Insurance again

[Black Panther 1,604]

Is this where we are headed?

 

House Bill 4844 would be a brief addition to South Carolina law, requiring that owners who want to anchor in the state for more than two weeks pay for insurance to cover salvage costs if their boats sink:

An owner of a boat that is anchored in the waters of this State more than fourteen days must maintain marine recovery insurance on the boat.

To obtain marine recovery insurance, the boat owner must provide the insurer a recent vessel survey that includes a declaration that the boat is seaworthy and that the boat can move under its own power as intended when built. Sailboats must have working sails and powerboats must have a working motor. The survey must have been completed within six months of the policy being issued and completed by a licensed boat surveyor. All policy premiums must be current before a policy can be renewed and new stickers sent to the boat owner.

The insurer shall issue two 3 ½ x 3 ½ inch watercraft stickers to the boat owner each time a policy is issued or renewed. The stickers must have the year in one inch font and the insurance company, policy number, and boat registration number on the sticker and be displayed on the boat. The insurer shall require a new survey from the vessel owner after each three-year period before renewing the policy on year four.

A person who violates this provision is guilty of a misdemeanor and, upon conviction, must be imprisoned not more than thirty days and fined not more than five hundred dollars.

[K4309 276]

We are already not far off it in NZ.

I'm in the midst of getting a condition assessment survey for my boat, purely for insurance purposes. Cost of survey, rig check and gas certificate alone is in the order of $3k. Not counting maintenance work and renewals I need to complete ahead of the survey (that I had planned for anyway).

Without insurance you can't moor in a marina or club mooring field (i.e. Weiti) and you can't haul out anywhere, so maintenance, or even doing an out of water hull inspection for the survey gets very complicated.

Sure, you can still have an uninsured boat on a swing mooring, or anchor anywhere you want. But that is why all the derelict boats go to swing moorings. If you go for a putter up the Weiti past Stillwater you can see a bunch of abandoned boats bunged into the mangroves or tied to the bank. That is not counting the ones on moorings that are also clearly abandoned.

What to do with old boats is a significant issue, and it is a community / environment issue now as well. I think in the State of Carolina they will just shift their issues somewhere else / the next state along. Not sure what to do in NZ. The cost of responsibly disposing of a boat is prohibitive. But there are no other options other than a big digger, crushing it and taking it to a landfill. 

In saying all of that, it's not just old boats that sink or hit rocks at full tilt. $2mil Rivitmos have been known to do some serious percussion hydrography and sink themselves in pristine bays and what not. Although you'd assume those types of boats are more likely to have full insurance, there is no legal requirement for it in NZ.

[waikiore 410]

Getting close over here, have had requests for an EWOF on two boats that I have -neither of which is ever plugged in to the national grid ! One does not even have any wiring on board !  (apart from outboard killswitch)

[Psyche 645]

"must be imprisoned"

🤮 

[khayyam 78]

1 hour ago, Psyche said:

"must be imprisoned"

🤮

That sets a *maximum* (of 30 days), not a minimum, as it implies out of context. Zero would be allowed.

In general, I'm a bit torn. Yes insurance inspections are pain in the * and I hate them, and insurance premiums only ever seem to go one direction (up, and recently by a lot). On the other hand, old derelict shitters coming and occupying your anchorages, and maybe worse sinking there, isn't something we as a boating community want either. See, for example, the issy bay hulk saga and the weiti example above.  How to solve that, I don't know. 

 

[aardvarkash10 972]

25 minutes ago, khayyam said:

How to solve that, I don't know

a disposal bond on all moored boats.  Bond is held by the applicable regional authority.  Just like a tenant bond, but different.  It would probably require registraion and formal ownership tranfer I guess...

[Black Panther 1,604]

I think that if a boat has decent mooring cleats and serviced through hulls nobody has any right to complain.

I also hate the idea of an insurance company telling me what I can and can't do. e.g. leaving the pacific after October.  That's my decision. 

[Black Panther 1,604]

BTW we wmt dinghysploring up the river over easter, didn't see anything to get excited about.

[motorb 30]

On 9/04/2024 at 12:25 PM, aardvarkash10 said:

a disposal bond on all moored boats.  Bond is held by the applicable regional authority.  Just like a tenant bond, but different.  It would probably require registraion and formal ownership tranfer I guess...

this idea just sounds like an annual registration with levy to me

those disposal (and admin) costs go up with inflation, and the existing abandoned boats wont be paying any bonds

I'm surprised that the aluminium, copper and lead aren't enough to cover a an old rusty digger smashing it up for an hour.... but I suppose it gets to be made much more complicated than that.

[waikiore 410]

When are insurance companies going to wake up to the Lithium battery issue, they worry about Ewof and gas lines -but the really dangerous fires lately have been battery started -I witnessed one , the intensity would make short work of boats in close proximity such as a Marina.. 

[motorb 30]

1 hour ago, waikiore said:

When are insurance companies going to wake up to the Lithium battery issue, they worry about Ewof and gas lines -but the really dangerous fires lately have been battery started -I witnessed one , the intensity would make short work of boats in close proximity such as a Marina.. 

do you know what type of lithium it was? I understand some chemistries are far safer than others, and having the correct chargers  and circuit protection is also important.

You  make a good point though.... I'm sticking with AGM lead in mine securely strapped down low where they can act as ballast. The keel is already 900kg of lead so whats the harm of another 40  right?

 

LiFePO is less energy dense than what you get in your phone for example, but far far safer. That, and I certainly would not be mucking around with some unknown brand of battery cells.

[CarpeDiem 443]

1 hour ago, waikiore said:

When are insurance companies going to wake up to the Lithium battery issue, they worry about Ewof and gas lines -but the really dangerous fires lately have been battery started -I witnessed one , the intensity would make short work of boats in close proximity such as a Marina.. 

It's baked in.  The same as it is for house and car insurance.

Your cell phone, your electric drill and your laptop, pack enough energy to burn your boat to the waterline and all the boats around it.

According to the NZ Fire Service over one house per week is lost due to battery fires.

CD carries a Ryobi 2Ah battery (for a cut-off grinder), along with laptops, tablets, phones etc... the installation/security of these devices is WAY WAY more concerning to me than the LFP batteries in the boat. I tell the crew no phones in bags, we have special bags/locations for phones, if someone stands on a bag and breaks the phone that combustible bag, everything in it and around it is going up in smoke!

It's not just Li-ion, Lead Acid packs enough energy to do the same.  I am yet to get on a boat in NZ that has a fused start motor cable - sure the risk is low - but it isn't as low as it would be if the circuit was fused!

[Island Time 1,249]

My boat's battery banks are all fused, incl the starter circuit.

[CarpeDiem 443]

15 minutes ago, Island Time said:

My boat's battery banks are all fused, incl the starter circuit.

I knew they would be IT. But I have not been on your boat 🤣😂

Out of curiosity what fuse did you settle on for the d2-40?

[Guest 90]

Don't recall any of my cars having fuse in main start cable, so why have it on boat. Switching circuit does, but not heavy cable to SM.

[CarpeDiem 443]

Just now, Guest said:

Don't recall any of my cars having fuse in main start cable, so why have it on boat. Switching circuit does, but not heavy cable.

When it short circuits the cable will heat up and become a marsh mellow toaster, left for several minutes you'll have a roasting pit - with a fuse you won't have time to crack open the marsh mellow packet, let alone find a stick

 

[Guest 90]

1 hour ago, CarpeDiem said:

It's baked in.  The same as it is for house and car insurance.

Your cell phone, your electric drill and your laptop, pack enough energy to burn your boat to the waterline and all the boats around it.

According to the NZ Fire Service over one house per week is lost due to battery fires.

CD carries a Ryobi 2Ah battery (for a cut-off grinder), along with laptops, tablets, phones etc... the installation/security of these devices is WAY WAY more concerning to me than the LFP batteries in the boat. I tell the crew no phones in bags, we have special bags/locations for phones, if someone stands on a bag and breaks the phone that combustible bag, everything in it and around it is going up in smoke!

It's not just Li-ion, Lead Acid packs enough energy to do the same.  I am yet to get on a boat in NZ that has a fused start motor cable - sure the risk is low - but it isn't as low as it would be if the circuit was fused!

Ditto except for phone protocol which I will adopt and will make crew aware that anything with Li ion batteries should not be tucked away and any sign of smoke it goes over the side. Which is a hell of a lot more stringent than happens in everyday life. Cordless mini grinder with several disks is must have. I even have a 12v charger specially for it.

How are the Na ion tests going? Im going to run the LTO for start past my insurance co and see what they say. Which I think I would fuse. (T+slow blow)

[CarpeDiem 443]

22 minutes ago, Guest said:

How are the Na ion tests going.

I found the voltage range too wide for a useful application on CD with the existing electronics/systems.  I considered running everything through buck/boost converter but it become kind of pointless and was destined to become an exercise in continuing down a path of diminishing returns for the sake of pretending I was cool.  Better to spend the time making money for a new main.

The battery tech is ready, need to wait for the tech to come out that supports the voltage range.  Fully charged was 16v, discharged to 10% was 6v.  Like LTO there's a usable area in the middle, but you lose out on about 30% of the capacity as it falls outside the usable range of most equipment.  I see a new breed of inverters being the first off the rank to support the chemistry.

My cells were NaMn02 - there's some experimental chemistries that might come to fruition which I am watching - but I have shelved the project for now and sold the cells for just less than I purchased them.

[K4309 276]

4 hours ago, waikiore said:

When are insurance companies going to wake up to the Lithium battery issue, they worry about Ewof and gas lines -but the really dangerous fires lately have been battery started -I witnessed one , the intensity would make short work of boats in close proximity such as a Marina.. 

Are you talking LiFePo house batteries, or the couple of dozen cell phone, laptop, drills, portable speakers, tooth brushes etc that all take all sorts of random Lithium batteries, have zero BMS and have dodgy as cheap chargers?

When I had a good look into this, there was an article around I think by an AU insurance underwriters or insurance industry association. The risk of LiFePo was conflated (excuse the pun) with the very wide range of other common batteries we take onto the boat, leave on the charger, leave in the sun, drop, sit on or dunk in water.

[CarpeDiem 443]

1 hour ago, Guest said:

I'm going to run the LTO for start past my insurance co and see what they say. Which I think I would fuse. (T+slow blow)

Plenty of LTO start batteries from european cars at the wreckers

I would use an AML fuse.

Three years ago, the reason I didn't go LTO start was multiple, 1. they are too hard on the glow plugs.  2, they need a special charging regime 3, I needed to find some bespoke glow plugs 4, I will get 10yrs out of the current ($250) start battery (7yrs left) 5, the (maybe 10kg) weight savings just weren't worth the effort 6, ewofs, electrical standards and potential marina demands

Maybe in 7 yrs time someone will have done the work for me