Nimbus C11 – Next Generation Commuter

While Axopar and Saxdor are snatching the headlines with their extraordinarily competitively priced outboard-powered sports boats, Nimbus has been, rather more quietly, building a tidy range of boats all of its own.

In fact, its entry-level T8 scooped the gong for Sportsboats & RIBs at this year’s Motor Boat Awards, but what we have here is at the other end of the scale entirely.

This here is the Daddy of the Nimbus sports boat range, complete with a fully enclosed wheelhouse and a pair of Volvo’s 4-cylinder 320hp sterndrive diesel for good measure.

It becomes evident immediately that this is no rival to the Axopar 37, even though with outboards they may appear natural competitors. This is a very different boat.

It’s more expensive, for a start, quite a bit more thanks to this one’s extensive specification but it feels a far bigger and more substantial craft – mainly because it is.

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The Nimbus C11 is a whisker over 40ft in length and nearly three tonnes heavier than the Axopar without either boat’s engines in the equation. This boat’s rivals do hail from Finland but they’re more likely to be a Botnia, Nord Star, or Sargo than anything Axopar currently produces.

The upright wheelhouse is unlikely to be bagging the Nimbus C11 too many beauty pageants any time soon but it certainly has a presence in the marina. The photographs don’t show it but there is more freeboard than you might imagine and it sits quite high in the water.

It is, being a Nimbus, incredibly practical and well thought out as well. There are guardrails all the way along with the side decks and wherever there isn’t a guardrail you can guarantee there is going to be a handhold.

Along with the side decks, there isn’t just the guardrail to cling on to but also a bar that runs the full length of the wheelhouse roof and a smaller grab handle on the cabin side doors to help slide them open and shut.

There is a double depth rubbing strake around the perimeter of the deck, which extends down to the fixed bathing platform to offer some protection close to the waterline.

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The side decks are deep and safe and there is bespoke storage for the boat’s fenders on the transom and a dedicated slot for the wooden boat hook outside the cockpit doors.

These are the sort of practical details that Nimbus’s designers chalk off in their sleep but they make life onboard so much easier.

Nimbus C11 specifications

LOA: 40ft 7in (12.4m)
Beam: 11ft 4in (3.46m)
Draught: 3ft 0in (0.9m)
Displacement: 7.7 tonnes
Fuel capacity: 850 litres
Water capacity: 135 litres
Test engines: Twin 320hp Volvo Penta D4
Top speed on test: 40 knots
Cruising speed: 20 knots
Cruising range: 223 miles
Noise: 74dB(A)
Fuel consumption: 51lph
RCD category: B for 10 people
Design: Nimbus