Right, here's a thread to post a few pic's and details of your boat with associated information. Maybe a bit about your boating, both now and through the years. We have a lot of talent on this forum recreationally and commercially.

The boat market is a massive and varied one in NZ due to the huge per capita boat ownership, and the many different types of boating scenarios we have.

So include a few photos, what you use it for, likes and dislikes, powerplants, and maybe a bit on boats owned previously.

A mini database that can assemble over time so anyone looking or considering buying a boat can refer to it as part of their decision process, and also just 'cause I like looking at boats lol.

Boat porn some may say.

Can be launches, runabouts, commercial, merchant navy, navy, yachts, jet boats, jet skis etc, if it floats, I'm interested.

It's not a pissing contest of any type, just info for all of us.

SAVAGE wrote on Mar 3^rd, 2013 at 11:33am:


lol, I 'll dig out some pics later today

Great boats, SENSATIONAL resale value.

Here's mine:



Marco 440 dory - 30 hp tiller steer evinrude etec. Great little boat, can launch and retrieve it anywhere you can get the trailer to. Great little inshore boat, with high gunwales and a beam of over 2m. Etec great reliable engine and starts first pull every time. My first boat and was bought on a budget.
Has had some bigger trips including great/little barries, curvier, mercs, far north, east cape.

Love it as it tows well and can be hand launched if required, fishes two blokes with dive gear etc perfectly.

My 14ft sea nymph fibreglass runabout.





55HP johnson seahorse, circa 1979 
I added the 5HP yamaha and this has seen more use than the johnson, trolling around the lakes and harbour.

Additional features include:
-1970's orange plastic decor
-bait board made from scrap wood and two hose clamps.
- ski pole
- Speedo that constantly reads 55
- jacket for when its raining
- sunglasses for when its sunny


Awesome wee boat, bought on a whim for loose change a couple of years ago it has never missed a beat. Uses less fuel than your nana's shopping cart and tows like a dream. Will also pull a 100kg wakeboarder. Great for a couple of guys + gear to get away hunting and fishing the lakes. Have taken a few blue cod off the coast, just have to pick your days and get up early.   

This is SNAFU (Situation Normal All f*cked Up) It's an 05 Polycraft (plastic) 4.5m center console, pushed by a 50hp 4/ Honda.





Has an inbuilt fish bin under the bow seat:



Nav lights, stereo, VHF, fish finder ect

Requirements when i brought it.

* Small enough to launch and retreive on my own but big enough to fish 3-4 people if needed.

*I wanted to get something late model that didn't need any work, so i could get in and go fishing straight away.

This ticked all the boxes and some.

By the time i'm ready to upgrade, this will fit on the bow of the new boat as the tender  .

Anyway, heres my wee water history and boat ownerships.

I was pretty lucky - the  old man, prior to settling down had been a navigator in the merchant navy, so boat ownership of ssome sort growing up was almost compulsory.
I'm well into my 40's now. My folks still reside in the same property they did when we were growing up, on the edge of the Manukau in Hillsborough. With a young family, mortgage and single income, money was tight in the early 70's, so as many did then, or moreso than today, we always built our own dinghys. Well lets be accurate here, the old man did, whilst I no doubt just made an arse of myself and messed up his workshop. I struggle to find any pics of the old dinghysnow but I am sure they are in the folks albums somewhere here....anyway, fun days with a great dad that made sure boatmanship was taught from an early age. It was row only..............again for Dad, under my supervision however and skilful pre schooler guidance.

We would row out on the Manukau most weekends and fill an old hesian sack - mullet and trevally were the only baits we knew back then.



We hit the big time one day though when Dad came home with an old seagull outboard that was gifted to us..........what a thing of great beauty I remember that allowed more fishing time and less travelling time, even if starting it was the first time I remember hearing my old man swear, and when finally started it made more noise than Sue Bradford after a benefit cut.

The real big time however was hit when I was about 8 or 9 from memory when we got a Marlborough 13'6" hull. This was paradise, with bigger longer missions, even if the old 25hp evinrude was a bit light and unreliable and saw us under tow on more than one ocassion. Outboards in the early 70's weren't the most reliable beasts.
In between this the sailing bug hit a wee bit and Paper Tigers or Hobie 16's were the preferred rigs, with racing of both for local clubs. We built the paper tigers. There was also plenty of time and holidays with the old riveted parkercraft on the roof



My first real 'own' boat was as a late teenager and was  a 13 ft Boston Whaler with cathedral hull.  What a pig, well, lets just say it probably got pushed and used well beyond its intended design, and was finally swapped for an old valiant car when the motor detonated by the Noises one day and we got towed in by Coastguard.
My next boat was a Haines Hunter v163. This came with an Old  Johnson on the back, a delaminating hull, and shocking trailer, but at 20 years old I was king of the ocean. Looking back now where i Itook that thing I shudder again, but it was a great wee boat. If you hit a big wave the floor would lift away. The whole thing was rotten. I don't think I would ever go over the bar again in such a beast!!In fact on one bar crossing I fell against the remotes and the whole thing fell apart and the motor died - we had to hotwire the old tub whilst bobbing around on the bar in a decent sized sea.......ended up spending a completely stupid amount of money on the hull and then I put a 115 suzuki on the back. I never forget chine walking at 50mph completely out of control under the Harbour Bridge. Good performance for their length,but prone to being a bitrolly, and also had quite a llow transom resulting in wet stuff over the back. They als came out in a cabin version ( 163C ) but itresulted in a very tight work area



Into my mid 20's and doing a fair amount of scuba teaching in the Bay of Islands, I bought a large Chris Craft center consol with 140 johnson on the back. It was a great load carrier, but was an evil flat bottomed thing that saw you come back 2 inches shorter every time. But for its purpose as a dive boat it was great, and again we took it places and did things to it that would have curdled the manufacturers blood. 80km off the mankau bar through to the same distances off Cape Brett and everything in between. Savages brother spent many hours on this waka as well. I sold this boat to help fund the building of a house. As a flat water boat in the tropics it would have been great, realistically here it was a pig.






With the diving addiction passed and a change in occupation it was decided to start heading bigger again, but this time with a BIG improvement in comfort and most importantly blue water handling, and duly purchased a Haine Signature 2050. this was, and still is I understand a great boat. It came with a 200hp Mercury though which was a gas monster, and a big days gamefishing was 200 litres. So I repowered with a 150 honda, which are sensational bullet proof fuel sippers, and enjoyed many hours on the briny.





With a 200hp laying around we pimped it and strapped it onto a Sonic hull and raced Sports Restricted class for a few seasons. The time involved and more importantly a rooted back saw me give this away though and sponsor another driver into the boat. Thinking I was going to die for an entire hour every fortnight soon wore off as well..........



With the 'hurdle' of the initial years of young kids behind me, and an understanding cook, I sadly  let my Haines Signature go to a good home and purchased my latest boat, Pork Hunt, a 660 Kiwikraft from Invercargill. I love this boat, it has sensational bluewater performance and stability when required. negatives would be like any pontoon it lacks some internal beam space, but that aside it is a great boat. If I was going to go pontoon, it had to be deep V as alot of my boating is offshore and I wanted the best ride possible. Stability at rest is a given with any pontoon, so it was ride quality that I focussed on. For me personally it came down to Osprey or Kiwikraft, and the Kiwikraft simply appeared at the right time. Really, in NZ we are spoilt anyway, with Stabi, Senator,Profile, Aqualite, and the twobrands mentioned al pumping out quality products. Matched to a 225 Honda it has no end of power and load carrying ability and a massive ( 12 hours ) gamefising is 130 litres, and thats with a decent run to and from the grounds. It tows with a my 3litre diesel turbo surf and has a high quality build level. I don't really think there is such a thing as a good looking pontoon  boat on the market of any type yet, but for me, purchasing a boat is about ride quality and build quality and functionality for intended purpose - if it looks pretty thats just a bonus, but NEVER the reason I buy aboat - mixed obviously with budget.

7 meter custom built Sea Rider 1999, on it's second motor