Stacer 489 Outlaw Side Console

Boats hitting the market fully optioned up often leave one breathless when the bottom line is realised but that's not the case with the Outlaw.
It has enough bells and whistles to keep an experienced boater happy and a price that puts it within reach of the newbie in the boating game.

The options fitted were the fully painted hull, custom vinyl wrap and bimini and its envelope. Without those trimmings the price comes back to an even more respectable $27,500 drive away.

The boat is fitted with mechanical non-return steering with a ratio of 4:1 and is supplied with two seats with swing backs for three seating positions on board.

The bow section is partitioned off from the forward casting deck by a carpeted plywood bulkhead and the forward casting deck and cockpit deck are manufactured from waterproof plywood covered with marine carpet.

This model Stacer features a lot of stowage under the casting deck which is accessible via four hatches. Two of them each side of the aft end of the platform swing outwards and extend down to the ribs whilst the larger in the middle has a rotaform insert that may be plumbed as a live fish tank. It has a slot in the fore and aft end of the moulded wall in which a removable board may be placed to baffle surging water and separate catches for tournament identification. The top edge of this bin has a surrounding lip which also turns down surging water reducing the amount that seeps out onto the deck.

The fourth hatch in the forward section of the platform uses the front of the fish tank as its back wall keeping your gear out of the wet bilge.

The three hatches are held down with elastic toggle cords that attach to plastic hooks fitted to the bulkhead supporting the platform. These hooks will be a pain for the fly fisher and will also will get knocked around or broken when ice boxes and other items are moving around the deck in rough seas. The forward compartment is secured by Velcro and these other hatches could be too, to alleviate the problem.

Two short side rails are fitted to the forequarter on the coaming and due to their short stature are more for manoeuvring the boat at the ramp and tying down gear such as crab pots to stop them bouncing around when underway.

Typical side pockets are attached to the hull in the cockpit and the console, which was a skeletal arrangement installed against the starboard coaming. The console was open fronted which would allow for a small ice or tackle box to be stowed in there to free up valuable cockpit space.

The face of the console was neatly arranged and fitted with a water resistant hatch to stow key fobs, mobile phones and the like. A Perspex wind deflector is mounted in a riser frame and stops short of the top rail which is handy for the skipper to hang onto when standing and underway.

The flat top of the console would easily accept a gimbal mounted marine electronics cabinet of around eight inches maximum.

The Outlaw features a rear casting platform with a large section of the deck sliding under stays in the starboard corner and is totally removable to expose the fuel filter. This available space would accept a 20-litre tote tank or a couple of small tackle boxes which will sit on the carpeted floor inside, up out of the wet bilge.

Central in front of the engine a smaller compartment has a hinged hatch which allows access to the crank battery and isolator switches and fuses. The battery is installed low down which will assist in lowering the centre of gravity to assist in stability.

In the port corner of the casting deck two hatches are found one of which allows two plastic tackle trays to be inserted sideways and the other features a plumbed live bait tank. These two compartments are moulded in one piece, and the section around the rim of the livebait tank is fitted with a rubber seal to prevent water ingress into the tackle draw department.

The hull topsides, bottomsides and transom are all 3mm aluminium and welds were typically ‘Stacer’ neat. The hull is built in Stacer’s Evo Advance style which incorporates smooth lines in the aft bottom corners where the sides join the transom. A short boarding step is welded onto the transom portside and the grab rail is incorporated with the rear passenger rail on the same side.

Two transducer mounting brackets on the bottom of the transom are standard fit.

The boat manoeuvred well at speed, and as mentioned earlier the steering was very acceptable in its performance.

We got the hull out of the hole and on the plane at 2000rpm with 5.8 knots on the GPS. A comfortable cruise speed of 17 knots had the two-stroke motor turning at 3000rpm. A faster cruise of 24 knots at 4000rpm will get you back to the ramp a little sooner and if dinner is on the table, WOT of 5800 will give you 30 knots.

The 489 Outlaw presents as a budget boat which is neatly finished in all aspects of its build. It sits nicely in the first-boat buyer’s market budget wise and in the retiree’s scope, size and performance wise. Yet another nice rig from Stacer and well worth a look.