Here at Richardson Marine - our demo boats were always big offshore craft - which got used for everything from local snapper and crays to Queensland beach runs, 3000km away. But quietly the staff wanted something smaller and easier to launch - and not have to pay for it! As a result, we convinced Ed to approve an order for a 420 Renegade, fully specced out. And it was a success!
We wanted to make this boat stand out from the crowd; a showcase of what was possible here with our smaller boats. We chose to have the boat painted all through with Stealth Grey paint; a custom order which we had previously done for customers on other Quintrex boats. It looked sensational and stood out from the sea of white and silver Renegades on the water. Other factory inclusions on this hull were the 50L underfloor fuel tank (a must!), electric motor bracket, welded top decks and gunnels, and console rod storage. It also came from factory with a Telwater alloy trailer.
On the back of this boat went a Suzuki 50hp four stroke outboard - super reliable, efficient and with the perfect amount of power. There's plenty of debate in the 420 Renegade world about the right motor (they are Australia's best selling boat after all) - some dealerships whack motors on as small as 30hp to get them out the door cheap, and some enthusiasts run motors up to (and even over!) 100hp claiming factory ratings were way too conservative. From our experience, these hulls are fantastic with the factory max at 50hp - 60 would be good if you're loading the boat up and don't care about warranty. With a 50 fuel economy is great, the hull still hits 50km/h easily and all warranty is intact.
With this boat we wanted to showcase some of Garmin's electronics gear targeted at the inshore & freshwater markets. So up on the bow went the Force Kraken electric motor, with a 24V 50ah lithium battery. This combo had more than enough grunt for a hull of this size - and power usage was next to nothing - less than 30% of battery used for 2 full days fishing! We also added a Garmin LiveScope plus system with a Gaff Mann pole, and this ran into a Garmin Echomap 95SV UHD2 with a Berleypro visor on the front. On the console we had an Echomap 75SV - the one thing we'd change (and did change on the next build) was upping these screens to 12 or 16" up front and 9" on the console.
Railblaza helped us out and provided plenty of rod holders and star ports around the boat which proved very valuable when trolling for mulloway along the Glenelg River. Just a week after taking the boat out west for a fishing trip and photoshoot we had a keen customer in looking at the boat - and it sold a week later! And not long after that, we had another customer who saw the boat and wanted one of his own - so he ordered a matching one! We were stoked with the outcome of this boat and highly recommend the same setup to anyone with a generous budget looking to fully kit out the ultimate freshwater, estuary and inshore tinny.