moving a Centaur by outboard and by trailer

in my relentless internet search for Centaurs I came across this

he runs an outboard on the back of the boat

in the q and a on the film he was asked this

William O'Riordan
2 years ago

thank you for the info how do you find the outboard performs is it up to the task and what sort of speed do you get I only need enough power to get away from and back to the marina

and his answer

Andrew Drossos
2 years ago
in reply to William O'Riordan

The biggest problem I’ve encountered is in rough seas, when the boat is pitching violently fore and aft, that the prop is sometimes out of the water and then the motor is totally submerged. This is an extreme case, but not fun when you need the thrust of the motor most. The other negative is having to reach over the stern to operate the controls. Also, I can only assume that the boat would handle differently (better) with the ballast of the original engine in the bilge, where it belongs,

William O'Riordan
2 years ago

I have noticed you have an outboard fitted to your centaur I also have a centaur and the engine 1970 vintage volvo has died and I cannot afford a new one at present so I would like advise and photos about your experiance with the outboard if possible thanks Billy CR 502 Ireland

Andrew Drossos
2 years ago
in reply to William O'Riordan

Billy, I purchased my Centaur used without the original Volvo inboard, so my only experience with it, is with the outboard motor. I think the outboard is a compromise to an original inboard for a few reasons I have used a 9.9hp outboard motor, which is adequate, but I think minimal for my particular inland coastal sailing area. It is hung off the stern with a typical store-bought outboard motor bracket. (more to follow)

Andrew Drossos
2 years ago
in reply to William O'Riordan

The prop will also be out of the water when healing if you’re power-sailing. On the positive side, the boat can be maneuvered quite well in tight areas, like docking, by swiveling the outboard and rudder at the same time, both forward and reverse. This same method works well in helping to wiggle out of shallow water. Hope this helps, Andy

A refit of the extreme kind

Following is an account of the renovation, repair and redesign of Beau, our 1971 Westerly Centaur. The ideas and philosophy used on Beau came from 13 years of living aboard, cruising and renovating other good old boats, namely, a 1946 Hinkley 28, a 1967 Allied Greenwich, a 1968 Morgan 30, a 1976 Parker Dawson 26, a 1986 Gemini catamaran, and a 1962 Chris-Craft Capri 30 before buying the Westerly in 1995.

In 1991-92, while cruising and living on the Gemini with my wife (our first home after getting married that year), we decided that if we were just going to go up and down the ICW and sail in the Bahamas for the winters, we could do it on a much less expensive boat and use the extra money to build a house. In 1993 we built the house, but before selling the Gemini we bought an old beat-up former charter boat in the Bahamas with a seized engine (the Chris-Craft) and spent three months cruising and having a great time and not missing the creature comforts of the Gemini -- like refrigeration, lighting, navigation instruments (we did have a compass with a large bubble in it), engine, etc. The next year after selling the Gemini and Chris-Craft, I saw the Centaur for sale, and from its price knew it was a fixer-upper. We were first to look at it and bought it and trailered it back to the Eastern Shore of Maryland where we put it in our front yard and began major changes.

I wanted this to be my experimental boat, one on which I could make changes without the thought of convention. After getting the boat off the trailer and onto a cradle of four tree stumps and two 6x6 timbers (Centaurs are twin-keel boats), I set to work. The boat had been decorated on the interior with indoor/outdoor carpeting: purple on the overhead and cabinsides and grey at the hull. I ripped out the purple but kept the grey as insulation and later covered it with a pine ceiling. The next jobs were to fill all the holes in the deck and cockpit and to take the teak off the cockpit seats. Next I scrubbed out the filthy bilge, a job I made easier by removing the propeller shaft so the water could drain out of the shallow bilge and center skeg.

The next step was rather extreme but has worked out very well and has to do with the separate facts that the V-berth on the Centaur was a bit small for us and that twin-keel boats are not known for their race-winning ability. I thought I could solve both problems with one solution. I felt if I could make it sail a bit faster I would have the best of both worlds. One way to do this was to get rid of that big three-blade prop in front of the rudder. I didn't want to go engineless again but I did want to be inboard engineless thereby doing away with the old unreliable, noisy, smelly, vibrating diesel engine that took up almost one third of the interior space in the boat. So I bought about a dozen saber saw blades and cut the cockpit sole and sides out of the boat, leaving the horizontal parts of the bridge deck and seats.
This left a gaping hole over the old Volvo, making it an easy job to pull it and all its auxiliary equipment out. I sold the 450-pound hulk for $600. After cutting out the engine mounts and removing the underwater cockpit scupper through-hulls, I glassed a new plywood and epoxy deck over most of the cockpit, leaving a small footwell just ahead of the rudderpost that is still big enough to shower in. This yielded a 4-foot by 5-foot flat deck at the height of the cockpit seats and created a huge space below combining the old quarter berths and engine space into one big aft cabin, perfect for a roomy, yet cozy, double bunk on the port side and center and a large storage area opposite to starboard. I then installed a 26-gallon fuel tank in the bilges under where the engine used to be, bought a Yamaha 9.9-hp High Thrust 4-stroke outboard and a large motor bracket. After beefing up the transom with plywood and epoxy and a large knee, I installed the bracket and engine which tilts out of the water under sail and goes down deep in the water under power to give excellent performance for each activity.

After 10,000 miles of cruising: two round trips on the ICW, three trips to and through the Bahamas, many times across and around Florida, and one trip to Canada and back, the engine has only cavitated once very briefly in a New Jersey inlet in the midst of a mega wake and rough seas. In the other 1500 hours of motoring we have enjoyed quiet in the cockpit and interior, complete reliability and 5.5 knots at 0.4 GPH, plus much increased sailing performance, a really comfortable rectangular bed, and a totally dry, clean white painted bilge! (Beau got third place this year in the Georgetown Round Stocking Island Race, in his class).

Another outboard advantage is that I can steer the engine via lines from a wooden yoke on the engine cover to the tiller to give unbelievable maneuverability under power, especially in tight quarters where wind and current make things tricky. A slip that most sailboats wouldn't consider approaching without a large crew standing on deck and dock to fend off and handle lines and much prayer, Beau can back into or out of in an instant under complete control. What all this translates into is low-anxiety cruising and lots of fun when we pass a larger boat under sail, partially because they are dragging a big prop, and we are not.
I believe most sailboats under 31 feet could benefit from repowering with one of the new efficient and powerful 4-stroke outboards. A friend of mine spent the last four sailing seasons babying his old inboard, spending lots of money on parts and labor, getting towed into various marinas, experiencing untold anxiety and loss of the fun the boat was meant to provide. Now he is going to spend another $8,000 to have a new diesel installed when he could have spent $2,500 four years ago and enjoyed trouble-free motoring and improved sailing. The status quo is hard to break.

Back to the renovation. Where I had removed the purple carpeting I glued white Formica to quarter-inch ply and epoxied it to the cabinsides and under decks to insulate and create a finished surface. (Beau has no core to rot, just thick solid fiberglass. Also the hull-to-deck joint is fully glassed together creating a leak-proof boat that is also very strong.)
On the overhead I used the same white Formica and made redwood battens to hold it up to the deck camber (Redwood salvaged from a jobsite dumpster).

I also removed the forward water tank and installed a new 35-gallon tank under the aft dinette seat. The batteries I relocated from the engine room to just aft of the water tank so most of the heaviest stuff is concentrated amidships.

I took out the alcohol stove and mounted an athwartships two-burner propane stove in the galley and turned the old hanging locker into a large pantry. We do not carry a cooler or have refrigeration and don't feel deprived. If we want cold beer we go ashore. However if we do decide we want a fridge, it will be a propane powered top-loading type. Yes, they do work on sailboats, only cost $400 and have zero moving parts to fail. My wife made new cushions and covers as well as interior curtains plus new sail covers, jib bags, and weathercloths.

Further modifications include a full skeg in front of the rudder, which was a semi-balanced spade and is now an unbalanced rudder with much better directional stability and seemingly impossible to snag on lines from crab pots and the like. On deck I added a three-foot bowsprit/anchor roller made of aluminum pipe.

The roller-furling genoa attaches to the end of this and sheets to the rail. At the original stem fitting I use another roller furler for the working jib, which sheets inboard. Both sails can be used on a reach, but the main purpose is to be able to choose one or the other from the cockpit. Mainsail reefing is accomplished with the roller reefing gear that is easy to use and effective. Though the sail is not quite as flat as a slab-reefed main, I think being able to reef so easily and in any amount makes up for fuller curve of the roller reefed main. My wife is particularly fond of this gear and would not trade for"jiffy" reefing for anything. You just stand on the windward side of the gooseneck, ease the sheet, ease the halyard and crank away as much as you think is necessary. No flapping sails, no pulling lines or tying reef points, just simple effective reefing.

So Beau has worked very well for us, and we still have less money in him than some cruisers have in their dinghies alone. He is sturdy, stable, able, and, I think, the epitome of a good old boat.
Rob Kreit
Bean Point, Va.

“Beau is a highly modified, much customised 26’ Centaur. In 1995 I cut out 2/3rds of the

cockpit well, took out the old, but running MD2B Volvo, redecked over the cockpit and

installed a 9.9hp Yamaha high thrust outboard on a bracket on a stiffened transom. By

doing so, I note the following advantages over inboard powered boats:-

1. a weight saving of 300 - 400 lbs.

2. no propeller drag under sail since the motor tilts up

3. no hot, smelly, noisy engine inside the boat

4. the space under the new cockpit is a full size double bed with lots of extra storage

5. the boats tiller can steer the engine as needed via lines and two blocks for greater

manoeuvrability under power. I can back or pull into any place a skiff can

6. no worries about catching crab pots on the prop.

With the 26 (US) gallon fuel tank I installed I can motor 52+ hours @5 ¼ knots or about

270 miles on a fill up. (I also carry a 2 ½ gallon reserve jug) The Yamaha makes 14 amps

of electricity for battery charging. We have 2 deep cycle batteries in our dry, cool. white

painted bilge and have never run out of juice. I have never experienced any serious

cavitation problems (more than a few moments) and after being in and out of many of

the inlets in New Jersey, some in NY, and many in Florida, a round trip that’s on the ICW

(intra-continental waterway) and two voyages to the Bahamas and back from Florida ( 4

Gulf stream crossings).

In all those 100’s of miles, we have not had any trouble with the Yamaha, which leads me

to another advantage of an outboard engine. Ease of repair. The motor can be taken off

the bracket and carried to a repair shop; it weighs just 100lbs.