<h3>For the traditional propshaft</h3>
<p><strong><img src="/sites/default/files/inline-images/mm185-38-01-match-willy.jpg" alt="" width="2362" height="1772" /></strong></p>
<p><strong>By Willy David</strong></p>
<p><em>Having always been a sailing enthusiast, Willy had to abandon monohulls in 1987, following an accident, and choose catamarans. For around twenty years, he sailed in the Mediterranean, discovering Spain, Italy, Malta, Greece, Croatia, Turkey…he crossed the Atlantic for the first time in a trimaran in 1995, followed by two Atlantic circuits, in 1999-2000 and 2014.</em></p>
<p>In 2016-2017, I crossed the Atlantic again in my fourth catamaran, a TS42 (the previous ones were a Corneel 26, a Louisiane and an Outremer 40-43). I prepared the TS for a round the world trip, and with this in mind, I tried to make the best choices, so as to have as few problems as possible. When it was a question of choosing the engine transmission – saildrive or traditional propshaft – I didn't hesitate. My point of view is based on observation and experience. Why make something simple and robust when we can make something complicated and fragile – this is what the engine manufacturers seem to have invented with the saildrive! Today the builders fit saildrives in the majority of cases - fitting is simple and they don’t have the responsibility for the system – but they don’t care about the purchasers to whom they transfer the costs of maintenance and purchase of expensive spare parts after the two short years of the guarantee, not to mention their availability over time. The saildrive’s internal complexity makes it fragile, it contains several angle transmissions, watertightness is ensured by a membrane, and it is exposed to electrolytic corrosion due to the presence of different metals (body in cast aluminum, bronze gear wheels, stainless transmissions…). I once asked a naval architect for his personal choice on this point; he replied without hesitation that he would opt for the propshaft, for its ease of repair and maintenance. I emphasize the fact that for cruising boats, a saildrive breakdown more often than not requires the boat to be taken out of the water! If you manage to find a means of lifting the boat and a specialist (not always easy, and rarely economical!), the engine has to be dismantled, diagnosed, the parts to be replaced have to be ordered and received, then you will have to call on the specialist again to carefully reassemble all that! This misadventure happened to me with my previous catamaran: before departure, I had both saildrives serviced, but when I arrived in the Canaries, the starboard one had broken! I had to take the boat out of the water and wait 3 weeks for spare parts, then pay a steep bill (parts, labor, parking in the technical area, lifting). Through the height of bad luck, the second saildrive let us down in the Bahamas, and there taking the boat out of the water was much more complicated, as the hurricane season was approaching! I therefore returned to France with just one functioning engine swearing that I would never again fit saildrives. I haven’t therefore renewed this error on my new catamaran, and I insisted on propshafts. Although these boats are equipped with saildrives as standard, the builder fortunately accepted the modification. To conclude, a propshaft, fitted, is cheaper and more reliable than a saildrive!</p>
<h3>For the saildrive</h3>
<p><strong><img src="/sites/default/files/inline-images/mm185-39-01-match-francois.jpg" alt="" width="1744" height="2538" /></strong></p>
<p><strong>By François Trégouët</strong></p>
<p>Francis learnt to sail in Quiberon bay in Brittany in the 80s, and was marked for life by the extraordinary multihulls which were plentiful at that time. This passion for everything which sails fast on two or three hulls has never left him since, even though he has sometimes sacrificed a few knots to be able to enjoy his cruising better. Sailmaker, broker and finally export and commercial manager in the nautical industry, he has contributed regularly to Multihulls World since 2011.</p>
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<p>Oh, the debate still goes on? Apart from for the most powerful engines, when the saildrive version is available, why do without? You are really looking for trouble if you insist on fitting a propshaft. The saildrive is fitted on a wide, thick rubber joint, which allows you to forget the meaning of the word vibration, and those of you who are paranoid and can’t sleep at night for thinking about the gaping hole in your hull would do well to look at the state of your seacocks! Have you noted even once the condition of a saildrive joint after several years? Officially, you are recommended to change this joint every seven years. Some people resign themselves to changing it after ten years, or even twenty, and they are often in as-new condition! It’s true, there is always the pernicious fishing line which gets jammed between the propeller and the shaft, damaging little by little the seal which isolates the nice mechanics from the sea water. The saildrive oil then turns into ‘mayonnaise’. Drama! Red Alert! cry the mechanical doom and gloom merchants. Well no, diving from time to time to remove the treacherous line, at the worst a new joint followed by an oil change on the saildrive during the annual scrub-off, and off you go again! Where is the predicted disaster? I will always prefer this to the almost permanent water leak of a stern gland and the problems of alignment. Forget the propshaft which bends in pain with the first floating line or carelessly trailing sheet it encounters (because it casts its net wide, this propeller at the end of its shaft as straight as an al dente spaghetti). But it is easier to have a traditional propshaft repaired in the most remote areas of the planet, the bird of ill omen protests! To be confirmed. And isn’t this offering a solution to a problem which wouldn’t have existed with a saildrive? I’ll leave you to think about that one…but let’s get back to the basics. The compactness of the saildrive/engine unit allows its mass to be moved aft, a movement which very suitably accompanies modern architectural development. Have you not noticed that the aft crossbeam of the latest trimarans, from the 50-footers to the Ultims, is positioned at the level of the transom? The mast? Moved several meters aft over the last ten years. A few years ago, I dared to ask myself out loud about the possibility of taking advantage of the floor height in a future 60-foot catamaran to ‘center’ the engines. Marc Van Peteghem then explained to me very tactfully that we weren’t on a monohull from the 80s! That everything is done aboard to move the weight, the center of gravity aft, reduce pitching, the risk of pitchpoling, and therefore increasing the power: end of discussion. No, I almost forgot, as the unit is more compact, and thus further aft, the saildrive is no longer under our aft berths. Better still, it can even be completely separated from the accommodation by a watertight bulkhead. As the engine-saildrive unit can be positioned towards the front or the rear, its contortionist properties open up more possibilities concerning the structure, the accommodation and the weight distribution. Goodbye heat, smells, noise and vibration! Hello safety and comfort! I hear the hardened conservatives trying a last stand, by throwing in two or three final desperate arguments:</p>
<p>- about the supposed fragility of this perfect mechanical system, but over the thirty years and more that it has almost systematically equipped all sailing boats, the production volume has become industrialized, with remarkable reliability.</p>
<p>- About the alleged increased drag of the leg compared to the propshaft. But behind an imposing fixed stub keel or even a daggerboard, and in front of the rudder, are we really certain about the impact of its slim profiled shape?</p>
<p>- About the risk of obstruction of the sea water cooling circuit – indeed, a treacherous plastic bag may obstruct the ‘ears’, but it’s the same for the classic raw water intake. Except that, in the case of the saildrive, you have two 'ears', and therefore increase the safety of your engine’s water supply.</p>
<p>In conclusion, and to calm things down, the only bad solution is not to sail, and look for excuses for not buying the boat of your dreams. As for the propshaft/saildrive debate, it will continue to enliven our discussions on the pontoon or in the yacht club bar for a long time. Nevertheless, although I find the rusticity of a Citroen 2CV charming and accessible, but for a long journey, I will always prefer a reliable, silent and comfortable modern sedan!</p>
