When you tour the temperate Australian coastline and turn off the well-trodden highway to visit one of those quaint fishing villages - something like the one made popular in Sea Change - chances are you will find a boat similar to this from Excalibur, a small custom builder in Sydney.

While Excalibur calls it a 5.8 Half Cabin, to my mind it is a wheelhouse configuration. The wheelhouse is a timeless design and always a big hit with serious fishers. The reason is simple: the layout offers protection from the elements, and not at the expense of cockpit space.

The Excalibur 5.8 is the kind of boat I would expect to see with LFB registration and a rough-around-the-edges pro fisho at the helm. You can picture it crossing a river bar at dawn, or surfing the back of a breaker at midday, with a catch of mackerel, crays or snapper aboard.

I can see the boat working out of fishing ports from Coffs Harbour to Bermagui, Western Port to the SA gulfs, Freo and Darwin. Having said that, the boat was released at the Sydney International Boat Show last year. Since then it has been a hit with city anglers, who can also appreciate the virtues of a wheelhouse.

CHOICE YOURS
Unlike the big production boatyards, Excalibur is a custom builder who will work with the owner to meet his or her specific needs. The boat's purposeful lines were in this instance made all the more appealing by a custom two-pack black paintjob. Of the several Excalibur boats I have seen, this is the best looking.

This boat's elevated dash is a change from the norm, as is the lockable side rod-pocket and aftermarket Humminbird GPS chartplotter/sounder, marine radio and Hydrive hydraulic steering. In fact, the owner of this boat even had the powerplant, a 115hp Mercury outboard, retrofitted.

Without all the fancy frills that can add a motza to the end price, Excalibur boats lend themselves to retrofitting and home fit-outs. Bare hulls are available and at least one owner has performed an apparently impressive backyard blitz on a bare boat. Food for thought.

A TOUGH NUT
Proprietor Frederick Gautschi and his chief welder, Doug Gray, have been making boats, boat additions and repairing other people's mistakes for some years now. They don't seem to get sidetracked by the minutiae or the aesthetics so much as the strength and integrity of their work.

Robust 5mm-thick aluminium sheet is used for the Excalibur 5.8 Half Cabin's undersides, 4mm for the hull sides, and 3mm for the cabin superstructure. Underfloor there is a gridlock system comprising interlocking bulkheads and stringers fashioned from extruded aluminium.

The one-piece subframe is joined to the hull with alternating welds to help create a stiff boat. The deck is added with continuous welds and capped with an extruded gunwale section of unpainted alloy - no need to worry about scratches when you brush up against a jetty pylon.

The underside of the boat from the bow to a metre short of the transom is fitted with a sacrificial aluminium rubbing strip. Underfloor voids, especially in the bow, are foam filled to the point of positive foam buoyancy, claims Gautschi.

On the one occasion he left a bung out of a boat while it was tied to a wharf, it sunk. But, hey, it dropped just 7.5cm below its normal trim level. And the powerhead was well clear of the water.

HULL OF A TIME
The hull shape is tried and tested on past models, although there is a shift away from fitting running strakes or sprayrails following extensive study of running footage. Interestingly, the camera boat during my test was another 5.8m Half Cabin but with the sprayrails and strakes.

Because the wheelhouse is located well forward, both boats fared well in the spray department. Add a wiper or some Rainex to the windscreen, and you should be able to button the bow down, charge into a windblown headsea, and throw as much spray around as you want without getting wet.

An efficient boat, the Excalibur 5.8 glides to planing speed almost imperceptibly. The moderate-vee hull has a flattish run aft, with 14° of deadrise at the transom. It's eager to plane and happy to hold low planing speeds.

But if you can keep the hull in the water, the sharp bow buttoned down and the forefoot working through the waves, you will achieve a smooth cruise. True, the sea was calm, but the boat was also impressive during my offshore sortie east of Botany Bay. And it got me through a weird sea fog reminiscent of the Bermuda Triangle.

At rest, the boat's wide beam - 2.40m overall and 2.20m at its widest point at water level - and flattish run aft deliver exceptional stability. With two adults leaning into the gunwales, which are higher than most boats for added security, the hull heels only gently.

It's my guess that three adults could drift fish off one side of this hull without the boat listing alarmingly. According to my trusty tape measure, the cockpit from the back of the wheelhouse to the transom corner is 2.35m long. Lots of fishing room, indeed.

DECKED OUT
Most of the boat's heavy-duty hardware is fashioned from welded, unpainted aluminium including a split bowrail and bowsprit and grabrails. The sidedecks are topped with non-skid and, using the handrails on the hardtop, you can walk around the boat quite safely at sea. Or at least I did.

There were four plastic rodholders, plus bollards standing proud of the aftdecks, but only a lightweight plastic cleat on which to tie off the anchor. The fold-down boarding ladder and removable berley pot to port on the transom were clever additions.

The aft-quarter decks had recessed bait bins, each of about 35lt capacity, that drain into the enginewell. The port side bin was plumbed with a water scoop and pump, so you can carry livies. There was a little deckwash hose, too.

The flat floor is covered in a marine-grade carpet that, sensibly, isn't glued down. The removable carpet makes post-fishing clean-ups, accessing the bilge and pump under the enginewell, and getting to the underfloor fuel tank that much easier.

The 140lt fuel tank is situated behind an aluminium panel that's pop-riveted in place. The tank is baffled, built to survey standards from 4mm aluminium, and connected to a water separator, single deck filler and one breather. Long-range fishos might carry a 25lt remote fuel tank or two.

I like the fact that the weight of dual batteries was spread evenly between each aft corner. And I like the idea of the central underfloor fishwell with a bung that drains overboard, even if it was on the small side. Measuring 900mm long, it will come in handy as a small fish box — think flathead, King George whiting, school mackerel, that kind of thing. A portable icebox would be useful.

Fitted with spigots, the removable cutting board over the enginewell has two additional rodholders and, importantly, room for the outboard to tilt underneath. Anglers will also be impressed by the clear access to the transom corners, rod clearance around the motor and big sidepockets.

This boat also had an interesting lockable sidepocket/rod locker, so the owner could park the rig and not worry about his outfits going walkabout. (After a good day's fishing, I hear he drops into the pub to brag of his catch and sample a pot or two ...)

Despite having to go through the cabin hatch, anchoring this boat isn't a hassle. The cabin itself is quite roomy and when you stand on the internal platform you get plenty of support on your thighs when you reach overboard. It's only a short stretch to the open anchorwell. The cabin rails come in handy for bracing.

I also noted a good amount of buoyancy in the bow sections for pulling a pick without shipping water. The boat's high internal freeboard of 750mm and deep enginewell help keep the boat dry when reversing out a fouled anchor.

CABIN OPTIONS
The hardtop is adorned with navigation lights, an overhead anchor light, GPS and marine radio aerials, and handrails. Off its trailing edge, a useful rocket launcher carries eight outfits. There's room to fit outriggers on the side of the cabin superstructure should a bit of marlin fishing be on the cards.

In the wheelhouse you get 1.95m of headroom and - full marks for this - space for three people to ride side-by-side. A big grabrail on the full-width dash keeps the third crewman from falling all over the place. The wide beam and open bulkhead also create unfettered access to the cabin.

A number of cabin layouts are available with more room or less room given over to storage or berths, depending on what you want. This boat had a V-berth with unfinished marine ply lids and lifejackets inside. But add upholstery and infill and you have room to doze between strikes.

As it was, two or three anglers could sit inside and escape the weather. Headroom and a deep footwell helped with the seating. A home handyman might add storage pockets, a cover over the dash to protect the wiring, a light or a stereo.

WAVE RIDER
While the helm seating is another personal choice, the arrangement on this boat worked well enough. The fold-down swivel seats are bolted to storage boxes welded to the floor, each with a five-tray tackle box, a recess for a fire extinguisher or EPIRB, and shelves for holding hardware.

The full-width dash has a glovebox and a big grabrail, a Mercury trim gauge, and tacho, hour and fuel meters - all on an upright panel. There were switches for lights, bilgepumps and bait tanks off to one side. The wheel was a budget plastic model, but at least it and the throttle fell to hand.

There was enough legroom to drive this boat standing and good vision when seated, too. Fore and aft footrests add to the comfort levels when you are facing back down the wake. But I would ditch the perspex windscreen panels and replace them with armourplate glass, add a sliding side window or hatch for fresh air, and a wiper for all-weather boating.

The Mercury 115hp was more than a match for this boat, although it could have gone down a notch to give a more complete trim range. With the leg fully trimmed in, the boat rode a whisker deeper than level. Once you got the forefoot working, the ride into a headsea was really quite good.

At 1000rpm, the four-cylinder outboard propelled the boat to 8kmh. At 2000rpm it sat at a trolling speed of 12kmh. Offshore lure trolling at 15kmh or between 2200-2400rpm was hard to maintain due to a sticky throttle and the boat's sudden urge to plane.

At 3000rpm with negative trim, the boat holds a heavy-weather cruising speed of 25.5kmh. By 3500rpm, the engine was sounding much smoother and the boat was settling down to a flatter trim angle. The cruise speed was 38kmh at these revs, 42kmh at 4000rpm and 45kmh at 4200rpm.

You can use more out-trim the faster you go on flat water, as the boat seems to run flatter and lift around the transom with more speed. It rode well at 4800rpm and 55kmh and felt fast and flighty at full revs of 5400rpm and 60.2kmh, according to the Garmin GPS.

I had the impression that the Excalibur 5.8 Half Cabin was at home in the deep blue, gadding about a lazy sea, running this way and that, cruising at 40kmh or trolling with skipper and anglers hidden in the wheelhouse.

With armourplate glass you have a boat for bar crossings, too.

While the package price is attractive at $38,000 drive-away on a tandem trailer with a 115hp Mercury outboard, you could make this boat even more pleasant by fitting a four-stroke outboard. Boy, do I hate those fumes sucking back into the wheelhouse.

But I would also like to try the next size up, the 6.5m Excalibur with a wheelhouse, powered by a diesel MerCruiser inboard. Even those snaky old pro fishers with seat hanging out of their pants would bite at that one. I wait with bated breath.