Ally Craft 610 Coastal

Ally Craft is a long-established and well-respected boat brand in Australia, competing strongly in the crowded aluminium boat market. Its new 610 Coastal will only cement its reputation for designing and building a great boat as we discovered recently on Deception Bay, Queensland.

The large cuddy cabin offers a spacious vee-bunk area for two and an infill in the footwell increases creature comforts. Three could sit upright without a problem. The cushions are separate from the lids which sit over stowage areas in the bunks, and entry to and from the cabin is easy enough for a big person. The cabin hatch opens aft and rests on the screen. From this position one felt safe working the ground tackle, which was within easy reach.

The helm features a neat fibreglass fascia inserted into an aluminium half bulkhead extending down from the dash. It consists of gauges for the big 140hp Saltwater Mercury and Eagle depth sounder. Available space for other instruments in the fibreglass fascia will be a little tight, but large cabinet-type electronics have plenty of room on the top of the dash. The helm sports an Admiral HyDrive Hydraulic unit and this was comfortable to operate right through the boat's speed and turning range.

NEW DIMENSION
This rig is big on beam and offered very good stability when moving around the cockpit with a couple of people aboard. Stability will increase once you put a bit of gear, a load of fuel and a couple of fishing buddies aboard, and the rig sits a little lower in the water.

 Standing at the transom, the battery and oil bottle shelf was low to the floor and it would be impossible to get the arches of the feet under it when fishing if the collapsible rear lounge was removed. Rubbish getting under here would be difficult to remove as well.

A polycarbonate door allows access through the transom bulkhead and out onto the full floating pod that features a drop-down ladder.

Spacious carpeted deck in the cockpit allowed for plenty of fishing room and four anglers could bottom fish from this boat with ease. The big sidepockets would hold plenty of gear; for example, spare bottom rods, handlines, landing nets, gaffs and bottles of water.

PERFORMANCE AND HANDLING
The Mercury blew this boat out of the hole effortlessly and it quickly attained its top rev-range of 5800rpm, at which time the handheld GPS reported speed over ground as 72kmh - and handy top-end speed for such a big boat. Trimmed out a bit, it offered a soft ride over an annoying short, sharp chop generated by 20kmh south easterlies.

Trimmed in for hard turning at speed there was no evidence of cavitation and steering was very direct. It felt very light and danced a little when trimmed right out, but then we were running on a near empty fuel tank with nothing but safety gear aboard. Point and shoot with this rig.

The passenger-side grabrail on the dash was a long way forward - too far in fact for the passenger at the time - and the only other options were to hang onto the canopy struts, which would suffer the bends with time. A few more grabrails and sliding seats in this rig might alleviate some of these issues.

The canvas work for the canopy was good quality though I would have liked to see a grabrail on the top of the screen to which the top could be attached. It felt a little flimsy when you needed to hold on to something for support. As an all-round family boat offering a good mix of cockpit space, shelter, and ease of operation in an affordable package, the Ally Craft 610 is well worthy of consideration.

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