Spark hull cracks again.

[pedrop]

Hi this is Pedrop, from Mallorca in the Spanish Mediterranean.

Got a Spark new in Winter, has maybe 15 hours only.
When it filled up with water last week we found a really big crack in the hull. Never hit anything except water, is always trailored but loaded carefully, never driven onto the trailo, never beached.
We have only 1 Seadoo dealer on the island who, of course, says it hit something. It def. did not.

They have been putting me off for over a week now, so I have to get a lawyer.

Anyone else experienced this sort of damage? The Spark is a cheap ski, and you can see that Seadoo have saved on material wherever they could. Is it possible that the hulls are not as thick as the normal models and jumping waves cracks them?
I have been jetskiing for over 20 years, had all the makes, and I have never ever experienced damage like this.

Does anyone think the Spark may have an inherent problem?

 

[Coastiejoe]

The Spark is a plastic hull. Many things affect plastic. Temperature, rollers instead of bunks, hitting water hard, ect ect,

I have seen them get repaired with plastic welding..

 

[pedrop]

Platic hull cracks

The Spark is a plastic hull. Many things affect plastic. Temperature, rollers instead of bunks, hitting water hard, ect ect,

I have seen them get repaired with plastic welding..

Thought all skis had plastic hulls, but in 20 years of intensive use of Yama, Kawa and Seadoo I have never managed to crack or damage one on the water. Don't really see the point of a high-hp jetski if it can't hit water hard! And the trailor has rollers.
Never really heard of the problem before, I believe it is inherent to the Spark, probably for a design or material reason.

 

[Coastiejoe]

Most do not have plastic hulls. Some are fiberglass and some are fiberglass with a composite material mix in with it for strength. With SeaDoo, until the 2017 models only the Spark was plastic. This was to help keep both the cost and the weight down.

 

[pedrop]

Hi Coastie,

That's about what I thought had happened - so there is an inherent hull weakness and Seadoo are ignoring it. I think it should be made public.

PS. It's all plastic to me!

 

[Coastiejoe]

Thousands have been sold and most do not have issues. But enough have that I would think that BRP probably is taking notice and seeing if they are being damaged in a consistent spot or manner. Beyond that, I doubt much other is being done as the percentage is very low. I'd guess less lower than 1%.

 

[Frank_Hassa]

Post pics of cracks. Let's see if there is impact damage. Question is if dealership is making a legitimate "diagnosis" or if they are pulling something out of their backside in order to avoid liability.

Have you searched online for other reports of possibly defective hulls? If you are the only person on the planet that has ever had a hull "spontaneously" crack, that's an argument in favor of "you did something to make it happen", however if there are hundreds of other people, with cracking in the same are, then you might have the start of a class-action lawsuit.

 

[pedrop]

Hi Frank,
There are def. cases of the same thing happening, even the dealer has mentioned at least one case here on Mallorca. And there is mention of it in the forum.
BRP/dealer will do nothing. It is impact damage according to them, and they have given me 2500 Euros for the ski (under a year old, paid 9800 for it) trade-in against a used GTR they have.
They even told me that the Spark is not really made for ocean use, better on lakes! Thanks very much dealer, you could have told me before you sold it to me. Bearing in mind we are on an island in the middle of the Mediterranean!
I'm writing to the local papers about it, but as you probably know, jetskies and skiers do not enjoy the greatest of popularity amongst the sane public so I doubt it will achieve much.
It needs to be made public, however, as there is obviously something wrong.

 

[Frank_Hassa]

Hi Frank,
There are def. cases of the same thing happening, even the dealer has mentioned at least one case here on Mallorca. And there is mention of it in the forum.
BRP/dealer will do nothing. It is impact damage according to them, and they have given me 2500 Euros for the ski (under a year old, paid 9800 for it) trade-in against a used GTR they have.
They even told me that the Spark is not really made for ocean use, better on lakes! Thanks very much dealer, you could have told me before you sold it to me. Bearing in mind we are on an island in the middle of the Mediterranean!
I'm writing to the local papers about it, but as you probably know, jetskies and skiers do not enjoy the greatest of popularity amongst the sane public so I doubt it will achieve much.
It needs to be made public, however, as there is obviously something wrong.

I read a bunch of threads like these on other forums and the common theme was not that the plastic hulls cracked, but that the OPs of the threads claiming there was non-impact (meaning spontaneous, design-flaw, defective product type of damage), but no one would post pictures. The forum regulars would ask for pictures, the OP would fail to post them and so the forum membership disregarded the thread as being unsubstantiated. Not saying that applies here, but I am saying that posting pics of the non-impact cracks are a prerequisite, in general, for being taken seriously.

No one said it openly, but I got the feeling that the crack hull threads were either cases of "buyer's remorse", attempts to defraud, or possibly some kind of anti-marketing effort by Spark competitors (whoever they may be) playing on people's fears of "cheap plastic" in an effort to drive sales away from Spark and toward (whatever else). Haven't seen anything like that on this forum, but got the feeling that saying the wrong thing in the wrong place could get a lot of people mad at you. Not sure what the whole story is, but I got the feeling that there is one. Just as an FYI.

 

[DErps]

I just bought a spark 3 up in June 2017 and the exact same thing occurred at 15 hours of operation. there is not a scratch or mark on the hull where the crack occurred. the dealer has inspected it and confirmed with a written report to BRP not a scratch or mark in the area of the crack. BRP refuses to pay anything. They just say no coverage. The crack is 4 or 5 inches long on the left upper third of the front hull.

We are on a quiet lake with no debris and not many waves. It has never hit anything! We bought one of the floating jet ski docks so it has never been trailored either except by the dealer to our lake. 3 miles. Dealer says only thing he can think of is the wheels on the jet ski dock but none of us believe that either including the dealer who inspected the dock and confirmed nothing unusual in the dock installation. As I research this on line you are one of numerous cases in various forums of a crack in this few hours of operation where you hit nothing. my exact case.

Very disappointed and will be in touch with a lawyer.

 

[Minnetonka4me]

I just bought a spark 3 up in June 2017 and the exact same thing occurred at 15 hours of operation. there is not a scratch or mark on the hull where the crack occurred. the dealer has inspected it and confirmed with a written report to BRP not a scratch or mark in the area of the crack. BRP refuses to pay anything. They just say no coverage. The crack is 4 or 5 inches long on the left upper third of the front hull.

We are on a quiet lake with no debris and not many waves. It has never hit anything! We bought one of the floating jet ski docks so it has never been trailored either except by the dealer to our lake. 3 miles. Dealer says only thing he can think of is the wheels on the jet ski dock but none of us believe that either including the dealer who inspected the dock and confirmed nothing unusual in the dock installation. As I research this on line you are one of numerous cases in various forums of a crack in this few hours of operation where you hit nothing. my exact case.

Very disappointed and will be in touch with a lawyer.

Interesting.... So you have gone thru two hulls? We beat the living piss out of ours, my brother bounced of a formula boat in a freak accident and caused 7k in damage to the boat. The ski had a bent sponson. I've put mine 20 ft in the air on a few occasions and had some gnarly landings without anything and I'm pushing 250lbs. I think that it's a possibility some plastic could not lay up correctly and cause a weak spot but to have two do it in the exact same spot?? Weird. Mine is a 2017 hull too, but it's a 2up.

 

[DErps]

Only one hull cracked. Not sure where you got two Subsequent to my first post I have argued that they have no evideince that the jet ski was damaegd due to operator error. There is nothing in the instruction manual that says don't use a jet dock. The Dealer confirmed this. I do not believe this is a design defect as there would be more cases but I do believe it was eaithr a manufacturing defect or potentially the hull was damaged during construction or transport to the dealer. Picture is below.

 

[Minnetonka4me]

Honestly it just takes the right hit on any machine to do damage. I would imagine someone hit something, but it wasnt enough to feel. Like a chunk of wood floating or something.

If its new I assume its under warranty?


As I said in my first post...my brother and I pound the HELL out of our jumping. My brother has had his 2 summers and did manage to crack the upper steering bulkhead but on the first sign of cracking he bought another one for $70 and when it totally split he drove home, had it replaced in 45mins and went back out to jump more boat wake.

The 14 hulls were a little thin in some places. Yes there are def some cracked hulls but if you put a ratio on units sold vs cracked hulls....prob less than 1%.

Yamaha has had a heck of a time with their new hulls on their high end machines. The spark is def built to be a entry, disposable jetski.