Caravelle’s Interceptor 232 Offers Good Value for the Money

Tested By Capt. Bob Smith

Every Caravelle features wood-free construction, including seat bases throughout the craft insuring years of trouble-free use. Even the stringer system is all fiberglass. Closed cell foam is injected between each stringer further increasing support and durability. TCS 6000 resin completes the Total Composite System producing one of the finest gelcoat/resin combinations in the industry. Caravelle’s high performance XPV extended running surface, pad bottom, deep-vee hull delivers great low speed performance and high end handling.

Bow Features

Starting up front our test model had a pop-up cleat up front for handling the anchor rode or docking lines as well as a stainless steel wraparound rub rail to protect from accidental dock strikes or when rafted up with friends. Bow seating wraps from a port lounger back all the way around to a matching lounger back on the starboard side. Lift up the hinged seat on the port side and you will find a finished compartment that is also insulated to become an ice chest for keeping cold beverages up front for these riders. Lift off the bow seat and you have a space for storing the anchor and rode along with clips to hold a standard Danforth style anchor. Flip up the hinged bow seat and you find a carpeted compartment for keeping gear stowed up front. There is a cup holder just ahead of the windshield on each side for the forward riders. The walk through is plenty large for everyone to easily get from the cockpit forward.

Behind the Wheel

The helm has a color coordinated Dino sport wheel with tilt adjustment. Just to the left of the wheel is a 12volt socket to charge up your cell phone or portable gear like a GPS. Rocker switches have red night lights for easy identification in the dark, and even the Faria gauges have been color coordinated to match the boat’s scheme. Instrumentation includes a digital depth gauge to the right. The rest of the switches are to the right of the wheel along with a cupholder for the driver. I particularly enjoyed the Zero Effort throttle and shifter on this model. Be careful and practice with these before you actually use them. If you haven’t had them before it is easy to get confused at a critical time and use the throttle for the shifter.

Spacious Cockpit

A wide opening floor hatch gives you access to a padded floor storage compartment for long and bulky items like boards. The bucket seats on this boat were great, and featured leaf spring suspension, ventilated backs and adjust for swivel and slide positions. The navigator also gets to be the DJ as the stereo is on their side. In my case it was a Sony satellite ready system with CD player just below the grab bar. Wraparound seating fills the stern for more family and friends on board, and of course, there is more storage under the benches.

At the Transom

You get a large sun pad at the stern of this boat that doubles as the engine hatch. The stern navigation light clips under the hatch for easy location when you need it. We also had an extended platform on this model with pop up cleats and a low center tow eye for skiing. A long reach three-step boarding ladder should make it easy for everyone to climb back on board from the water. Caravelle offers three separate graphics packages with three different color schemes for the Interceptor 232 this year.

Performance

The Caravelle Interceptor 232 Bowrider measures 23 feet in length overall and has a beam width of 8 feet 4 inches. Her dry weight is approximately 3,500 pounds, and this model has a standard 36 gallon fuel tank. I tested the Interceptor 232 on Lake Blackshear in Southern Georgia in the early fall. It was a foggy calm day which gave us a chance to really see how she performed in turns and hole shots.

The Interceptor 232 did not disappoint us on test day. She delivered a smooth dry ride and cut tight corners that will make your skiing partners smile. She was out of the hole in only 3.3 seconds, and she was traveling up to 30 miles per hour in only 6.6 seconds. I found her best cruise speed to be about 34.3 miles per hour which will give you about 128 miles on a full tank of fuel. Wide-open-throttle speed was achieved at 57.1mph. Our test boat was equipped with the Corsa selectable exhaust system. Even with the exhaust open, sound levels didn’t exceed 92 dBa.

If you are looking for a high performance, family and friends ski boat and appreciate the value of no wood construction, then you really should take a closer look at this new model from Caravelle, which I feel is going to be very popular on the lakes this year.

• Top speed for the Caravelle Interceptor 232 is 57.1 mph (91.9 kph), burning 20.3 gallons per hour (gph) or 76.84 liters per hour (lph).


• Best cruise for the Caravelle Interceptor 232 is 34.3 mph (55.2 kph), and the boat gets 3.94 miles per gallon (mpg) or 1.68 kilometers per liter (kpl), giving the boat a cruising range of 128 miles (206 kilometers).


• Tested power is 1 x 300-hp MerCruiser 350 MAG MPI.