Warranty issue

[Hannu Reiman]

Hi.
I have 2015 Yamaha 242 Limited S. When I bought the boat from Barney´s Tampa, we found 3 vertical "hair cracks" on the left side. The biggest one was about 12 to 15" and other two a bit shorter. I made a claim to Yamaha and they came to see it...after seeing the person told me that they are just normal stress cracks but as goodwill, they will fix it. I asked how is it possible to have stress cracks in a brand new boat with zero hours in it? I assume that these cracks comes after several hours if they come not before putting it in the water. After "fixing" it looked just awfull, because there was about 30" matt black halo around the cracks.

Now I contact Yamaha again and made this claim again, because it´s getting day by day more easy to see and I also have extended warranty. I got an asnwer that the warranty doesn´t cover cosmetic issues. I undertand that it is very expensive to fix the side of the boat so I offered an idea that instead of redoing the side they will wrap the boat with some nice sticker. The answer was NO, it´s cosmetic claim.

Makes me think that if you buy a cheap car and it has a scratch, the dealer will fix it, but 65 000 dollar Yamaha is not covered by YAMAHA.

Any thoughts?

Best,
Hannu Reiman

 

[MrMoose]

@Hannu Reiman I think that you are lucky to have gotten Yamaha to fix the cracks. I think that some have failed to get stress/spider cracks fixed in the past.
There are 3 non-operator related root causes that I've heard of (told to me from a fiberglass shop that does Yamaha warranty work):
1. Bad pre-gelcoat factory repair.
2. Gelcoat applied too thick.
3. One member on this forum had the bulkhead panel under the portside storage seat installed too tight to the hull and it caused the gelcoat to crack.

If I were you, I wouldn't bother with Yamaha. I would take the boat back to the shop that performed the gelcoat work and tell them to make it right.

Good luck

 

[Scottintexas]

Glad to have you on board! I'm sorry to hear about your problems.

Did you notice you posted in the "things to buy / Swag" forum? It probably won't matter as many look at the "new posts" or "recent posts" tab and will see this.

Welcome to Yamaha warranty world. The boating world I've come to find out is very much geared toward the purchase only. If you happen to have a good dealer they'll go above and beyond to take care of you but if you don't, and most it seems don't, you'll suffer tremendous headache.

At first I thought you were going to say they refused to fix the cracks, that's what we normally hear.

I have no idea about Barney's. Did you speak to your salesman or the general manager yet. I would start with them in a very nice, just want to get this fixed way and move it up the food chain. Putting a new shiny clear coat on it I don't think would be a big deal.

I doubt they'll pony up for a wrap as that will be real money vs. getting one of their guys out with buffer to fix it themselves.

If the dealership doesn't help you count it as a lesson learned and don't go back because you'll probably just get more of the same.