That 's right it is the 1003s. A spare skeg is not a bad idea as this is sacrificial. I see Nestaway are now UK dealers and the guy who runs that is very helpful - we did a homebuild on one of his boats a few years ago.

Simon, Yes, Ian at Nestaway is a good source. He built my Danny Greene Chamelian nesting dinghy which we are very happy with. Nice workmanship. His web site is also informative about Torqeedos in a reasonable way and not the usual hype. Dick

Agree. We have the Nestaway Trio 14.

Hi Everyone,
We have one season using the Torqeedo 1003 and wish to echo all the advantages said so far about these quiet powerful motors. So far no negatives. It is a pleasure not to have a gasoline outboard with its fuel, gear lube, additives, smells and spills and heavier weight.
My best, Dick Stevenson, s/v Alchemy

Dick,
For the last 2 years we have been carrying two batteries with us. This summer the older of the two batteries failed. It holds charge and runs the motor fine but I cannot recharge it. I presume it is a circuit board failure so will return it for repair and I will let you know the outcome. Getting a large lithium battery onto a plane back to the UK was a bit of a drama. So flying spares to remote places may be a difficulty that needs to be factored in. If it is the circuit board that has failed then it will be our second in 6 years. Apart from that I have nothing but praise.
Simon

Hi Simon,
One of the pleasures of our nesting dinghies is that they row so well, that if the motor craps out, we can still go long distances up wind. Dick

We 've had a Torqeedo Travel 1003 since 2013, which we purchased in the U.S., our home waters. We are happy with the product, but as a result of our experiences with it...

- We purchased a second battery in 2014.
- We obtained a Torqeedo "fast charger" in 2015.
- We found Torqeedo repair service in Spain and Portugal nearly inexistent and the German office worse than useless. Fortunately the U.S. office was more collaborative.
- We still carry a gasoline engine, 8HP, as a spare, and for when we must traverse longer distances.

Our preferred engine is the Torqeedo and it is the one that sees the most use, by far. But there 's been times when we 've celebrated that we have the conventional one as well.

Cheers,

Thanks for the info. We shall see what spares we accumulate over time. When in the Bahamas, Carib. and Central America, we carried 2 outboards, a 15 and a 3.5 and a RIB. We used them all the time and they worked well generally. Since leaving those areas, having an "SUV" became far less important and we used the outboards far less. As a consequence, they became far less reliable. I am not sure what I would do if I returned to those waters, but I am pleased with the distances achieved with the Torqeedo so far. Dick

Prompted by this thread I just plugged in the "failed" battery (the one that wouldn 't charge so we brought back from Iceland) and it is no charging! I am wondering if they changed the specification of the charger as the old battery now works with the old charger whereas it would not charge with the newer charger I had on the boat even though the new charger worked with the new battery!! All a bit confusing.

Just need to figure how to get the now working battery back to Iceland now given that the airline really didn 't like us for checking into hold baggage!

Simon

Frustrating!

All I can say is that both of our batteries charge equally well with either the fast charger (3.5 hrs to charge) or the original charger (14 hours to charge). A difference is that the fast charger warms up the battery whereas the original charger does not.

As it is well known that internal heating is a dire enemy of lithium battery life, we keep both chargers together but only use the fast charger when we imperatively know we must recharge a battery quickly because we will need it shortly; i.e., rarely.

Best,