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Batteries deep in the hull provide the energy to move. They've been charged from dockside AC or from onboard solar panels.
Electrons flow from the batteries through a controller that chops them into pulses. The pulses surge through the motor windings and create fluctuating magnetic fields that silently spin the shaft.
If headwinds or high seas start to slow the boat down, more electrons automatically flow through the motor. Boat speed stays steady, without operator control.
When the sails go up in open water, you throttle the motor back so it's just ticking over. The motor turns the prop slowly while you sail. It corkscrews through the water and cancels most of the drag. When boat speed increases - from sliding down a wave or the wind picking up - the prop is forced to turn faster as the water rushes by. The motor then becomes a generator and sends electricity back to the batteries.
As you rise up the back of a wave, the ammeter reads negative. The motor is consuming more electricity to maintain speed on the upslope. Heading back down, the ammeter turns positive as the boat speeds up. The motor is regenerating electricity and recharging the batteries. On a windy day, the boat can return to the dock with more power than when it left.
If the wind dies, you push the throttle forward to maintain speed. Apparent wind picks up and keeps the sails pulling. Now you're motorsailing, but still with no noise or diesel smell, and you haven't burned a drop of fuel.
Eventually the batteries discharge to their preset minimum level. A cocooned diesel generator starts up automatically. From the cockpit, it's barely audible over the wind through the rigging.
The generator runs with maximum efficiency at a constant, optimum speed. It recharges the batteries as the boat continues motoring, and shuts down automatically when they're fully charged.
On the hook at night, the air conditioner starts up and runs quietly off the batteries. Depending on their state of charge, the batteries may power the AC through the entire night. If they run down, the cocooned generator automatically starts running quietly to bring them back up. No more getting up in the middle of the night to start a noisy diesel engine to recharge the house batteries.
Heading back to the dock, the boat is easy to control. The motor can be slowed to single digit rpms, stopped and started repeatedly, and reversed in an instant.
No more wrestling the shift lever from forward to neutral to reverse to forward again. No more heading into a slip too fast with no way to go slower. Collisions with the dock are a thing of the past.
Its all part of clean, green, electric sailing - the sailing wave of the future.
Please call or e-mail to discuss all the clean, green catamaran opportunities available to you today.
There are plenty of new Lagoon 420's in stock and the upcoming NEW Lagoon 421 will be available in June 2009.
Lagoon 420 Hybrid Brochure
2007 Lagoon 420 Hybrid - Knot On Call
2006 Lagoon 420 Hybrid - Windance VI
2007 Lagoon 420 Hybrid - Blue Water Bound
2008 Lagoon 420 Hybrid - Shrek
2005 Privilege 395 - Starlight Express
TODD MOFFATT, YACHT SALES
Serving THE CATAMARAN COMPANY
ANNAPOLIS, MD
309 Third Street
Annapolis, MD 21403
Phone: 443.569.3389
Fax: 954.727.0024
Cell: 410.279.6426
 
todd@catamarans.com
www.catamarans.com
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