, end up with a Solar Cat or two…"},"content":{"rendered":"

Every waterborne electric propulsion journey has to start somewhere. My own started about 7 years ago, concluding with the sale of Sailing Yacht Elektra<\/a> in recent weeks. That aside and the insights gained over those years, it was refreshing to hear from Nicoara Bogdan in Romania – who started his own marine electric propulsion journey in 2016.<\/p>\n

Project No. 1<\/h3>\n

His first project (shown in the headline image above) was a fibreglass canoe converted to solar\/battery\/electric, using a small 12V DC electric motor, 6 x 50W flexible solar panels wired in parallel giving 300Wp in total, controlled by a PWM solar charge controller charging a 12V, 100Ah AGM battery, which provided power to the motor.<\/p>\n

That all worked well but like all journeys, lessons are learned on the way and there are always dreams and improvements to be made with ‘the next project’.<\/p>\n

Project No. 2<\/h3>\n

The second project was a solar catamaran using similar electric principles but with increased motor power, more battery Ah and more Wp in solar panels, adding in upgrades and refinements along the way.<\/p>\n

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Project No. 2, with later sponsorship & stickers<\/p><\/div>\n

The Cat concept was chosen for the low drag 5.2 m, 2.2 m width hulls and generous space for solar panels, not to mention being fully demountable for transport by car.<\/p>\n

Bigger budget required<\/h5>\n

This time everything worked well as before, but two 24V motors were used (one on each hull) giving a total of 2kW of electric asymmetrical thrust power. Plus there was more room for solar, allowing 3 x 250 Wp of panels to be fitted. Still, more could be done…<\/p>\n

It was at this juncture that Nicoara was fortunate to meet Lucian Popescu<\/a>, Victron Energy Sales Manager for Eastern Europe and Eftenoiu Cornel of Darcom Energy, who are a Victron Energy dealer in Romania.<\/p>\n

With some help and sponsorship from both Darcom Energy and Victron Energy in Romania, Nicoara’s craft is now running sweetly.<\/p>\n

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Arriving at the launch site<\/p><\/div>\n

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CAT assembly<\/p><\/div>\n

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Success!<\/p><\/div>\n

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A solar sailing pause & solar recharge<\/p><\/div>\n

On his second trip along the Danube river Nicoara achieved 24 km range <\/span><\/span>entirely propelled by battery electric propulsion and that included going both upstream and downstream.<\/p>\n\n\n