Please produce an Outback with a 360 drive!

I encourage the new owners of Hobie to produce an Outback with a 360 drive. A 360 Outback would be better than a 360 Pro Angler, and I think that there would be a big demand for a 360 Outback, for the following reasons: (a) A 360 Outback would be narrower and lower than a Pro Angler, and consequently would be faster, would have a smaller wind profile, and would be less work to pedal than a Pro Angler. I never use my 12' Pro Angler 360 for trolling because it's so much slower and so much more work to pedal than my 13' Revolution, particularly in waves and wind, and when moving from one place to another in my Pro Angler I always wish I was in my Revolution. (b) A 360 Outback would be lighter and easier to transport and launch than the Pro Angler 360 kayaks. I transport my 12' Pro Angler 360 on top of my vehicle, and most of the time I launch it from unimproved launch sites. I would far prefer to do those things with a 360 drive kayak with weight similar to or lighter than the weight of the current Outback. Keep it light! The pedal fishing kayak market is infested with way too many large and heavy mini bass boats. I think that most kayak anglers prefer light and easy to transport kayaks. (c) There are times when it is necessary or desirable to paddle rather than pedal a kayak, such as when going in and out through surf, and a 360 Outback would be much easier to paddle than the 360 Pro Anglers. The H-Rails and the steering mechanisms mounted on them make Pro Anglers cumbersome to paddle, and require the use of a very long paddle. Paddling a Pro Angler even a short distance between the shore and shallow water is slow and awkward, and using a paddle to launch and land a Pro Angler through waves or surf is challenging. The Outback is much easier to paddle than a Pro Angler. (d) A 360 Outback could be paddled with a normal length paddle, which could be bungied to the side of the kayak when it's being pedaled without dis-assembling it. The paddle required to paddle a Pro Angler is so long that it needs to be broken down after you paddle away from shore and clipped separately to the back of the kayak, and re-assembled when you need to return to shore, which is a hassle every time you do it. (e) It would be much easier to climb back into a 360 Outback from the water in a self-rescue situation than it is to climb back into a Pro Angler, because the gunwales of a 360 Outback would be lower than those of the Pro Anglers and wouldn't be obstructed with H-Rails.

The current Outback is only two inches narrower than a Pro Angler, so the width of the Outback shouldn't make it unfeasible to produce an Outback with a 360 drive.

I would be content with one without seat support and scupper cracks...

As someone who works in a Hobie dealership I think there are very few punters would spend the extra to get the 360 drive and I reckon Hobie know it. Escalating prices is already holding customers back. Don't hold your breath.

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Kayak Fishing Specialist: SLH
https://slhobie.com.au

I don't know what the "punters" are likely to do, but a lot of experienced kayak anglers, including me, have bought Pro Anglers with the 360 drive because it has some terrific advantages over the 180 drive. An Outback with a 360 drive would have a lot of advantages over the Pro Angler 360 drive kayaks, and based on the current manufacturer's suggested retail prices of the Outback, the 12' Pro Angler, and the 14' Pro Angler, an Outback 360 would probably cost about $1,000 less than a Pro Angler 360.