Lost Faith

[Walter P]

Even very big "boats" built for anything the seas can throw at them break on occasion.....remember the Edmund Fitzgerald..

Walt

[motoryacht lover]

I have a close friend whose father bought a brand new Chris Craft 30' foot go fast in the 1980's and got caught in the gulf stream in a storm and broke the boat up a fair amount. He went back to the dealer and wanted it repaired under warranty and they said no. And he whipped out the brochure for the boat that showed the boat on the cover jumping out of the waves. the boat was repaired by Chris Craft at no expense to the owner. I can't add much to this discussion but that I am continually amazed at how reasonble people can disagree so strongly. Pascal, I sincerely enjoy your input on this forum and others but you seem to me to be defending Hatteras and in my opinioin with a strong bias. It is rare in life or business that one has the luxury of having all the facts before the time comes to make a decision. And if you were to ask me to gamble on whether Hatteras would lose a decision in a court room based on the info that has been presented here I would bet fairly heavily that they would lose. Taking the risk that I don't know Hatteras's side of the story. I own a Viking but if Viking screws up and does not handle it responsibly I will not defend them. I get the feeling that some of you want to defend Hatteras because their potential wrongdoing or failure is somehow a reflection on you. I don't intend to be inflamatory or to be going after Pascal it is just that I enjoy his posts and was surprised that he and I disagree.

[newinlet]

Hey Dave Will you show me the boat I live about 1 Hour from Fairhaven

[Tim Powell]

just wait till they throw that computor reading on the trial table .It will show rpm to total howers run. then the truth comes out with out a shadow of doubt.
Today i went to FATETTVILL NC this is the collection point for cat repos commercial equpet.I was looking a wheel loader,Getting ready to spend 60000 grand i ask the mechanic did he belive the wheel loader had been run to death.He said he could run a rpm to hour ussage report. I did ask if this applied to marine engines. If it is computer controlles he did not see why not especially late modles. you can bet your favorate horse shue if it is possible hat will be asking for it or already has it.

while i am at it all you guys who belive those captains you hire are reiable and do no run then boats..Come on down to NC and watch. Sit on the back porch with me for a weak or so you will definately change your mind. I am right on the icw with wide open watter.

[Angela]

So Angela, are you saying that attorneys do hold on to cases to build hours then move to settle?

No, I'm not saying that. I just understand the life and course of a typical lawsuit where the dollar amount isn't trivial. Asbestos cases are a whole other animal! In cases where there are several Defendants, for example, each Defendant will have his gang of experts to rebut what the Plaintiff's experts have to say about the matter, and when the Defendants are pointing the fingers at each other, there are even more experts to have to depose, etc. Defendants in high dollar civil litigation such as med mal, death cases, catastrophic injury, complex business litigation, and yes, even warranty cases where the product, such as a new Hatt, is quite valuable as opposed to the warranty on a used car. It would not surprise me at all if there was more than the one obvious Defendant in this case. They all spend a lot of time getting expert opinions on the matter. When you consider that some of these experts are not local, and given attorneys' schedules, it can take a year or two just to get through all of the experts' depositions, and that's after the usual discovery has been completed. Thus, trials get postponed over and over because the case simply isn't ready. It's after all of the facts and opinions are known and digested by all of the parties and the picture becomes more clear that real settlement negotiations begin. And sometimes, that ends up being three or four years down the road!

[saltshaker]

Jack try driving your porsh on a very pothole road or better yet a bumpy dirt road at about 70 mph the same principle applies.

Tim,
The Porsche is designed to run fast and hard on relatively good roads. My point here is that a 50ft Hatt should be able to run in reasonable seas without falling apart. A tournament boat that can only run fast in flat seas is useless. Of course there are limits to what any boat can handle and you can't expect the boat to survive constant abuse. There are a lot of unanswered questions here and we have only heard a very small part of the story. If the boat was run reasonably and came apart then that is a major issue. In order for the boat to suffer the damage that has been reported I would expect she was run very hard in heavy seas. Again this boat should be capable of running 30+kts in 4-5 footers with no problem. If your doing it on a regular basis in 10 footers that's a different story. At some point all boats/ships can become too small when mother nature decides to stir up the ocean. Question here is what was this boats breaking point and was it reasonable to expect it to handle it.

[Vincentc]

There are 2 sides to most stories.

We have heard only one side regarding the facts, and since this is in litigation, it is appropriate for Hatteras to not comment and leave this matter to be decided by the court which will hear both sides. In addition, I expect that the people at Hatteras have more class than to discuss one of their owners in a public forum.

An opinion without an accurate assesment of the facts is not worth much, but I will state my belief that with 30 kt plus capability comes responsibility on the part of the owner as well as the manufacturer.

A few questions come to mind.

The owner has been a member of this site since October 2007. Why is he now choosing to post about his problem and for what purpose?

Doesn't this site have rules about defamation?

The people at Hatteras as most US manufacturers are struggling with a bad economy. What useful purpose is being served by this thread?
Is it fair?

[administrator]

I have decided to close this thread. I do not know the circumstances involved but I hope resolution can be reached for everyone involved which sounds like it will come from the judicial process... not this forum.