SEALINE S390

Is this crossover day boat' the finest to emerge from the modern Sealine stable? Alex Smith suspects it might be exactly that...

- Alex Smith

There’s a distinct trend going on in the day boating world – a trend toward spacious, versatile open boats that are also able to provide enough accommodation for longer family cruises. We’ve seen it in stylish cockpit-centric powerboats like Jeanneau’s DB line and in De Antonio’s high-volume outboard-powered party platforms. And those same basic crossover underpinnings are equally evident in Bill Dixon’s latest Sealine design.

For a start, there’s the beam. At 12ft 8in, the S390 is certainly quite wide for a boat of this length and the cockpit is carefully set up to embrace pretty much all of that. It uses a single access point on the starboard side to maximise the breadth of the aft bench. It also uses quite narrow bulwarks to maximise internal space and the hardtop is supported by a pair of stanchions that reach right out over the gunwales. The fact that there are strong steel bars inside these moulded uprights means they can afford to be very narrow too – and that’s in spite of the fact that the hardtop itself is quite a complex piece of kit.

In addition to speakers and spotlights, it provides a big sliding sunroof above the helm, plus an even larger retractable soft top that projects aft, above the bench, between a pair of rigid roof extensions. Unlike most sunshades, you can run with this out at top speed – and although (like most of the equipment on this boat) it’s an optional extra, it’s a fine feature and something a boat like Jeanneau’s DB/37 would do very well to emulate.