Re: Looking to buy a new aluminum boat
The boat I was referring to is an older model, which has a splash well, transom knee braces and a full wood panel which goes nearly to the bottom the the hull. The boat has had a few gusset cracks but they have been re-welded. The bent hull occurred recently. There is also signs of corrosion on that hull, much more than I'd expect from a freshwater boat.
From what I see and hear, it's a brand to stay away from unless your just after a boat to use as a starter boat and dump it after a few years. I'd have to be pretty desperate for a boat to go looking for a Tracker after seeing first hand what my neighbor and several others here have gone through. I can understand why some of those boats crack after seeing the transom construction, but for a hull to sag or bend like this one, there's just no excuse.
Years ago I had a Grumman bass boat which I bought used, it was rated at 35hp, and I hung a fresh 35 hp motor on it, the boat was fast, faster than I needed it to be. Being young, I did stupid things to that boat. I can remember jumping wakes and running it aground at speed quite often, it got beached regularly, tied up for weeks at a time and run in the river with ice chunks slamming the hull the whole way out. It never leaked, never cracked, and never showed any signs of how bad I treated it. The floor eventually needed replacing, but long after I sold it. Looking back over the years, knowing what I do now from years of experience, that boat should have darn near broke in two or sunk. I can remember hitting huge wakes and having so much hang time I could look back and and all around before it crashed back down. Being a flat bottom modified V bass boat, it would pound every time. I also can remember having to chisel it out of the ice one winter after it froze in the lake, I had loaned it to a buddy farther north who let it sit all fall and all winter in the water. When I got it out, it had a foot of ice in the boat and was nearly frozen to the lake surface. We chipped it out with iron bars and dragged it across the ice to the boat ramp with a quad. It was fine come spring. Even the motor survived somehow. 25 years later I'd never think of doing half of the things I did to that boat. I'd still like to find another one like it now. I always regretted selling that boat. The new Grumman boats are quite different than the original ones. The one I had had an all welded hull with round gunwale rails which were like bumpers. They never dented and never flexed. That boat was solid and very rigid.
