3 owners in 3 years???

who can afford to take a hit like that?

Unless you really, really need to get rid of the boat.

A lot of people jumping the gun on this. Who knows if there was previous damage by the previous owner(s).

you may as well include ranger, skeeter, and triton in with this comment and not just tracker. skeeter is $200 and 10 days, ranger is $100 and 15 days, and triton is $100 in 15 days. my point being is this is "NOT" just trackers BS deal. before you jump on the wagon realize this is standard operating procedure for just about all brands of boats. it does suck and hopefully they step up but this is just not a tracker problem.

The previous owner discussion does not hold water.

So what if the boat has hit MULTIPLE STUMPS. I have hit thousands of stumps in my Ranger. It has not done this. This is nothing more than poor craftsmanship.

And NO, Tracker cannot afford to take a hit. We are in a recession, and I know boat sales are down at LEAST 20% in the last two years for all manufacturers. Even Ranger had a shutdown for 45 days in 2009.

They arent making a ton of money right now..I assure you.

Also this kind of issue doesn't just pertain to boats. Paint on cars does this all the time. Usually starteod by some sort of impact and not manufactorer defect. Same with windshields. You get a tiny rock chip and then all the sudden there's a huge crack in the windshield.

By the way insurance never, I mean never, cover manufactorer defects. If insurance covered it, it wasn't out of the goodness of their hearts. So don't say that brand x wouldn't cover it so my insurance had to. Insurance had to because it was obvious that there was some sort of impact that caused the damage.

Why doesn't previous damage hold water? You had a fiberglass expert post on here that if CAN happen and DOES regularly...

If I get time tonight I will go thru some emails and find some pics I took of a ranger on the Mississippi river that looked like that. The guy told me he had hit something a few weeks before prefishing and then it came apart during the T. He was loading when I was. Looked like half the hull had just come off.

It probably does. Realistically how else could it have happened? Pre-existing condition is not a good thing though.

I've been around a lot of ramps and a lot of boat owners (as I'm sure you have) and I have never seen anything like that. If that was a common thing to happen they would build all bass boats out of metal or something. It's not just cosmetic, that thing could have been deadly.

How can you be POSITIVE YOU didn't hit anything?
I don't mean this in a negative way but how can you be positive? You'd think your insurance company would cover this. If not, shouldn't it be a manufacturer issue by default? and vice versa?

And in regards to the warranty, I agree that 5 years should be 5 years regardless of how many owners, but they did cover their butts with the fine print.

Every manufacturer is going to produce a lemon at some point. I remember Hawk bass Boats had delamination issues. It's the way they handle customer service that makes all the difference. Hawk went out of business. Wonder if it's because the consumer had no confidence in the product?

I can't imagine any of the smaller manufacturers not adressing this better than Tracker is. Have heard too many good stories of the OWNERS of Bass Cat boats and Legend Boats responding to customer issues PERSONALLY.

I bought the boat and immediately headed to Choke Canyon to fish for 7 days straight. Due to the weather conditions, I concentrated on main lake structure fishing and was not banging around in the hardwoods. I had put about 200 miles on the hull before this happened. I am certain that I did not hit anything. I was out in the middle of the lake taking my time getting back to weigh-in.

Could I say I hit something and try to claim insurance? Yes, but that would be insurance fraud. I am an honest fair individual and call things as they are.

I have pursued Tracker Marine to see if they would help with this. I understood from the moment I presented it to them that it was not formally under warranty. They reviewed it and put together their best offer and gave me 7 days to respond. Tracker Marine's offer was not even close to making up the loss I incurred with the failure of my 2008 Nitro Z-9 and therefore is not an option.

At this point, I do not expect any more to come from Tracker Marine, but maybe they will surprise me. My goal with this post was to disclose the facts as they happened to me so that others could be educated with their boat purchases, particularly Nitro. I did not EVER think somethiing like this would happen. One of the reasons the boat appealed so much to me was that the motor was still under warranty as this is what usually gives someone problems.

I will tell you this...... I understand what Jr is saying.

but if my insurance wouldn't cover it

and the manufacturer wouldn't cover it

I would be doing the exact thing you are doing.

I would be too...i couldnt afford to fix that.

I wasn't under the impression that you had hit anything with this boat. I would say if Tracker feels it was a manufacturing issue, they should make it right. If they feel it was due to abuse by previous owners, then up to them how they want to handle it. I don't think this is an insurance claim for sure. I don't know if there is way to know which one this is either, I am not a boat builder or fiberglass expert. If there was a way to figure that out, that is what I would be trying to do. If it came down to a previous owner caused the damage and you feel you were decieved in your purchase, might be something on that side, I don't know. The previous owner would probably have had to have known there was an issue with it. Hard to prove that.

Talking bout the jacked up puma sorry.