Arkansas Canoe Club Forums

After less than 20 trips, my dry top is delaminating. Everything else about the top looks new. The shell, gaskets and most of the seam tape. They responded to an email, told me that I was out of warranty period and offered to sell me another POS for a discount.

I understand that the company is protected by the warranty, but the top is falling apart WAY before I would wear it out.

.... Never again..

If the breathable material is delaminating, that is normally considered a manufacturing defect based on my experience with two Marmot rain jackets in the past ten years.

Sorry to hear you are having this problem.

Not the end of the world for me.. It should "last" another season.

I just wanted to warn anyone who was curious about L6 products. Not worth it.

Good to know when companies won't back their products.

Stohlquist may have a lot of issues but based on everything I've heard they take care of them. Of course kokatat is the best. You might try one of those two next time.

Planning on some stohlquist suits if the instructor deal is as good as I've heard...
Hopefully not too many issues with those. Tom B. seems to like his suits.

Never had a Level Six garment.

Way back in the days when Gore Tex was relative new stuff, I had a Kokatat regular coated dry top.

Wore it long enough for the gaskets to wear out (back in those days I spent just about every week end swimming down some rocky creek in Arkansas). Sent it back to Kokatat for new gaskets.

Got a phone call, words to the effect:
Kokatat: Dave, I have your dry top. When I inspected it, it appears the inside coating around the wrist area has excessive wear. I think you need a larger size and there may be a problem with the coating. If you will pay a extra ten dollars for handling I will send you a new dry top size XL?
Dave: I will put a check in the mail today?

When I got the dry top it was Gore Tex----- Yippee

Don't know if that kind of thing still happens but I have been a big fan and customer of Kokatat ever since and never got bad gear from them.

By the way, have used a lot of Stohlquist gear as well. Not quite the quality as Kokatat, but a bit cheaper and has performed really well for me. When the factory was in Nathrop CO I often went by and picked up good deals there. I think they moved a bit south but are still in CO.

Both companies get the job done for me and are recommended.

I bought an NRS Plunge drytop and Stohlquist drypants in the early 2000's and then proceeded to hang them in a dark closet unused for 10 years. When I finally decided two years ago that I wanted to paddle in the winter, I got them out and found that the seam tape glue on the pants had re-liquefied. When I told Stohlquist about it they said they couldn't take back a 10yo piece of gear. I said I didn't think it had just recently gone bad, but they wouldn't do squat. Not that I expected them to, but it has crossed their gear off my list.

I just bought a new Peak UK "Whitewater" drysuit from Gavin Rains. I am really impressed with the quality (I also have a Kokatot Rogue drytop), and like the leg-entry zipper. Hopefully it won't fall apart from lack of use!

I'll put in another plug for Kokatat. My personal experience has been limited to letting them do most of my gasket repairs, but I have friends that sent suits in for minor repairs within maybe the last 3 to 5 years (???) and were sent entire new suits because K said they detected delamination. Also, they have not moved production overseas in order to get cheaper labor. Put those two things together, and I pretty much "have" to buy from them even if they do cost more, simply so that I won't be the world's biggest hypocrite when I criticize big American-based companies that buy everything from China and other places with cheap labor pools.

PS - And I also get a great product!

Cowper, you are correct.. The GMer is the "gold standard" for kayak drysuits.

The top was a bargain that turned out to be an expensive mistake. I'll use it for light days in warmer waters. It's still dry for now.

Shopping... And deciding how many boats to sell.

Cowper wrote:I'll put in another plug for Kokatat. My personal experience has been limited to letting them do most of my gasket repairs, but I have friends that sent suits in for minor repairs within maybe the last 3 to 5 years (???) and were sent entire new suits because K said they detected delamination. Also, they have not moved production overseas in order to get cheaper labor. Put those two things together, and I pretty much "have" to buy from them even if they do cost more, simply so that I won't be the world's biggest hypocrite when I criticize big American-based companies that buy everything from China and other places with cheap labor pools.

PS - And I also get a great product!

I think this post may have put me over the fence... Either way, I finally did it! Got a Gmer!