My local Hobie dealers (really anyone in Texas) have no ETA on getting a Lynx, and my 15 year old Revo is in desperate need of retirement, so I scoured the internet and found several places with stock, I picked the most reputable looking place with decent shipping fees and kicked off an order.
It took about a week to ship, then another week or so to arrive. Not ideal, but I can work with it. I got the Kayak, it was well wrapped in a white plastic with "do not forklift", "Fragile", "this side up" stickersall over it, and there was no visible scuffing or damage on the package. So I ripped that off, took off a layer of heavy cardboard and another layer of heavy duty bubble wrap and it was beautiful!
But then I noticed the Hobie stickers were all crooked and bubbled, I had a laugh that QA must have had an off day as misapplied stickers on a premium $2,600 kayak isn't really acceptable, but whatever I bought it for kayaking not for admiring.
I started rigging it up, and that was when I started to notice actual damage to the kayak.
A dent/crack near the front
A line of deformation along the base
and what looks like a long cut down the side in the plastic
I immediately contacted the dealer and we talked through the damage and we both agreed it was unlikely to be shipping damage as their would have been clear evidence in the packaging, especially the long gash in the last image. They contacted their Hobie Rep and Hobie came back just now saying that it was shipping damage. Now the dealer wants to claim it against freight, which I get, but unfortunately with nobody having stock, there doesn't appear to be a way to get a replacement without Hobie coming to the party and helping out (they have to have hulls for warranty replacement). It will also take weeks or longer to get a refund, and I have a week long kayaking vacation coming up on the 3rd Sept, so I'm without a kayak, and without the money to get a new kayak.
I have contacted Hobie directly as well, but so far have just gotten the "work with the dealer" response. I would love an opportunity to contest Hobie claim that its shipping damage based on how well packaged the kayak was, and no noticeable scuffing etc on the packaging itself, I don't see how that long cut/scrape could have been done through all the layers of packaging etc. I also feel that the stickers being all messed up, while although not being a big deal, is a sure sign there was no QA done on the kayak, so I don't think Hobie is in a position to claim it couldn't have happened at the factory.
Anyways, at the end of the day, all I really want is a functional Hobie Lynx that I can get years of fun out of, like I have its predecessors. Regardless of who is at fault, I believe the best thing for all parties would be for Hobie to send me a new hull, and then let the dealer, freight, and Hobie figure out who's going to pay for it. As far as I can tell, without that happening, I'll eventually get my money back but not have a kayak and have to wait until some time into 2022 to get the kayak that I paid for at the start of August, which just means I'll end up getting a not Hobie kayak instead and nobody is happy.
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