New to Boating: Advice for First Boat?

[purple5ive]

Purple, my research comes (to a significant extent) from threads and forums, where members post about their experiences. The Polycraft boats apparently are durable enough that during early shows, visitors would be allowed to take a sledgehammer to them to try and break them.

Thats intersting to hear that they have been labelled as not a very stable boat. ive been on a few polycraft and also own one myself ( smartwave 4200 its the same material as a polycraft but made in newzealand.)
its not just sledge hammers, they also take a shotgun to it and also drop it from a crane at height and drag it around attached to the back of a utility.

heres a video of the smartwave boats, they predominatly feature the 4200 model which is what i have

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SdvItIRvImc

and heres some more testing videos halfway through the clip, this one features the 4800 model

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mkii9FCFssE

and heres an insight to the polycrfats made in australia

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wIkOXY1R0jc

and heres some furthere testing

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yEC_JwvxFg0

as you can see they are quite tough boats which is one of the main reasons why i got them.

[tropicalfisher]

[/quote]

Thats intersting to hear that they have been labelled as not a very stable boat. ive been on a few polycraft and also own one myself ( smartwave 4200 its the same material as a polycraft but made in newzealand.)
its not just sledge hammers, they also take a shotgun to it and also drop it from a crane at height and drag it around attached to the back of a utility.[/quote]


I haven't heard too much about their stability specifically. Toughness is clearly very high, but I don't think that the price for them is justifiable, unfortunately.

[yepi'mon]

Thats intersting to hear that they have been labelled as not a very stable boat. ive been on a few polycraft and also own one myself ( smartwave 4200 its the same material as a polycraft but made in newzealand.)
its not just sledge hammers, they also take a shotgun to it and also drop it from a crane at height and drag it around attached to the back of a utility.

heres a video of the smartwave boats, they predominatly feature the 4200 model which is what i have

as you can see they are quite tough boats which is one of the main reasons why i got them.

Can you fix things through the coating? I.e if you wanted to install a snapper rack could you just use your typical screw fixings?

Where I used to work we used to make planter boxes and water features using a similar method, polystyrene core with an outer cement/fibreglass coating. The only downside of the construction was trying to fix other components to the units as there wasn't really anything solid to attach to. We would need to fibreglass in steel or aluminium plate if there was ever anything to be attached that would be load bearing.

[purple5ive]

yes you can buy tinnies of similar size for a lot cheaper. the smartwaves are cheaper than the polycraft boats though and lighter as well. but these boats are certainly not for you with a budget of 3k.
look around you will find something soon enough. if your on facebook then join the boats and boat parts buy swap and sell or similar pages, theres always cheaper boats in there.
if your around the frankston area then let me know, more than happy to take you out and give you a run down of whats involved in owning and operating a boat
cheers

[purple5ive]

Thats intersting to hear that they have been labelled as not a very stable boat. ive been on a few polycraft and also own one myself ( smartwave 4200 its the same material as a polycraft but made in newzealand.)
its not just sledge hammers, they also take a shotgun to it and also drop it from a crane at height and drag it around attached to the back of a utility.

heres a video of the smartwave boats, they predominatly feature the 4200 model which is what i have

as you can see they are quite tough boats which is one of the main reasons why i got them.

Can you fix things through the coating? I.e if you wanted to install a snapper rack could you just use your typical screw fixings?

Where I used to work we used to make planter boxes and water features using a similar method, polystyrene core with an outer cement/fibreglass coating. The only downside of the construction was trying to fix other components to the units as there wasn't really anything solid to attach to. We would need to fibreglass in steel or aluminium plate if there was ever anything to be attached that would be load bearing.

yes mate using self tappers, the hull is usually 7-10mm thick and theres 2 skins, if you accidentally drilled in the wrong spot or made a hole and dont need anymore, just use a soldering iron and melt the plastic over.
heres some railblaza installation videos on the smartwave 4200 (exact same boat as mine)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z52vgPsP2tM
in saying that, these boats come as a bare minimum sorta package and cant be compared to a similar tinny with all the storage options and the likes. i had to modify mine quite a bit to get me to where i wanted the boat to be. casting decks and storage mostly.

[yepi'mon]

yes mate using self tappers, the hull is usually 7-10mm thick and theres 2 skins, if you accidentally drilled in the wrong spot or made a hole and dont need anymore, just use a soldering iron and melt the plastic over.

Looks like a pretty neat alternative to a tinnie then!

[purple5ive]

yes mate using self tappers, the hull is usually 7-10mm thick and theres 2 skins, if you accidentally drilled in the wrong spot or made a hole and dont need anymore, just use a soldering iron and melt the plastic over.

Looks like a pretty neat alternative to a tinnie then!

yeah it is, see above i edited to add the video

[gregmaka]

yes you can buy tinnies of similar size for a lot cheaper. the smartwaves are cheaper than the polycraft boats though and lighter as well. but these boats are certainly not for you with a budget of 3k.
look around you will find something soon enough. if your on facebook then join the boats and boat parts buy swap and sell or similar pages, theres always cheaper boats in there.
if your around the frankston area then let me know, more than happy to take you out and give you a run down of whats involved in owning and operating a boat
cheers

Very good advice

[yepi'mon]

yeah it is, see above i edited to add the video

Cheers mate. Lucky for me we have actually got 6 rail blazers running of our boat so there is no need to upgrade or worry at the moment!

[Mallee]

Not sure if this is any good but looks like a pretty good set up but is a auction
https://www.ebay.com.au/itm/222461915324
Mallee