Two things:
Above is the same failure as mine, but his hull is much cleaner than mine! But a question arose during our correspondence, as to the cause of the failure.
Ivan tried to lay it to my St. Croix lifting pad eyes. *I* think it came from lifting by their own petard so to speak, in our alongside overnight lifts, where the hull, effectively, is supported by the hinges.
So, the first item is: How, if ever, did you
lift the dinghy? If you've been following this thread, you probably know that we started lifting it aside using the factory specified attachment points on the transom and bow eye. If you never lift it, or have some other means than either their or our specific, that failure would not be attributable to lifting.
Second item is that I was able, starting with the first dinghy which was replaced in 2011, and which failures included a floor system lift method specified by the-then
marketing director when I met him at a show, and later by correspondence with the selling dealer who had the St. Croix system installed on a boat in his showroom, document that I had been specifically instructed to lift in the fashion I had executed. In the first, an imminent floor failure (accompanied by hull distortion) presented, and in the second, no engineering reason could be presented, nor refuting the selling dealer, to make the St. Croix solution be invalid (it started with Ivan saying the
installation was unauthorized and thus voided the warranty, as well as the proximate cause of the failure).
I can't imagine any other reason (my ability to document my appropriate changes to the boat, and the potential, should I be nasty enough to initiate, for
legal action) that they now have offered:
Free new hull (presumed nothing else - no
hardware, no floor system, seats, oars, wheels, splash preventers,
keel strip,
bilge plug) but I pay for
shipping (~250/300USD) and
installation
and
some form of reinforcement for the hinge area (implicitly admitting a design issue, but perhaps allowing much more useful time for me).
However, had I not had that offer, which I'll take, I probably would have removed the
wheel wells and used some EternaBond over the crack area (from the inside) and then replaced the wheels, which for the few times we've used them, we LOVE. I've watched our leak point (starboard is still a mere crack without a leak), and it doesn't appear to have gotten notably worse, so I'm not afraid of catastrophic failure.
EternaBond is an extremely sticky flexible stuff which RVs use to patch their rubber roofs. I learned about it as a remedy for a split bladder on the PortaBote transom (a common failure point on those also-marvelous dinghies)...
So, while the final chapter has yet to be written, in effect, since my warranty - they say - was effective on the first boat, which has now passed the 10-year mark, and thus technically I am out of warranty, they are honoring the HULL portion of the original warranty, and dinging me for the
shipping and labor due to expiration-by-time.
I have some unanswered questions of interest rather than of substance which have yet to be answered, but I expect that this will be the end of the discussion in my case. Any of you reading now or later (as I pointed out to Ivan, nothing really dies on the internet) may possibly use this discussion as leverage to resolve your dinghies' issues.
As this will involve
removal of everything from the hull, and replacement on the new hull, I'll document as I always do for everything aboard Flying Pig, and follow up with a new post about the transfer of stuff (eventually - no promises as to timing!).
I'll continue to
monitor this thread. It would be good for as many folks as possible to put up their hands (and pix) if they have had this failure, and how they believe it happened (lifting by the transom rings? something like my St. Croix pad eyes? some other failure mechanism not related to merely inadequate bulk/strength there); perhaps if it becomes adequately visible, WB will make design changes.
As I put it to Ivan, I'd dearly love to be effusive in praise of the Genesis, as we really do love the good things about it, and if this is common enough to - in our very limited audience due to population and happenstance of time - get several occasions of the same failure, surely it would be in their interests to remedy the issue.
L8R, y'all
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