The transmission and steering units are quite robust and I dont expect any serviceability issues from them. (See How Fuel-Efficient Are Pods, Exactly?) The biggest savings might come when the pods aft-located engines add interior accommodations. That smooths out some of the minor gear asperities and grinding marks, improving the life of the gears. After break-in, pods are serviced every 250 hours or 12 months, whichever occurs first. But in that case, its the ability to point and shoot that gives them comfort level. International service is also a concern for pods. Not a lot of guys know pods yet. Zeus ArcPods - The 3rd Generation of Vaporizers is Here! Down sides were in the San Francisco Bay Area there is only one person that can work on them. Pods have taken certain segments of the cruising-boat market by storm, and now big-game charter captains who were once fixed-shaft aficionados are embracing this new technology. Here are both performance charts. But I usually run at 32 miles per hour and get 1.5 mpg, he says. And hitting something hard at speed would strip the pods off the bottom as neat as you please. Sabre Yachts, for example, first offered pods in 2008 as an option over straight shafts in the 42-foot express cruiser. Those anodes shouldnt dissolve like zincs do, but both systems should be checked annually. I also feel they will continue to loose market share to Volvo. I had SeaVee owner Ariel Pared with me when we pulled away from the dock sideways, crabbing away briskly from our side-to moor. Although there are claims of 30 percent efficiency gains in cruise and top-end speed as well as fuel savings, the results vary from boat to boat when compared to straight shaft and prop configurations. But point and shoot was only part of it; IPS also claimed more speed and better fuel efficiency (the precise amount of each is still up for discussion), and thanks to its aft engine placement, more interior space and lower interior sound levels. We are not early adopters. (I know you're supposed to replace each use for both the other companies, but it is possible to get more than one sesh out of each pod). The biggest difference between IPS's and Zeus pods is the position of the propeller. Joystick control? We didnt have to touch it until we got back to San Diego.). If so, does anyone know whether they will continue to produce replacement drives/parts? The performance numbers on the IPS are slightly better. By turning pods in opposite directions and running one in forward and one in reverse, the vessel can be pivoted more quickly and easily than in either outboards or inboards. In standard shaft and prop boats, props lose their bite in close-quarters maneuvering, Smith says. What customers are choosing is maneuverability. His company, Siebert Yacht Management commissions and maintains most new Sabre boats delivered to Palm Beach County, Florida, giving him considerable experience with Volvo IPS drives on Sabres 38- and 54-foot models and with Cummins Zeus drives on Sabres 42- and 48-footers, as well as those same hulls with conventional shafts. The following cookies are also needed - You can choose if you want to allow them: This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged. There support network is much better and to me is a better product. Using a ZF transmission, it could mate any marine engine (Yanmar and Caterpillar have been popular partners) to its pods. Petzold pulls the props annually to grease the shafts, and to remove any fishing line or other foreign matter on the shaft or wedged into the seal. Volvos Active Corrosion System, which is standard on IPS 800 or larger drives, is similar. Controlled at low speeds by a joystick rather than wheel, shifts, and throttles, pods take most of the angst, the apprehension, and, sometimes, the sheer terror out of close-quarters maneuvering. Vessel Systems Considerations for Marine Repower, ZF Marine Propulsion Systems Miramar, LLC. You can also reach us at +1 (833) ZF WRENCH. Click to enable/disable _gat_* - Google Analytics Cookie. is ryan bingham related to ken curtis. In fact, shafts and struts have been driven through the hull by groundings and collisions with floating debris. For a ballpark number, Im deferring to a well-researched article written by our late friend, Capt. Add to Cart. If I could afford em, Id get em. Being new to power boating, I selected this configuration for ease of docking and it has been fabulous. And maneuverabilitywell, any good sportfishing captain can put his ride wherever he wantswithout a joystick. Care should be taken prior to using a vaporizer, as vaporizing will not necessarily eliminate any and all toxins found in vaporized blends. Spencer Yachts was one of the first to embrace pod-drives, including Volvo Pentas IPS and ZF Marines pod-drive system with Caterpillar engines. pathfinder kingmaker river's justice . Comfort Onboard comfort is improved too. Parts for them now have to go through mercury. Pull into any port in the world, and theres probably a guy there who can fix it. Autor de l'entrada Per ; Data de l'entrada ice detention center colorado; https nhs vc hh cardiac surgery a are zeus pods still being manufactured a are zeus pods still being manufactured Yet catastrophic groundings are rare for all boats, although again, the financial consequences for the pod owner are usually steeper. For more information and/or quote, please complete the contact form below. Docking is super easy with joy stick controls. Yes, BM, thanks for all the info and posting your actual experiences always adds a lot of value to any discussion. The Zeus ArcPods are the convenient method of preparing, loading, and transporting your dry herb for use with your Zeus Arc GTS or Arc S vaporizer. Due to security reasons we are not able to show or modify cookies from other domains. Cabos sport-fisher benefits from Cummins Mercruiser Diesels Zeus drive. When you back down an inboard, the rudder posts start vibrating, and the boat sounds like its coming apart. The company didnt invent them, but it made pod a household word among boaters. One drive had a. Whats going on here? Pod drives have been widely available only since 2007, yet they have the market awhirl. These versatile drive systems are not as popular as once thought. I am considering buying a Meridian 441 flybridge motor yacht, which is 47 LOA and 31,000lbs. To get a good hole shot, Zeus countered with automatic trim tabs and matched the pods with tunnels to reduce draft. The engines are in their normal spot, but then you jackshaft to pods, so you lose space in the lazarette, he says. For nearly a decade, pod propulsion looked like it would render inboards obsolete. Although hes well versed in the care and maintenance of inboards, Anderson was still anxious to run a pod boat. $44 MediaLight Mk2 Flex 4m D65 6500CRI98 Bias Lighting USB powered ComputersTablets & Networking Laptop & Desktop Accessories USB Lights & Gadgets If they dont increase the odds of hooking up, who cares? They bite hard and wont let the engine spin up.. Drive Pirates Heck, Mercurys Verado 400R comes with a two-year warranty, even though its got Racing painted on the cowl. Most new boats developed in the 35- to 45-foot class were pods. Such tales are grist for boaters imaginations, as is the mere idea of components made of expensive, finely machined alloys dangling below the boat, protected by neither keel nor shaft. Petzold uses Propspeed, or some other antifouling paint formulated for underwater metals. With the joystick, my 12-year-old docks the boat.. You put it in sport fish, and it locks the pods in opposite directions. They said it was so easy a child could do it, and sure enough, it wasnt long before a lad barely out of kindergarten deftly maneuvered a 40-footer into a slip all by himself. Boat will operate 75% of the time in displacement/9kt mode, if that is relevant. But this will always prompt you to accept/refuse cookies when revisiting our site. You cant take the grate off to clean or paint in there. His solution is to spray Interlux Trilux 33 or Pettit Alumaspray Plus from aerosol cans inside the seawater intakes. With its forward-facing counter-rotating propellers, Volvos IPS pod-drive is a unique system. Skip to the beginning of the images gallery, Zeus ArcPods are finally here! However, most sport-fishers rarely operate at wide-open throttle. Ill bet everyone whos read this far is asking, How much does all this cost? Maintaining pods is a lot more involved than maintaining conventional running gear, and therefore more expensive. Over the years, Ive found online forums to be some of the most ready places for first-hand accounts of engine-related problems. At Volvo Pentas IPS rollout in Mallorca de Palma, identical inboard and pod-drive boats were pitted against each other. From a long term maintenance perspective you are better off with a conventional drive line. Check the status of an existing order here. But now thats all gone away. These are often second- or third-told tales with a questionable provenance and few verifiable facts. I was surprised by how light and long lasting these were. Reproduction in whole or in part without permission is prohibited. Pods are robust.. The Arc GTS is no . If you get to know these pods and keep regular checks on fluid levels, they will treat you well. When Volvo Penta took the industry by surprise with the IPS, it had patented the forward-facing counter-rotating propellers, patented new propellers for the design and also sent the exhaust out the back of the pod, not through the hub of the props. And with good reasonthese propulsion systems offer several major-league advantages over traditional inboard power, so once a few savvy boaters got their hands on 'em . With quad outboards, Id get about 0.7 miles per gallon. Pods have been pretty darn foolproof, he said. The owner of the boat spent almost 40k on the drives themselves and they were just under 8 years old. 2023 Active Interest Media All Rights Reserved. As one broker told me, Its like automatic transmissions. Use of Cookies: ZF Friedrichshafen AG uses cookies to continuously improve the website and optimize its design. But the rest? Only thing is, outboards burn gas, and more of it than diesels of similar power. Naval architects have also gotten better at maximizing the efficiencies of pods at all speeds. Mark their location any way you can, with a waypoint or a buoy, said Steve Little, president ofTowBoatU.S. One described his skepticism like this: Its just too good to be true. This article originally appeared in the February 2014 issue of Power & Motoryacht magazine. Zeus offers dramatically improved high-speed handling and delivers up to: 30% improved fuel economy 15% faster cruise speed Finger pointing is worse in any situation when it is out of warranty, then you are left on a deserted island. Not cool to open two threads on similar subjects, yup, definitely my bad, rookie mistake, thought I was posting in the forum the first time around. The downside is that a boat with less horsepower is more easily burdened by loading the boat. The 390 with Volvo 600 IPS drives was absolutely one of the most fun and outrageous-performing boats I have ever driven. Hang around a boatyard, and youll hear at least one horror story about some unfortunate soul who was stranded, or worse, because his pods failed. Click to enable/disable Google reCaptcha. Buckley dismisses the fear of forward-facing props. By using a vaporizer, you understand that inhalation is inadvisable as it may be harmful, and use of a vaporizer is done at your own risk. Today electronics are inextricably entwined with every aspect of our lives, and whether its commercial jet engines, cars, home appliances, or chartplotters, we expect and receive virtually bulletproof reliability. Using a fresh arcpod lid enables you to visibly see which one of your pods is used and which ones have been depleted. Pod access aboard the Riviera 43 is through the cockpit sole. There are a lot of traditionalists in that market.. I see the cummins split from Zeus around here was not a good thing myself. Its also important to monitor for seawater dripping onto drives. Zeus ArcPods are finally here! Initially, I too was surprised at the lack of trained techs in my area but once I realized you can use Mercury techs that have been to Mercury Diesel school, more options opened up. (Volvo Penta soon followed suit.) All up, pod owners can expect to pony up something like an additional $2,500 for scheduled maintenance. Today, 250s are middle of the road: Triple and quad 300s are common, and 400s built for everyday use are available, too. Capt. But pod-drive engines use counter-rotating props. Zirk fittings require grease in U-joints and at both ends of jack shafts that connect engines to drives. (Power & Motoryacht once had a company boat powered by inboards with which the publisher at the time rammed a sunken fuel barge at a healthy clip. Definitely good value for the price and performance these offer. Make sure to do this, and if buying a used boat, make certain the first owner did it, too. I rarely say this but if your dead set on a pod option I would put Volvos in. The maneuverability of the boat is what sells it, especially in close quarters, he says. If we have to go searching or put divers in the water, thats another story. To prevent later claims of piracy, come to an agreement beforehand, Little said. If you do not want that we track your visit to our site you can disable tracking in your browser here: We also use different external services like Google Webfonts, Google Maps, and external Video providers. And if they dont want them, I cant talk them into it.. Controlling wind, waves and current. I can do a 180 in about a second and a half. Siebert puts annual maintenance for pods roughly $2,000 above what straight shafts cost, not including extra haul-out fees for boats that exceed 250 engine-hours per year. Then forward-thinking builders (Tiara, Cruisers, Regal, and Sabre among them) redesigned their boats for pod power and the technology became mainstream. With SmartCraft innovation throughout, Zeus provides a seamless approach to propulsion technology, marine electronics, and on-board information management that makes boating safer and more enjoyable than ever. Zeus Arsenal has always made only reliable, well-performing devices that go beyond just being the perfect daily driver. Sorry, but as an ex-Cummins and Merc dealer, I've lost all faith in the Zeus system. On Zeus drives, check the steering oil reservoir dipstick, and check the clear reservoir for lower-unit gear oil for any signs of water seeping into the drive. In many ways, fishermen a nongendered term that embraces both sexes trust what weve learned over decades of personal experience and the experience of our mentors. A little cheaper because it was in SoCal. The store will not work correctly in the case when cookies are disabled. Okay, the motors cost about $80,000 and $90,000, respectively. Im all about new technology. While there has not been a flood of acceptance in the sport-fishing market for pod-drives, the cruising market has seen a larger number of owners making the transition away from conventional shaft-and-wheel boats. Fashioned out of high quality aluminum, the Zeus ArcPods are designed to hold up to 0.3 grams of dry herb and work perfectly with the Zeus Xtruder which directly connects to, fills up, and automatically ejects the pod once the optimal amount of dry herb has been loaded. What if you do hit something? he says. Nevertheless, pods are making inroads. The biggest fear boaters have is not about running out in the open water. However, I think the best application I have run to date was a 39-foot SeaVee with pod-drives. There are many factors that go into all of this, not the least of which are service and technical expertise to repair the systems, parts availability and costs for purchase and maintenance. We may request cookies to be set on your device. And joystick piloting? Pods also expand morning fluid checks to include the lazarette. No thrusters are required, saving more cash. For the best experience on our site, be sure to turn on Javascript in your browser. Siebert removes all loose paint from the drive, sanding down to shiny metal with 100-grit sandpaper, and then applies primer and two thin coats of Trilux 33 or Pettit Vivid copper thiocyanate anti-fouling paint. A couple of tanks of fuel? are zeus pods still being manufactured. ZF Marine entered the pod fray when its exclusivity agreement with Zeus expired. A frequently overlooked benefit of IPS is this new stateroom, made possible by the compact power installation. Sensors and things like that. We get a lot of oyster growth inside the drive intakes, Siebert said. We fully respect if you want to refuse cookies but to avoid asking you again and again kindly allow us to store a cookie for that. Theres no free lunch, so there must be a hidden cost that no ones factored in.. How to Manage Boat Finances During a Recession, Gamefisherman 43 Express on the Drawing Board, Marlin Expeditions Offers Light-Tackle Paradise in Guatemala. A Bonnier LLC Company. In that case, its not the pod; its our joystick-maneuvering system that does this, and we offer a joystick in a traditional shaft boat. Obviously, you have run over fish to get a bite, but we proved that pod-drives were no fearsome thing. . (Depending on the pod, there might be internal anodes, too. The props themselves are patented. Its more maneuverable than an outboard, and you dont have any engines on the back.. Although pod housings are built of corrosion-resistant bronze rather than the aluminum alloy used for stern drives, its still critical to maintain the anodes. Unless you get the boat at a knock-down price, I mean really low, I wouldn't touch one without a full service history or a late model. Ignore it and you can forget about that edge in fuel efficiency over inboards. The drive can be simultaneously connected to electric propulsion too. The tank has a 24mm diameter (0.94 inches) and measures 50.5mm tall (2 inches tall). Review Images (jpg, jpeg, png) Max 3MB file size allowed. The sport-fishing world has seen builders such as Spencer and Winter Custom Yachts introduce several pod boats. And the Zeus pods also came with a joystick. Please note that to purchase a vaporizer from this website you must abide by local laws and be a minimum of 19 years of age. You can check these in your browser security settings. Warranty concerns may shorten the list of service providers. You might not think of Cat as a pod company, but since ZF offered its pods to the market, hes helped several manufacturers build ZF or Zeus pod with Caterpillar engines. We recommend consulting with a licensed physician before using a vaporizer. IPS followed with its own, and ZF ponied one up too. Exhaust fumes are emitted into the prop wash. The other companies give you a metal lid aluminum or steel, so you would only replace it to your liking when the taste gets yucky. Controlled at low speeds by a joystick rather than wheel, shifts, and throttles, pods take most of the angst, the apprehension, and, sometimes, the sheer terror out of close-quarters maneuvering. I am on the East Coast. Both throttle and steering. Each IPS has anodes as well, one up inside the exhaust tunnel (the other is on the transom); both Zeus anodes are on the trim tabs where theyre easy to reach. On the other hand, touching bottom only hard enough to bend the propellers will likely cost more on pods, because they have two props to repair on each drive. Arrogant factory leadership, poor parts fill, and high parts prices scared me off. Fifty dollars per prop should do it. Outboards are, in my opinion, the most interesting. For more information and/or quote, please complete the contact form below. Petzold said the most common problem he sees with pods is owners not maintaining the corrosion protection. If your zincs are gone, your warranty might be gone too, Siebert said, so all his clients boats with pods are cleaned and checked monthly by a diver. If we can go straight to them and safely lift them into the boat, most tow boat operators are going to charge an hourly fee or a flat fee, and not claim salvage. The counter-rotating propellers and large rubber grommets the engine is mounted on means reduced vibration and engine noise. You get a little cavitation but nothing close to the noise from shaft-drives, he says. I liked the idea of being able to handle the boat from the helm seat instead of standing up all the time. On Cummins drives, standard-equipment MerCathode system anodes emit a tiny electrical charge opposite the damaging electrical currents that normally flow through metal parts in seawater, actively protecting pods from galvanic corrosion. Hes president of Petzolds Marine Center (petzolds.com) in Portland, Connecticut, a dealer for both Sabre and Regal, two boatbuilders that moved into pods early in the game. I understand in order to get pods cheap they had to use this cardboard-like substance, so seeing how you can't even try to clean it because of the material makes the company seem like they are fishing for my money every month unlike Healthy Rips and Storz and Bickel with their "pods" (IDK what to call them). They have the only tech here that will work on them. Are they worth it? Yet the pod makers are quickly closing that gap, and captains who have run them for several years indicate that the reliability has been very good. Months later, Mercruiser and Cummins joined forces to deliver Zeus pod-drives to boaters. (A complete maintenance schedule, including annual and longer-term items, is in the owners manual, so pay attention to it.). Phone: 1-844-858-8273 Email: [emailprotected].com. More interior room? Our best guess is it will take a significant chunk of the market. Because they operate independently, pod-drives can be controlled via joystick for superb maneuverability. Thanks to all.just the practical advice I was looking for. I did some work on them but really didnt have the time to become efficient. Most pod boats burn roughly the same per mile through a wide range of cruising speeds; conventional shaft boats typically have a narrow sweet spot. Shafts, Props and a good ole thruster or 2 can have you handling your boat like a POD boat.