My opinion is the the Hobie mirage system is a wonderful invention. Believe it or not the greatest feature is seldom discussed, and few are even aware of the features existence. Around here the area is vast, the most fun areas are the backwater areas, and miles of mangrove tunnels leading to hidden lake and backwater areas. However at low tide the typical water depth is only 8-12” deep with lots of oyster beds everywhere. When we first started kayaking we used mostly recreational paddle yaks, we felt pretty safe staying a few hundred feet from shore, (only in protected back waters) and our typical outing was a 2-3 hrs, if I had to guess we would go 2-3 miles total, at the end we were typically very tired. I have a pretty bad back and the twisting motion of paddling was brutal on my back, ( even though I had spent most of my life canoing ever since boy scouts). We saw quite a few Hobies out there and talked to the people, they all said they loved them. So we bought a few Hobie mirage kayaks and fell in love with them. We were able to quadruple our range, weren’t afraid anymore to go a few hundred feet from shore, and extended our time out quite a bit without getting tired. However we were scared to death of the mirage drives in fear we were going to destroy them in shallow water. So in any water less than about 3 ft we pulled the drives out, (the absolute stupidest thing we ever did in our lives). In all the shallows and mangrove areas we had the mirage drives pulled, and laying by our feet, out of fear, and ended up paddling a lot. Whenever we beached the boat we always pulled the mirage drive, out of fear of damage. I don’t know a lot about the propel system, besides seeing a few, and watching videos. My opinion is you have a rigid frame with a delicate prop. So with that I would think the unit would be of little use in anything less than about 3ft of ‘known’ water, knowing if you come up on an unseen oyster bed the likelyhood of wrecking the unit is very high, same applies with mangrove roots and coral heads. One feature the propel promotes heavily is it’s ability to reverse, stating Hobie can’t do that, ( the older pre-2015 mirage systems). Well fact of the matter is across 8 different Hobies over ten years, ( going out every weekend year round), we pulled our drive out and flipped the drive around to use reverse twice, ( takes 20 seconds to flip the older drive around to use reverse). Either boat needs a pretty deep rudder so operation all day on say 8” deep water, your gonna be paddling all day, not even using these expensive units at all. For the next couple months we went out every weekend paddling our Hobies in the typical 8-12” of water with the mirage drives by our feet laying on the deck, thinking boy did we get ripped, ( lol).
Then I went onto this forum and learned from guys like Roadrunner and others, how to actually use the mirage drives. Turned out I wasn’t doing anything right, and didn’t understand the first thing about how to use the things effectively. Once we figured the darn things out, we found out we can use them in pretty much any water anytime down to around 6-8” deep. We even use the things in class two rapids, drag the boat over shoals, beach the boat, etc, etc. Actually we seldom remove the mirage drives at all anymore. Sure the mirage drives and the hull both look like they survived WW2, but both are way more durable and repairable than we ever imagined. All of our Hobies we purchased the big sailing rudder along with the boat, installed, then lopped off with a saw the entire bottom 5-6” of the rudder, so we can use the rudder even in 6” of water, ( no different from stock rudder functionwise). Next every mirage boat comes with a pedal bungy to force the fins against the hull, learn how to use it...( hint you can still pedal the mirage drives just fine with the bungy on). Next learn how to shallow pedal, ( the fins work like butterfy wings). Once you get good at it you can shallow peddle faster than you can paddle, and consume much less energy), in 8” of water. Anyone who goes on any of our kayaks get a 5 minute instruction on how to use the mirage drive properly, (lol), if they don’t listen I give them a paddle and put the mirage drive in the car trunk, here ya go, lol, ( they can be totally destroyed in about 5 seconds if used improperly), I’m sure the propel is exactly the same. Yes you are going to bend the fin rods once in a while, learn how to straighten them, the rods are a consumable item, and need replacing every few yrs. same with the fins, if used properly you will never rip any fins, ( we haven’t ripped any at all in 9 yrs), however they are also a consumable item, they get all stretched out and wavy after a couple yrs, time for new fins, (they are not expensive). Now lets talk energy consumption, endurance and possible distances. Believe it or not this has much more to do with the boat design itself than anything else. As an example I can pedal our TI kayak with just me pedaling, both me and wife aboard, ( she pedals very little) ten hrs up quiet rivers easily, but the TI is very long and narrow with a length to width ratio of 8 to 1, (really important measure), because the boat glides and tracks better than any kayak we have ever owned. At one time we both had revo 13’s, we couldn’t do half that distance. We can keep up with some high end sea kayaks, but most of the OC-2’s, (and many high end surfski’s) out there blow our doors off every time. But even stating that, the Revo 13 is still our favorite kayak of all time, (we just no longer use single kayaks at all, everything we own is tandem).
So if you have a fat short boat like a PA 14, your gonna expend a lot of energy whether you paddle, pedal with mirage, or pedal with a propel system, but then again the PA is the ultimate fish killer, definately worthwhile, but a different animal. In otherwords if your into distance pleasure stuff, (not talking about racing or too much about fishing here), a revo16, a TI kayak, or anything longer and more slender will do better than say a revo 11, outback, or PA. I would place the revo 13 right in the middle.
I know very little about Natives stuff, but would assume the same would apply, (skinnier/longer is usually better for touring, roughly speaking).
So in conclusion, on the surface the three systems seem comparable, ( paddle, mirage, propel). However once you understand all the ins and outs of everything, that mirage system is darn good, the high end sea kayaks in expert hands are darn good, you need to figure out for yourself where the propel system fits in.
Don’t do like we did, without knowing what we were doing, we thought we got pooped on with the mirage drive because we are mostly in very shallow water, but once we figured it all out, the mirage system ended up being superior to everything, ( who the heck knew, lol). My opinion is if your mostly lake fishing in fishing specialty kayaks in mostly deeper freshwater lakes, all three options will do the job, but that’s just my opinion.
We are also avid kayak sailers, and are mostly salt water and ocean folks, (keys and S Fl), Hobie is king of the hill here for anything and everything you can possibly imagine, ( and boy do we imagine a lot). Hope this helps FE
Edit: don’t get pooped on, ( lol)
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