Anyone else had a spine failure?

I bought my Lynx mid-2022 and have been quite happy with it. But in that first season I heard some creaking coming out of the drive. I always followed every instruction about rinsing it in fresh water and using lubrication at all the proper points but it came and went the rest of that first season.

In its second season it got worse and worse. Last fall I tried repeatedly to get the shop I bought it from to take a look and diagnose the problem, to no avail, so I sent a video of the problem to Hobie. They were very responsive and told me the spine was failing and I needed to make a warranty claim. I found another dealer that immediately got the ball rolling but six months later they still don't have the spine in from Hobie. I'm afraid to take it out into any challenging conditions and risk a drive failure, which means I have a product where my warranty is running down and I can't use it. I don't mind a little delay but a product under warranty should either be fixed in a timely fashion or the warranty extended.

I've seen all kinds of stuff online about the tension cables coming too tight from the factory, causing the drives to fail. Has anyone else had a similar experience?