Has anyone else had the deck start separating on their Pro Boat UL-19?

[John P]

Hi All,

I have two areas on the L/H side of my UL-19 with cracks between the deck and where it joins the hull.

After stripping the boat down to just the bare boat I was able to see how bad the cracks are. I found one of them is now 3.5 inch long at about the center of the left sponson.
The other one is near where the stock water outlet is located. It is about 1.5 inch long. If I flex the deck upward you can see a gap between the deck at both areas.

It looks to me like they sanded the fiberglass so thin at those points it was mainly the paint holding it together.

This probably was one of first batch of boats shipped. I bought it in November but the dealer had it in stock for quite awhile. The boat has only been in the water twice with
a total of 8 runs. Mostly 4S and 5S and two 6S runs. Props were balanced and drive shaft properly aligned so I doubt vibration caused any problem.

Also there are several places on the hull bottom and the deck where there are spider cracks. They appear to be only in whatever they used as gel coating but I need
to check them a little closer as they are spreading out. The best way I can describe it is at the hole where the radio antenna mount is, there are at least 8 distinct cracks
emanating from the center of the hole. My impression is when the hole was either punched or drilled too much force was applied. As for the cracks on the bottom, they seem to
be centered right where screws to hold down the plate are located. I bet the screws they are using are too long and caused the cracks.

I will call Horizon tomorrow and see if any others have the problem and what might be done about it. I'll check back and post what I find out. But I suggest you check your
boat and see if any of the above applies to your boat before it gets worse.

Cheers

[rol243]

can you get the dealer that sold you this hull to make a claim for a replacement hull ? you shouldn,t have to contact the main supplier [ horizon hobbies ] .

[John P]

Thanks for the suggestion. I live in the next county and would like to avoid having to drive that far again. He was the only one in my state that had the boat at the time. That's why I was willing to go there.

[martin]

There is a guy over on RC Groups from New Zealand that recently posted about several cracks in the bottom of his UL-19 that he only ran a few times, I understand Horizon are sending him a new hull.

[fweasel]

And his cracks were just gel coat related, from the description. Nothing to like the separation described here. Surely Horizon will replace this hull under warranty as well.

[martin]

There slightly more than the usual gel coat cracks that you get with a good bit of running, after all wasn't this after only the second time out. Guy must be pretty peeved after spending what he said was $1000 in New Zealand. The point I was making is that this guy's hull cracked & they are replacing the hull with a new one.

[fweasel]

There slightly more than the usual gel coat cracks that you get with a good bit of running, after all wasn't this after only the second time out. Guy must be pretty peeved after spending what he said was $1000 in New Zealand.

indeed.

[JimClark]

How many times did he blow it over?

[MADRCER]

Some key info on the guy that got a replacement UL-19 hull for the Gel coat cracks from Horizon on the other forum. He placed an order for a $900.00 Zelos 48 as well from them on his call to support on the UL-19, so I'm sure that helped persuade them to replace his hull.

[Clintnz]

Yes they are sending me a new hull.

[Steven Vaccaro]

can you get the dealer that sold you this hull to make a claim for a replacement hull ? you shouldn,t have to contact the main supplier [ horizon hobbies ] .

I personally would suggest calling horizon direct. Call them for support, since it's their product. Then the hull goes straight to you and you cut out the middle man(the hobby shop).

This happens for many items. When my refrigerator broke I called the company who made it, I probably could have called Home Depot but why do that when in the end the manufacturer is going to do the repair.

Sent from my SM-N950U using Tapatalk

[John P]

Hi All,

This is a follow up to my original post regarding the spider web cracks and deck separation on my UL-19.

Thanks to those who replied.

After reading my receipt from the shop that I purchased the boat from, it pretty clearly stated: "No returns, no exchanges and warranty to be handled by manufacturer".
He was the only one in NC that had the boat on the shelf is the reason I didn't buy it locally. Lesson learned, YES!

The good news is that after contacting Horizon, they requested some pictures of the problems. After they saw them they agreed that the hull should be replaced under
warranty. They requested that the old hull be sent back to them (at their expense) so their QC guys could take a look at it.

The new hull has been shipped and would have been here by now except for the 9" of snow we got last Wednesday. It will be in my hot little hands this Tuesday 01/23.

Meanwhile, since Horizon now has boats in stock I decided to purchase another complete boat to use for spare parts since it was financially advantageous.
I ordered and received it already from my local shop, King R/C. We inspected the hull and didn't find any spider cracks and the deck seems more substantial than
my original A model hull. If anyone is interested in purchasing a UL-19 I wouldn't hesitate to recommend one. It looks to me like the B models have solved the problems
like I had.

This is the first time I have ever had a problem with a Horizon distributed product. Overall I am very pleased with the response from Horizon Support.
I have been a customer of their products since forever. Now I am even more likely to buy and recommend their products.

If there are any R/C boaters in the Greensboro/Winston Salem area I would love to hear from you and maybe get together this coming season.
We live near Belews Lake where I run my boats and have a 22 ft Larson with plenty of room as a recovery boat.

I hope everyone has a Happy 2018.

John P

[John P]

To Jim Clark,

I can't speak for anyone else but the answer to your question with regard to my boat is zero times.

I'm not sure if you were referring to my post or not but felt an answer was in order.

Cheers,

John P