We will give you a brief overview of choosing the suitable electric motor for your boat. Depending on the boat, engine type, and desired travel time, many different aspects must be considered. An electric motor is not always the same as an electric motor. Also, some boats are other. We hope you enjoy reading! Please send us your questions and suggestions about the article.
1. Is there a personal contact person?
From my experience, it takes a long time to familiarize yourself with electric boat drives. It would help if you planned a few days for the basics and brought some technical know-how about engines and boats. If you have the time and leisure, you might enjoy it and learn a lot.
When we were looking for an electric motor, we just wanted to know which one we could use with which battery and battery charger. Finished. We would have preferred to have done this within a few minutes at Amazon or Check24 or a digital consultant. Our goal was simply a silent, clean and efficient electric motor.
The first question should be: Do you want to discuss your requirements for the electric motor for your boat with a personal contact, or do you want to read up on the topic yourself? We would have opted for personal communication, as we needed more experience with boat engines.
First, we saw electric motors in many online shops, and the first challenge was accessibility and the appropriate medium. Some do not offer telephone advice and can only be reached by email. In a personal conversation, it is much easier to determine which motor suits you best, which is why many shops choose it.
The shops and some manufacturers could hardly be reached by email or telephone or have yet to reply to emails.
Tip: Get an impression of whether your contact person is easy to reach.
We attach great importance to a personal contact person and are therefore available 24/7. You can contact us by email, telephone, request a callback, or in person at trade fairs. If necessary, we will, of course, also visit the site to get a better picture. You can also find out all the details about electric boat motors from us and even find the right solution yourself in our digital consultation.
2. Is a professional consultation carried out for you?
On our way to the first electric motor, we sought advice from 10 companies and ended up with 11 opinions. We had to find the golden mean from the different aspects. Not that easy.
What distinguishes high-quality advice? We thought it couldn’t be that difficult. All e-motors are similar, and we need to figure out their performance. However, many more factors play a role: type of boat, weight, length, salt or freshwater, current speed, driving time, frequency and engine type, and many more.
We would probably have been very disappointed if we had bought the proposed boat motor directly after the first consultation. In some talks, the dimensioning of our requirements needed to be corrected. Especially since the consultations are usually not carried out in the level of detail, often three to four questions are asked, and then only some products are told.
Tip: Pay attention to how well the needs analysis is carried out and how well your contact person listens.
We wanted to develop a new consulting standard, make it freely available, and take all aspects into account in the best possible way. We are constantly working on improving it and presenting it digitally and personally. In our digital consulting tool, you will find all relevant points and descriptions of why this can be important for you and what needs to be considered.
3. Are performance and battery capacity optimally designed for your boat?
The most important aspects of the advice include the engine’s performance and the marine battery capacity. The size of the battery, in particular, also significantly impacts the package’s overall price. We calculate the performance based on the weight, the boat type, and the application area. The battery capacity is then determined based on the motor and the desired driving time.
There were also often different values when the manufacturers or dealers consulted. Some would have let us go for the 3-ton houseboat with a 3 kW motor. Ultimately, we opted for better maneuverability and a 6 kW motor.
There was another way: without batting an eyelid, some manufacturers brought an 11 or 15-kW motor into play. In our opinion, completely oversized, especially since we didn’t want to take the boat on the Rhine with a larger current.
There were also some deviations in the driving time and, thus, the size of the battery, which of course, were also due to the motor. Sometimes it can be worth considering a second offer. It would help if you remembered that the contact persons often want to make more profit by selling more or larger drives. Tip 3: Find out more from several or use an independent tool such as our digital advice.
Our modern and digital consulting tool provides practical information and complete packages. The advice is equal to or better than that of many providers. We are working on turning the device into a DIN standard as part of a DIN Connect competition.
4. Does your contact have a neutral overview of all 500+ engines?
You now have a good overview of how much power you need and which 12 volt battery suits your driving style. Perfect! It continues by looking for individual manufacturers or suppliers and looking at the motors and batteries.
Easier said than done. There are more than 500 different electric boat motors. We also had to find out, and the research lasted several days. We have not found a contact who knows every supplier on the market and can assess which engines work and how well.
You can find all the information available on our engine pages. You can get extensive knowledge, and in the long term, we will also make videos, customer reviews, and data from test series available to you here. There is still much work ahead of us, and we appreciate any support.
Tip: Take the time to get an insight into various engines and compare them.
Our goal is to unite over 400 engines from more than 20 manufacturers on our platform and thus offer a transparent possibility of comparison. Those interested in electric boat motors can obtain all information free of charge, compare prices and find the right contact person directly. We are working to improve this offer for you further.
5. Do you get different alternatives from different manufacturers?
Of course, the manufacturers advise on their motors, and most shops or dealers usually only have two to three different manufacturers of electric motors. That covers most of it.
However, there are over 20 manufacturers, and we have noticed that there are undoubtedly other, sometimes higher-quality motors. In addition, we were able to save a lot of money on the purchase!
What would have helped us back then? We would have liked to have had a contact person to do all the research for us and find offers for any engine from any manufacturer. We are bargain hunters and would not have liked to pay anything for a consultation. We would have wished for a win-win situation in which the seller provides excellent advice and, at the exact time, costs no more than the manufacturer.
Tip: Take advantage of our free service.
We ensure that the manufacturers provide you with an individual offer without any additional effort or costs. In return, we receive a small commission from our cooperation partner. The price for you is the same.
6. Is there extensive information and advice?
Information and hints. With some manufacturers, finding information about the products in addition to the technical data is more challenging. You are familiar with your products, so there needed to be more knowledge, especially for beginners like us some time ago. Information, customer reports, or examples of how the system looks in practice.
Not everything that glitters is gold. In addition to little information, the presentation of advantages and disadvantages leaves much to be desired. In our search for the perfect electric motor, we didn’t even(!) notice that there were adverse reports about individual motors. We would have wished for a kind of Check24 where, in addition to the advantages, it also clearly shows what needs to be considered and where some models perform worse.
Tip: Read through our extensive product pages!
We remain true to a neutral presentation of advantages and disadvantages and want to communicate aspects that we do not think are optimal. Further information and download options will soon be available on the individual pages to find more detailed information if you are interested.
7. Do you find it easy to compare the products?
Electric boat drives are pretty difficult to compare. The motors and batteries look the same from the outside. Judging which products are better or worse than others is very difficult.
In the first step, we are working on clearly comparing the engines’ numbers, data, and facts for you to make a possible comparison. Enter the information and select the complete packages that are suitable for you. Alternatively, all products in the shop can be compared with one another.
This is also not so easy in a personal consultation, at least without some visual support. Some manufacturers offer test drives or send models to larger customers for testing. Depending on the size of the engine, this is something you should consider.
Tip: Go to boating shows and look at the products live. There are usually opportunities to test them there.
In the medium term, we want to review and compare all engines in videos on YouTube. It would have been worth seeing the machines and how someone uses them on the boat.
8. Is an individual solution possible for you?
Each boat is unique, and there is no uniform standard. We were not in a situation where we needed a completely individual solution. We receive many inquiries or boat owners at a trade fair with special requests or ideas, from the size to the system’s voltage.
This is where the wheat separates from the chaff. Some manufacturers focus on bringing products onto the market that are exciting for a large number of users. However, there are far fewer contacts for these exceptional cases.
For individual requirements, we have a few special contacts who can cover all areas, from the winding of the motor to custom-made products for commercial shipping. Special features for your boat are not an obstacle on the way to clean and sustainable electric motors.
Tip: Write us a message or call us if you have particular ideas.
Your boat. Our drive.: That is our motto, and we try to make everything possible. We have already made a lot of contacts and can assess which partners are suitable for which projects and want to expand this further in the long term.
9. Is it possible to install and service the boat engine?
The perfect motor has been found, regardless of whether it is an individual solution or an engine from a well-known manufacturer. What’s next? Who takes care of the installation of the electric drive? This is a simple thing with outboard motors up to a specific size. The assembly at the rear is uncomplicated and can be done quickly by hand.
What happens with larger systems? It is easiest if you already have a boat builder or contact person on site. However, many still need a permanent partner for such conversions. In any case, you should start early to find a specialist for the installation. The demand is high and the supply relatively low, which will be challenging in the coming years.
To bring supply and demand together, we want to create a map with service partners to find a service partner as quickly as possible. Some manufacturers, such as power, offer to install them themselves, while others only sell the motors. If you have any ideas or suggestions, please feel free to write to us.
Fortunately, an electric motor requires minimal service apart from installation since the engines are usually maintenance-free. Depending on the durability of the batteries, they should be checked if necessary. In any case, maintenance-free electric motors save you time and money.
Tip: Start looking for a supplier for the installation early on.
It is not easy for us to do the installation and service justice. Instead, we are an independent broker who wants to advise all boat owners on electric propulsion. However, this is only possible with structure, so we work with partners here and forward these orders directly. We would also be happy to look for partners at your location.
10. Are warranty and spare parts available?
The electric motor runs and runs and runs. But what happens if you ever need spare parts? A broken propeller, after hitting the ground, can happen quickly. Many manufacturers have been around for years and offer appropriate spare parts. As a rule, a regional dealer is not that important, and the elements will come directly to you by post anyway.
The situation is similar in a warranty case for smaller boat engines. The motor will be returned and repaired, or you will be sent a new one. A regional contact is recommended for larger installations, but most manufacturers provide all services throughout Germany via a broad service network.
The warranty looks quite similar for all manufacturers—usually, a two-year warranty for private users and one year for commercial users. We have heard from some manufacturers, such as FMT, that there have not yet been any(!) returns. Others like RiPower even offer the option of a 5(!) year guarantee.
In our opinion, these are service promises that make the difference. It doesn’t always have to be the cheap model, and it has to be high quality, especially for my boat. In general, we think that spare parts will not pose a problem in the long term, even for new companies or models, as the industry is developing extremely well.
Tip: Don’t just look at the price when choosing the right system; keep an eye on the service and guarantee!
We will be happy to advise you on choosing the right drive and answer your questions about the guarantee or spare parts.
Conclusion on the purchase of electric boat motors
Ultimately, almost all manufacturers and dealers provide sound advice on their products. A little less will also calculate a complete package or create various offers for you.
If independent and high-quality advice is essential to you, you can use our advice tool, the comparison options, or our direction with a clear conscience. Of course, we recommend our advice and look forward to finding the perfect electric motor together with you!
