People don’t generally associate Ribs with fishing, their perception is that the hooks will puncture the tubes. One man Hamish Currie has disproved this theory, Hamish who runs one of the top charter angling businesses in Ireland has just taken delivery of his new purpose built 10 meter rib.
This new rib replaced his previous 9m rib which Hamish has fished for the past six years. In that time Hamish has customers from all over Europe and has been the top Irish specimen boat for the last five years. Last year Hamish’s rib caught one hundred and thirty nine Irish specimens and the heaviest Irish & British skate at 247lbs.
Having worked his old rib for six years Hamish decided to order a purpose built rib, putting his experience and needs to the team at Red Bay Boats, we came up with what we feel is the ideal charter angling boat.
The first advantage of the rib is that there is no sideways roll as the tubes touch the water at rest this cuts out the sickness that many anglers experience on a rolling hand sided boat. The next advantage is the low horse power required to push the boat. Hamish boat is fitted with a single 285hp Yamaha diesel stern-drive at 18 knots his fuel burn is 20 litres per hours. This gives him a range of 400 miles and at top speed of 28 knots.
So the design spec of the new boat is as follows – 10 meter overall, with a beam of 3.5m, self draining deck complete with twin stern scuppers extra D-fender and cladding, heavy duty tubes with 3 compartments per side. Island wheel house with seating for ten persons and helmsman Fish hold/storage lockers and stern, sealed engine box all with reinforced lids for added fishing space 1m high side deck and rails large bow storage locker with anchor and rope storage in the very bow. Hamish carries 1500ft rope and anchors in 400ft of water so with the bow storage he can haul his anchor from deck level! The wheelhouse features two Seaglaze sliding doors, with a separate toilet on the starboard rear. The off-set forward console houses the Garmin 12’ plotter complete with depth and radar, stern camera, Garmin VHF, 2nd Garmin fish finder and sound system, under console there are storage areas for the various bits of fishing tackle needed to catch large fish, weights, traces etc. In order to get enough walk round space round the wheelhouse Red Bay opted for a D section tube, this enabled us to mould a straight side and deck encasing the tube, the result a full walk around boat with 23.5 meters of fishing space on a 10m boat this is exceptional. Rods are stored above the cabin roof along with the liferaft, boat hook etc. < /br> < /br> < /br> < /br> The Yamaha stern-drive is fitted with twin props for max drive and grip, the leg can be trimmed up for shallow work and ease of launching and recovering. Hamish hauls his rib each day with the aid of a special drive in trailer. Hamish believes his boat to be the best angling boat available, the large fishing space, lack of roll, ease of running, excellent sea keeping range and the fact that the boat can’t sink would indeed all add up to the perfect angling rib.
For more details and photos visit www.redbayboats.com and www.predatorireland.com. If you would like to try Hamish’s boat then send redbay an email.
The boat is coded to mca: Cat 3.
