Have You Got a Cocooned Beta Engine?

[aread2]

I'm in the process of commissioning a bespoke narrowboat. I'm thinking of equipping it with a cocooned beta propgen. Trouble is I'd like to see just how quiet they are. Has anybody got one I can come and listen to? I'm based in the Milton Keynes area, so the South Oxford and Grand Union are easy for me to get to and I'm regularly (every 6-8 weeks) in Manchester.

[tony collins]

I'm in the process of commissioning a bespoke narrowboat. I'm thinking of equipping it with a cocooned beta propgen. Trouble is I'd like to see just how quiet they are. Has anybody got one I can come and listen to? I'm based in the Milton Keynes area, so the South Oxford and Grand Union are easy for me to get to and I'm regularly (every 6-8 weeks) in Manchester.

 

 

I used to work for a company that supplied Beta Marine with antivibration mounts. Beta were one of my accounts. Having seen one of their cocooned propgen units running at the factory, I am sure that you will be impressed when you get to see one. Why not contact Beta and ask them to arrange a demo? I am sure that they will happily oblige.

 

Tony

[bottle]

If you have no luck before May try to get to Crick Show, they will have one on their stand that can be run.

[rog guiver]

Just check the output of the 240v gen at cruising rpm's. A friend has the same setup and needs to run the engine at more than 1600 rpm while cruising to power the washing machine!

[anhar]

Check out this site

 

http://www.nbwhisper.com/

 

Andy has an all electric boat with a Beta cocooned propgen and seems well pleased with it. Quiet running was one of his criteria, achieved by locating the engine remotely from the usual position and cocooning it. The remote location means that it doesn't use a conventional straight prop shaft and the engine runs at constant rpm, unlike a normal system, with the "trolling valve" transmission providing the means to vary prop revs. His other reason for using this engine was to achieve an all electric boat.

 

He is based in a marina near Reading. I haven't seen the boat but he was extremely helpful to me in an exchange of emails we had a while back, after I contacted him because I found his design ideas very interesting. It was not a cheap boat to build.

 

regards

Steve

[Gary Peacock]

We fitted the first production unit and a subsequent one later on both had their share of teething problems but those were early days and the concept is fine, I'm sure by now those issues will have been long sorted.

 

The unit is very quiet but maybe a cocooned engine or well thought out soundproofing rather than the Propgen might make better economic sense?

[rog guiver]

We also fitted a Beta to our new boat, considered a cocooned unit but the difference between the basic and cocooned unit was, we felt, excessive. Access for engine servicing seemed a little tight within the cocoon. Mind you that was two years ago, perhaps the cocoon has changed.

 

A well insulated installation has resulted in a very quiet engine with the the prop producing more noise.

 

Now a cocooned prop, that might be a winner!

Edited February 25, 2006 by rog guiver