First test drive of RIB dinghy with Spirit 1.0 Plus electric motor

Today we were excited to test drive our new ePropulsion Spirit 1.0 Plus motor with the new to us Highfield CL290 dinghy.

Mounting the engine on the dinghy went very smoothly – the light weight made it a breeze to get it on board. I adjusted the trim up one stop to 7° as it seemed to be at the wrong angle with lowest setting. I don’t like the pull ring end for the trim pin as they are a little hard to get started. I liked the Yamaha pin (on previous boat) which had a kind of pivot tab that was built in as part of the pin.

We went out for a spin around the harbor trying a bit of forward and reverse maneuvering. I steered a bit outside the channel and got it the weeds. I did notice that some had gotten around the prop so stopped the engine and pulled them off. We then headed back to the boat.

It was definitely a learning experience to get use to throttle having both forward and reverse without a seperate shifter. Handling of the outboard for steering will be a learning experience too as it has been several years since I have done that. Sharron will get a chance tomorrow to get some experience with it all.