Haines Hunter to launch Southern Formula boat brand

The parent company of Haines Hunter, Maritime Global Pty Ltd, is preparing to release a new fishing trailerboat brand called Southern Formula. The Southern Formula range will start with the V15 and V17, include the V19 and V21, and top-out with the V234, which we recently saw in build and show as a 'plug' above.

Must of the boats will be runabouts with small cuddies — although it’s really more of a cabin on the V234 as we saw it as a scale model and as a mock-up hull well under way — and there is also talk of producing centre console models.

The new boats will be based on deep-vee hulls with flared bows and sides, wave-breaker moulded ‘windscreens’ and cool old-school lines that are very much back in vogue with hardcore fishos these days.

Registering the brand name Southern Formula, Haines Hunter principal John Haber says he will be keep his banner brand completely separate to the new range also built at the same Derrimut yard in outer Melbourne.

Haber told us the idea behind Southern Formula is quite different to buying a turnkey premium Haines Hunter boat with all the bells and whistles.

The new pared-back brand and boat range will have basic hulls with flow-coated interiors upon which buyers can add extras or DIY the fitout using either supplied parts or those sourced themselves.

We are told there will be limited dealers selling the complete Southern Formula boats — Phil Pierias from Port Phillip Boating Centre will be offering them with Yamaha power — leaving most buyers with the option of fitting out a factory joined hull and deck with windscreen or moulded wavebreak and little more.

OLD SCHOOL STYLING
"We have combined the old school Haines Hunters and their look with our new model designs made to carry four-stroke outboard engines. A lot of the old boats weren’t designed around the four-stroke engine technology. Our boats will have a bit more volume around the aft sections to float the four strokes," explains Haber at his factory.

He said as a result of that, the new Southern Formula boats will be roughly 20-30 per cent more fuel efficient than their predecessors due to the superior hull designs.

"We are going to go with the traditional 21 degrees of deadrise, some will have planing planks and some will not, they will have reverse chines and strakes. They will be more stable than their predecessors," Haber adds.

THE NEW 234 FORMULA
When we saw the 234 hull in build we were blown away. This is a cool looking retro Formula-looking hull with extensive flare in the bow that extends to the old-school flared hull sides. It was a very pretty creation in the making.

"The new 234 is a beamer and drier boat [than the Formula 233], with a Carolina bow with a huge flare," Haber tells us, as he takes us on a tour behind the scenes.

"There’s more dash space, more fuel, higher horsepower ratings, bigger underfloor kill tanks, bigger live bait tanks, with a no-frills uncluttered interior.

"It’s a more commercial finish for the hardcore. Because a lot of the guys that will use these boats are exactly that.

"They’ll be bashing them around and crashing through. And it will be priced well in the market," Haber adds.

The Southern Formula boats will also be fully foam filled with the yard’s new underfloor matrix stringer system. The range will be mainly bespoke or built to order at the factory.

Altough the Southern Formula boats are slated for a release later in 2017, we will also add this is very much a work in progress and changes are being made as the concepts, drawings, designs, plugs, hull moulds and boats ultimately evolve.

The new Southern Formula brand to cater for keen fishos who might otherwise rebuild an old boat is part of the big plans of the Melbourne boatbuilder.

Haines Hunter says it had a great Melbourne boat show with the release of its new
Haines Hunter 700 already accounting for more than a dozen sales.

Meantime, you can check out some 300 Haines Hunter boats listed for sale on our sites with this Haines Hunter search. And if you want to sell an old rig, ads for boats up to $7500 are free on our sites.