People are forgetting you have two boats on hand. I would cut the bow off both boats and attach the good bow to the boat without the hole. I work in a shipyard and we do this kind of thing all the time.
When you cut the good bow off go slightly long so you can trim it down for an exact fit. A good file slightly heated should work well.
Harbor freight sells plastic welders that will do the trick. I suggest you do a few test passes on the old boat to get the hang of it but it's pretty easy to become proficient. I would make the weld from the inside so the hull remains smooth. If you remove the seat you can lay up inside the hull while you weld. Be sure to wipe all mating edges with a good coat of acetone to prep the plastic.
Since you will be combining two boats you will have to take down the Hull ID #'s (located near the stern on the starboard side) and notify the Coast Guard what you have done. I don't think there is any paperwork involved, just a phone call to your nearest detachment but you might want to call them first and check. The regulations may have changed and I would hate to give you bad advice.
Well I want a new boat and don’t want to spend more than $700. Aren’t the 13 ft perception, the Pungo, and most other rec boats in that price range made of the exact same materials?
Quit buying from Amazon. Since a quick goggle search shows numerous kayak shops in the state of Ohio, several REI, several Cabelas, etc. Why are you ordering from Amazon? You could buy the exact kayak that you are crazy about (Old Town Dirigo) from Cabelas and have it delivered directly to the store for free. Unwrap it at the store, inspect it, send it back if damaged, or take it home & paddle it if it’s not damaged. Easy. Done.
If you want something different, order from REI with free shipping to the store. Same as Cabelas…unwrap & inspect.
Or, the third option that everyone on this forum has advised. Go to a local kayak shop. Tell them you budget and see what they have. Test paddle it. Buy it & take it home.
Some folks, like me, live thousands of miles from a kayak shop. We would give anything to have the options you do. We have to have things shipped. We cross our fingers & say a prayer that our boat arrives in good condition.
shipping canoes and kayaks The problem here is not the kayak, it is the shipping method used. Amazon is not in the kayak or canoe business. They are in the low markup, bulk retail business. Products to them are a commodity. Put it in a box, slap on a sticker and put it in the UPS or Fed-ex pile. Wrap the kayak in bubble pack and send it out. Trucking companies hate boats. They are set up for palletized freight. They hate to handle loose items. Especially long bulky irregular shaped items. Boats get piled on top of crates and pallets and have to be moved to get at the stuff underneath. Boats bounce around in the truck. They slide, they roll. They get damaged!! And in the bubble wrap and paper it doesn’t get noticed and the driver sure doesn’t want to stick around a residential delivery while someone unwrapps a boat.
Sending a boat by freight company is not playing Russian roulette, it is just an exercise in how many damaged boats will arrive before you give up. Ask any canoe or kayak retailer how they get boats from the factories. They come on a factory truck or via a specialized delivery service that does nothing but deliver boats for a living. That is one reason the paddlesports retailers charge more than Amazon.
We keep saying it, but too many people are just set on buying online and they don’t believe the risk is real.
Sorry fella, but it is a sad truth. You buy a boat from a paddlesports dealer,or you get screwed one way or another.
I’ve tried to find it locally Nobody has it. Cabellas does not ship to the store, they ship to your house the same as Amazon. And where do you live that is thousands of miles from an outfitter?
My bad I have ordered lots of larger items from Cabellas and picked them up from the store, but looks like no kayaks to the store. So…choose another kayak. One that REI sells, since they definitely deliver free to their stores for pick up. Or, like everyone has said, go to a local kayak shop and see what they have, or can get for you.
I live in Utah. Closest touring kayak shops are in Cali, Oregon, or Washington. I have ordered a kayak from ACK in the past with delivery to my door. It arrived very well wrapped & protected with no damage. Maybe I was lucky…or maybe I ordered from a company that does nothing but kayaks and they ship with a company that handles kayaks regularly & takes better care of them. Who knows???
Speaking of ACK. They have a lot of kayaks in your price point, and they offer free shipping on some of them. Mine was shipped free.
Hey Ohio guy If you are legitimate and I kind of think you are, you are either having a very bad run of luck and someone above our pay scale is trying to keep you out of the water, or this is just SOP for boats coming from Amazon as has been suggested.
I hope you realize that the pirate guy who is suggesting that you cut off the bad parts and make one good boat out of the damaged ones is also yanking your chain.
You wanted a new boat and if I were you, I would settle for nothing less. However, you could probably straighten up this latest one enough to take it for a little paddle while you’re waiting on the next delivery. If you do, I would be very careful with the boat to not add additional damage, so that Amazon could claim that you used it and now you’re stuck with it.
The safest and most reasoned procedure from this point is to either try for a total refund, or just keep trying Amazon to see how many times it takes, or to see whose patients runs out first. As one poster said, they might get tired of the mess and let you keep all the damaged boats along with a good one–if that ever happens.
It’s ok I would think Utah would have plenty of outdoors stores. I know a lot of it is rural and desert areas but there is so much outdoors tourism there you’d think it would be accessible.
Thanks as I mentioned above, it appears Amazon now has 2 available, shipped from and sold by Backcountry.com. I’m hoping this means Amazon won’t touch it.
“Plastic” kayaks may all be made from some sort of polyethylene but there is crosslink, linear and superlinear poly, single layer and multi-layer, all with different trade names.
And then of course there are big differences in the quality of the fittings, especially the seats.
Pirate over 40 has the right approach you should take. That way if your stern or the seat gives out for some reason - and these things can happen with the best of boats - you can always repair that as well. Kinda like folks back in the day who always kept two or more MG cars on hand.
Utah has just a bit of water in comparison to its other outdoor recreation assets.
Not surprising that in October… any box store has kayaks out on the floor or in the warehouse… Space needed for items that can be sold in the current season
And I have yet to see an Amazon truck. They do not ship as far as I know. If they use FedEx or UPS I’m not surprised there is damage.
Amazon Amazon is frequently just a broker in these transactions handling things like billing and customer service. One of their “storefronts” would be the actual seller.
If the latest in stock are from Backcountry, then they have a very good reputation and should know how to pack and ship a kayak.
Still, you’ll probably be at the mercy of UPS, FedEx or USPS.
Have you bothered to check? OhioGuy, honestly, you seem to have some cognitive problems, maybe attention deficit? You continually ask questions that have already been answered. I suggest you step back a few minutes and completely read ALL the responses. Have you bothered to call the Field and Stream stores? There are THREE of them in Ohio and I sent you the contact information.
And why would you buy through Amazon again when they have informed you that Outdoorplay has it in stock? Call Outdoorplay and talk to them about shipping and then buy direct from them. Why should Amazon get a cut? I’ve ordered direct from Outdoorplay many times and they’ve been great to deal with. Tell them what you’ve been through and maybe they will give you special attention.
Better yet, since the season is almost over for Ohio (unless you are willing to invest a couple of hundred dollars in cold water clothing), just take the kayak with the crushed nose out until Amazon arranges to pick it up or whatever (and you should still be demanding a full refund). Then come Spring you can drive to Field and Stream and pick up the boat you want.
In fact, if I was in your place, I would call Field and Stream, tell them your story and see if they would let you pre-order the boat you want for Spring delivery at the price you wish to pay. You never know until you ask. F & S might not do it, but a lot of independent shops will. I referred two friends who were going to buy their kayaks from big retailers to our local independent outfitter and he was able to match the price exactly AND give them free shipping by ordering their boats with his stock shipments.
By the way, Cabelas are no great shakes for outdoor gear. They charge higher prices than just about anybody – I dare you to find anything in their store or catalog that is not straight MSRP. I used to stop at the gigantic Flagship store they built south of Ann Arbor Michigan when I was on my way from Grand Rapids to Pittsburgh and I was underwhelmed. Even their “discount” room was a joke, They would have beat to crap, returned or defective items marked down 15 or 20%. What a joke. And their water sports product lines were pathetic. IMHO Cabelas is for fishing and hunting wannabees with more money than sense. Even Gander Mountain has better stock and prices.
Got a full refund from Amazon Plus a $200 credit to anything shipped from and sold by them. Just placed an order for my boat from Backcountry.com who reassured me that they have been shipping kayaks for decades and are very careful. $800 w shipping, - the $200 Amazon credit (as long as I buy stuff I was already going to buy like groceries and toiletries) leaves it at $600 for an $800 kayak. I’d say I still did ok.
Outdoor stores yes…tons. Touring specific kayak shops…none. Utah is in the middle of some of the best whitewater rafting & kayaking in the world, and we have one whitewater raft shop in Salt Lake City. Whitewater kayak shops are plentiful, but none that are specific to touring. Our local Cabelas, Scheels, Dicks, and Sierra Trading Post carry a fair number of the lower to mid priced poly kayaks in their stores during the summer months. REI carries a few mid priced kayaks in the store, but they have a decent selection of mid priced options that will ship for free to the store at any time. The paddle section of my local REI is now full of ski equipment. Any higher end kayak or canoe must be ordered either directly from the manufacturer or through a dealer.
As I see it, you can keep messing around with Amazon, find another way to order a kayak, or choose a different kayak that you can buy locally.