PARAGON 31
BUILT: 2011 PRICE: £145,000
LENGTH: 32ft 3in (9.8m) BEAM: 10ft 8in (3.3m) DRAUGHT: 3ft 6in (1.1m) Displacement: 3.7 tonnes FUEL CAPACITY: 450 litres ENGINES: Twin Volvo Penta D3-220 220hp
FOR SALE: Offshore Powerboats www.offshorepowerboats.co.uk
It’s no coincidence just how often the wildcard in this series hails from Scandinavia. Their boats are more tools of transportation than luxury playthings. It’s why the focus tends to be on functionality and build quality rather than style, which is why they’re just so darned rugged and useable. The Paragon 31 you see here (there’s also a smaller 25) is a case in point.
INTERIOR
Despite the open, walk-around decks, there’s actually a decent amount of space inside the Paragon 31. Centre stage is the wheelhouse with its sliding side doors and vertical wrap-around windscreen. There’s an L-shaped bench seat across the back and up the starboard side, the front of which swivels to become a navigator’s seat. And a table slides down a pole from the ceiling for dining. At each end are two cabins, a vee berth in the forward one and a useful single and double berth aft. There’s a small galley and a separate heads.
EXTERIOR
There are two versions of the 31, one with a flat topped wheelhouse roof and the other somewhat optimistically called the Flybridge. You won’t find any dinettes and wet bars up here, but perched on the trailing edge of the wheelhouse roof are a couple of seats and a surprisingly useful raised outdoor helm.
PERFORMANCE
We tested a Paragon 31 with the single diesel that Scandis prefer - in this case a Volvo Penta D6 370hp sterndrive unit. Progress was ‘swift and effortless rather than brisk’, however it still managed 36 knots and the twin D3-220 engines fitted to this boat ought to offer a little more poke, not to mention the redundancy reassurance of twins.
SEAKEEPING
A 24.5 degree deadrise and the certain knowledge that it was designed by Swedes to go fast almost irrespective of sea conditions provides immense (and entirely justified) reassurance. “You’ve got more chance of making a stone bleed than you have of getting a slam from the hull” we noted when we tested this model in 2010.