Hey GS,

I can't really speak about Alumawelds, but I have had 2 Hewescrafts. I bought a new 179 Sea Runner in '01. I broke the hull when a weld on one of the stringers came loose and caused a 4 in crack . After several attempts to fix it, they bought the boat back and I stepped up to a 20ft Sea Runner in '03 that I still have today.

The 179 beat the cra* out of you with any chop at all. The 20 ft rides fantastic in comparison, and still does mid 30s with a 115hp Yamaha. It has great freeboard, and feel extremely safe. Both boats are difficult to balance the weight and ride funny at times, I'm told this is true with most aluminums. I installed hydraulic trim tabs and it made a world of difference. I strongly recommend them, truly the best $400 I have spent on the boat.

I will say that you might want to do some careful comparison of the accessories, however. I admit I am not the best at cleaning and maintenance, but I am not happy with the way the salt has affected everything from the pumps to locks and hinges and even steering cable. I have had to replace every pump ( bilge, livewell, washdown) and motors (wipers). The gas gauge never worked right and completely quit right after the warranty. The hinges on the doors and compartments are either loose or froze up. All the locks froze after the first year, even with regular cleaning and wd40. The seat swivels are rusted and they didn't use stainless nuts on the fuel vent fittings and the resulting electrolysis ate right through the aluminum diamond plate. I am not an expert on boats by any means, but it seems that the Hewes was built as a freshwater boat.

After I bought it I look carefully at some of the other boats, most notably the WeldCrafts, Thunderjets, Silver Streaks, and noticed their welds were a lot nicer looking and the grinding and finishing looked much better. The seats also looked heavier and hardware better quality. Any one here will tell you that all boats are time consuming and expensive to maintain, but I wish someone would have told me to look for some of these things before I plunked down 30 grand. If I was to do it again, I would be more picky, but at the time I was stepping up from a 13 ft livingston I had fished in for better than 10 years, and was very easily impressed.

I never really looked at the Alumawelds because I was looking for a deep Vee and smoother riding boat for the Sound, and the models I saw didn't seem to match up. I also like the safer feel of the higher freeboard in the Hewes.

Best of luck to you.