£1,850 Marina berth £1,900
£201.40 Insurance £255.17
£425.94 Antifoul £381.00
£144.50 Sea Start membership £155.50
£735.07 Lift/wash/store/launch £1,026.00
£686.70 Service £1,285.00
£828.33 Total cost of fuel £999.05SMUGGLER’S BLUES1996 6.6m Skibsplast 660D
(Volvo Penta TAMD 22P 106hp diesel)HEAD TO HEAD: THE COSTS£4,871.94 TOTAL £6,001.72SMUGGLER’S BLUES 22006 8m Jeanneau Leader 805
(Volvo Penta D4-260 260hp diesel)a longer season (SB2 didn’t launch
till late May), we clocked up just over
100 hours with the Skibsplast in
2016 versus 75 hours for our first
year with the Jeanneau. Fuel prices
rose, of course, going some way
to balancing that out, plus the diesel-
fired central heating saw some action
this year and we cruise faster in the
newer boat, so for a given distance,
hours would be lower. Finally, I deem
a boating year to be based on the
season, so March 1 to February 28.
Anyway, enough waffle – here’s
how it all stacks up.
On the face of it, it seems my
‘additional 10-15%’ was a little
optimistic: the final tally was an
additional 23%. However, had I opted
for like-for-like servicing and storage,
I reckon that would have reduced the
righthand column by at least £650,
slashing the gap to 10%, the lower
end of my estimate. Furthermore,
SB1 needed a new fuel tank and
new outdrive power tilt rams last
year at a total cost of about £2,000
whereas SB2 ran virtually fault free,
which made it cheaper to run overall.
I am, however, reluctant to tempt fate
by including the lack of repairs within
the comparison!
The bottom line is that, repairs
aside, it costs £1,130 more to run
SB2. Some of that increase would
have affected the smaller boat year
on year so call it £1,000 extra in
reality (more than half of which
would be erased by like-for-like
servicing and storage).
I will gladly take that for the
increase in performance, seakeeping
space and facilities. Most importantly
of all, the total costs remain belowand costing £13.25 an hour.
I can’t confirm how that equates
in miles as I don’t record distance,
other than to say that unless we’re
in a harbour or river, we’re planing!
We cruise at 20-25 knots and
maximum speed is 33 knots so
averaged out at 15 knots, I make
it 1,131nm, so 5.3mpg. Not bad!
Nick Burnhamthe total income – at least for now.
Mr Micawber and his creator would
certainly approve.DRILLING DOWN THE FUEL COSTS
We’ve clocked up 75.4 engine hours
consuming 968 litres (213 gallons)
at a cost of £999.05. Averaged
across the year, it’s using 12.84
litres an hour (2.8 gallons an hour)Nick averaged 12.84lph
over the year, costing
him £13.25 per hour97BOAT MASTER OURB OATS