I stopped by a Ranger dealership to ask about dropping boat for a issue with sea star steering and they told me if you didn't buy it here we won't work on it. The same dealer just serviced the engine in February. They begged me to bring it in then but don't want to even talk about it now. The only thing they could say is we so short handed. I didn't ask to fix it then just when could I get it on the schedule. WTH money is money. I call another dealer today, so on the schedule. This the new way of doing business I guess.

They must really be hurting for service people.

good service people are in high demand some dealers have chosen to take care of the folks that buy their boats .

I know of 3 dealerships that are doing this... They're swamped with just their customers so they're turning away people who didn't buy from them... That's why you should support local businesses... Now me, I bought my boat from a dealer 130 miles away because no one sold Bullets locally... I worked through them to order the boat from a Bullet. I had them rig everything but the motor. When they were done rigging I picked up the boat and had a local dealership rig the engine... A lot of extra driving, some additional cost but it was worth it because the local guy feels like I gave them some business and he'll work me in if I'm having a problem... Dan

Think about it. If they are swamped with their own customers they are turning out a [censored] product. Go elsewhere.

Hey guys go easy on me please. I found a 84 skeeter strada f-80. Does anyone know of a place I could contact about having it checked out before trying to buy or what is everybody's opinion.

TIA

Johnny,

You can check out that boat on your own without a dealer. Go to Tactical Bassin on Youtube. They did a really good 20 minute vid on buying a used boat. For sure do a compression test. You can rent the tester at O'reilly's for a deposit.

That is how I bought my boat.

Was this Ranger dealership in Del Rio?

The dealer I bought from closed years ago due to health reasons. I have used the dealer since then even with it being a little drive to reach. They have serviced boat for at least 8 years on a regular schedule. This is a very very clean boat and I don't want to spend 90 to 100 thousand just to be a special customer.

The boat dealership world has some issue..... and the manufacturers need to clamp down on them

That guy is a trip. We got off the water early to buy tackle we needed for a trip. We got there 15 minutes before close. He comes driving up on a skid steer from across the highway and tells us we are too late. I pointed to times on the door and told we were fixing to drop a lot of coin. He then Went on a rant about it being fried chicken day with his wife and he would never miss one. Weird all the way around but that [censored] will never get another penny of my money and we literally spent thousands in there each year as that’s when we would pick up all our Yamaha fluids for the year.

Ya think?!

They don’t want to service anything. From anyone. They just want to sell new boats and new motors. Then they want to block your number.

Back during Covid, my buddy and I were gonna fish the Permian open. Went to the the dealership to get my Mexico license and some odds & ends tackle. My buddy has know the owners (let’s call them JIM and GAIL for sake of discussion) for decades. She wouldn’t sell me a Mexico license, “because she was saving what she had for friends”.

Called up James at Falcon Lake Tackle and he had it to me in minutes.

I know I’m not a consistent customer of “Jim’s”, but I wouldn’t help pee on their building, if it were on fire.

I was gonna buy a hub when down there once. Basically the only hub they were putting on rangers at the time. They said they would have to order one. A dealer should have a few things in stock like the most common hub that went on basically every ranger trailer at the time.

Y’all take it easy on Jim and Gail. Long time family friends and good as gold if you know them. Small town with little to no qualified help, so he pretty much does it all mechanically.

I’ve known them since I was 3 years old, but understand what some may think, Jim has no filter and does it his way. I’ve seen it with my own eyes many times. He’s a trip!