Northcraft, opinions..

[johnskip44]

I looking for a decent boat that can take me round the Scottish Isles.
What are Northcraft like?? I understand they are built in the North East but maybe not so well known?
Any advice and experiences appreciated.

[A1an]

I have one, they aren't the Rolls Royce of Ribs but they serve a purpose, I'm quite happy with mine, the build quality is ok, they do have an issue with cracks around the transom but they are purely superficial, well, mine were and I've seen another couple of NCs with the same thing.

[Under the Thumb]

I absolutely love mine - 5.5m commercial wide body with a 150Hp opti. Its got lots of extra armouring on the tubes making them fairly bullet proof.

Fantastic seakeeping even in big stuff - especially when loaded up with 150+kg of racing marks and ground tackle. Comfy helm position

the big planing pad makes it ride really nicely, absorbing chop well and its great fun running down wind in big swell.

With the opti, it cruises at 35 kts doing 1.2Nm/Litre 45 is 1.0Nm/Litre and it tops out around 50. Does chine ride a bit over 45.

[Daibheid]

I had a 5.3 with a 90Hp 2 stroke on it. It was a nice quick boat with predictable handling and an ideal driving position with a single seat console. Very good deck space and under deck cabling kept it free of clutter.

I felt it was biased toward speed and economy with a relatively shallow V toward the back so plenty of acceleration/speed but a bit skittish over waves/chop. The positive side of that is it tended to skid out of a high speed turn on the limit rather than hook.

Not heavily built like a Humber/Osprey/Ribcraft etc but nicely finished. The transom top edge did develop superficial cracks that needed to be dealt with to avoid water ingress. The 5.3 was rated max 80Hp and that would be more than enough as the 90 was OTT unless well loaded up but a real hoot.