Northbank 600C

When I first laid eyes on a Northbank 600C, I really liked the look of it, although the brand was new to me. I liked the way it was built and couldn't wait to get my hands on one.

Northbank's Victorian dealer, Craig O'Donnell, of BL Marine in Melbourne, provided the opportunity on an absolutely wild Port Phillip Bay day which restricted our testing somewhat but confirmed initial impressions that the Northbank brand is a good one.

The man behind the brand, Robert Cuming, tells me that Northbank has been around in South Australia for many years under the ownership of founder and builder Jaan Lindsaar who retired in 2003 and sold the business to Rob.

Jaan had been content to service the SA market but now Rob's gone nationwide, appointing dealers in every state to handle the five-model range from 4.9m up to 6.5m.

We tested the 600C on a wild Port Phillip Bay day and it handled the conditions with aplomb. Both the company's 600C and 650C were designed by naval architects using CAD/CAM technology. They're fairly beamy boats in the bow running back to a constant deadrise of 21º with twin strakes and a rounded keel. There doesn't appear to be anything radical in the hull design (no pod for example) but it works well in the rough stuff when driven sensibly.

BUILD QUALITY
The stand-out feature of the 600C is the way it is built. Like, solid as. Northbanks are built to survey standards, and can be built in survey for those who require that. For example, the bare boat weight is 1125kg approx, compared to most mass-produced boats of this size which usually come in at around 800–900kg. The upside of that is better performance on the water and the downside is that you'll need more horses to push it, a bigger fuel bill and a decent-sized 4WD to trailer it from here to there. This boat, fitted with a single 150hp Mercury on a dual-axle Dunbier trailer, weighed in at 1740kg. Add 160lt of fuel plus gear and you're going to be north of 2000kg on the road.

 Everything on the boat is strongly built, from sidepockets to bulkheads to deck to hardware. And it looks great too. The moulding is practically flawless and the gelcoat finish is first class.

A lot of thought has gone into the boat as well. For example, the fairlead is moulded to accommodate a Teflon strip to protect the gelcoat from anchor chain damage. The split bowpost is a hefty unit, strongly bolted to the foredeck. The side-opening anchor locker is huge and accessed through a four-latch smoked glass hatch in the cuddy foredeck, although an electric winch is a handy option. A split bowrail is solid. There is no access to the bow around the stylishly bubbled foredeck.

INSIDE LINE
The cuddy is very plain Jane but highly practical, with flowcoat on everything and no carpet. Two storage shelves on both sides are padded, the lower pair acting as backrests. There's a heap of shelving space, plenty of headroom, the hatch lets in plenty of light and bunk length is close to 2m. Bunk cushions are vinyl covered.

The cuddy bulkhead is massively strong, with a door opening in the centre. You have to duck a little to get into the cuddy because there is no central lift-up section in the dash, but by flipping back a carpeted deck lid between the two seats you step down into the cuddy footwell which makes access a little easier.

Instruments for the two-stroke 150 Mercury are mounted in a specially-moulded binnacle which also accommodates Navman Fish 4500 and Navman Tracker 5500 nav units. While a compass wasn't fitted to the test boat, there is space in front of the five-spoke stainless helm, which was a touch low in its mounting position.

The windscreen is five-piece wrap-around glass, with a grabrail across the front section only. Nevertheless, the whole set-up is very strong. Two short reinforcing rods from the dash to the centre screen panel also add strength. A bimini and clears complete the action station set-up apart from an aftermarket overhead rodrack which was far too flimsy for offshore work, and one imagines that's exactly where a boat of this type is going to spend most of its time.

NEAT TOUCHES
Both bucket seats were comfortable and swiveled, but there was no forward–aft movement. They were mounted on open sided pedestal boxes which had mouldings in the cockpit side for easily accessible fire extinguisher and EPIRB. Stainless bent-rail style footrests bolted to the bulkhead were well positioned but too smooth and slippery.

A feature of the Northbank is storage space and a glovebox in front of the passenger, with black acrylic lockable cover, is ideal for the smaller items such as car keys, sunscreen and glasses. A stainless grabrail is well positioned in front of the navigator's station with the GME Electrophone GX294 marine radio mounted beneath. A sliding cover protects it from the elements. While this radio position is not ideal for the skipper, it is within a reasonable stretch and can be read from the helm position.

The Northbank features huge sidepockets on both sides of the boat, with an additional metre-long one on the port side, and they are as solid as a rock. Everything in the cockpit is flow-coated with just a strip of grey carpet down the centre covering the aft-mounted fuel tank (160lt) and a huge wet storage or fish box forward of that. It will be easy to clean.

ROOM WITH A VIEW
The cockpit is large and uncluttered, with wide, flat gunwales and hip-high coamings which incorporate in-built stainless grabrails a metre long on both sides. Four quality rubber-insert stainless rodholders are good gear and there are two other light rodholders on the bait station. There are night lights on the coamings and transom and in the cuddy.

The cockpit sole has water dispersal channels down both sides draining into the bilge with pump. The battery and oil bottle are mounted on raised platforms off the floor, under the transom, and behind a canvas screen. For ease of refilling, it would be handy if the oil bottle had a filler hose built into the transom above it similar to the feed pipe for the fuel tank.

A feature of the larger Northbank boats is that you can order the transom of your choice, for either a single outboard, twins, or sterndrive petrol or diesel motors. The test boat had the transom built for twins but was fitted with only a single motor which looked very lonely in such a big space. The single motor transom has space for a livebait tank on one side and a door on the other, but the twin set-up has no space for either, which is disappointing.

The test boat was fitted with a small boarding platform on the port side with a fold-up ladder and grabrail.

PERFORMANCE
Port Phillip over near St Kilda was just too nasty to get the boat really flying, but a steady trip over to Williamstown found some better testing water and the Northbank handled very well indeed although a faulty speedo very much under-estimated our WOT which the manufacturer lists at around 72kmh. While I felt the 150 EFI Merc was adequate, pushing the boat on to the plane quickly, I did wonder how much better a couple of hundred horses would go behind this rig.

The Northbank sits flat and high in the water at rest, handled all tests really well, was stable and dry, and travelled very flat in the wind. There was no sign of leaning. Going hard into a headsea might make things a little lumpy but that's just a matter of backing off until you get comfortable. There was some water slap noise at speed (which perhaps some foam filling in the hull and sound-deadening carpet lining in the cuddy could eliminate) and we found ourselves having to shout to be heard over the two-stroke Mercury.

Despite these little nit-pickings, there's no doubt Northbank is a premium brand. It's in the market occupied by the popular and bigger volume sellers such as Seafarer, Haines Hunter, Haines Signature, Allison, Caribbean and others, but doesn't have the moulded linings and other fancy bits these craft can boast through mass production.

What it does have though is strength, fishability, ruggedness and finish, and will probably find itself in the serious fisho's niche market occupied by the likes of the Formula 21 and the Edencraft 6m.

Now wouldn't it be fun to get those three together in a comparo!


HIGHS