RE: [Paddlewise] Sea Kayaker Reviews

Ralph wrote (and I snipped some):
> My beef with the reviewers part of the writeup is not in the reviewers
> themselves but rather in their being anonymous and the snippet/soundbite
> format. Kevin felt I had insulted the expert paddlers testing the boats
> and asked if I have met any of the reviewers.  Without appearing to be
> mocking, my answer would be "How would I know if I met one? They are not
> identified!"  Kevin also said that they are often instructors and tour
> guides and some also write for Sea Kayaker.  Wouldn't the reviews be
> better understood if we knew who they were, especially the paddlers who
> have written articles for Sea Kayaker.  If say, one of the testers is
> Nigel Foster or Chris Cunningham, I would like to know that.  Why the
> secrecy, or am I missing something?
>
I think the original reason for using only initials was to keep us
manufacturers from knowing who to bribe. For instance know that I just found
out Kevin is a Sea Kayaker tester I'd better start treating him better.

> On to the snippet format.  It lacks cohesiveness.  It is certainly
> alright to have the snippets for discussing whether there is legroom and
> you have a 5 ft. 2 in. person commenting and a 6 ft 4 in. person adding
> her two cents.  Those are add-ons of important comparative information
> to a reader.  But a review is always better off if a review is filtered
> through one known source who is upfront about his likes and dislikes and
> experiences and does an honest job of looking at all key aspects of a
> review in a more narrative format.  Sound bites, as we sadly know from
> the political arena, don't always get right the totality of what was
> said.

Chris Cunningham edits the comments and has most likely paddled the kayak as
well. I think he tries to succinctly get the information from the testers
across to the readers in a relatively consistent format using the tester's
words where possible.

>
> If this is so, and I trust Matt on this, then, boy, a big point should
> be made of this.  Moreover, Sea Kayaker should refuse to review plastic
> boats because, by what Matt says, the reviews are basically useless if
> the variation can be so wide in the actual boat you buy.  Or am I
> missing something here?
>

My experience is that I get a wider variation in turning times on retests I
have done on plastic kayaks. The one I discussed was startlingly different.
Most of the characteristics written about (pounding, wetness of ride,
leaking hatches, sticking rudder pedals, etc. etc) will be pretty much the
same even though the rocker changes some between boats and affects tracking,
turning and probably weathercocking. This variability is also not very
widely known among kayakers and I certainly don't have the data to say that
all plastic kayaks are variable (only that some of them are in relation to
the repeatability of turning times and I haven't seen that in glass kayaks).


> Why should a person be an expert reader to figure out the reviews?  If
> so, shouldn't that be stated as a warning to the person who is a
> newcomer or not so well versed in reading between the lines?  What about
> when the review is copied by the manufacturer and distributed as a
> source of information?  The person reading the handout would be at a
> lost to detect the nuances.

Welcome to the real world. Unless you know thyself how can you know what is
important to you and what isn't. Chrome and upholders sell cars, why do you
expect it would be any different with kayaks? Often times its the gimmicks
we can see that get used to differentiate what we think we want from what we
don't think we need. Some stores think the customer is always right and
cater to their whims. I argue with them and try to educate them so that they
don't make a stupid mistake because of a little knowledge or miseducation
they learned or misinterpreted from somewhere else. Some customers
appreciate that and others just think I'm a crank and go elsewhere. It is
always the customers final choice though. I try to do my best for them even
though they don't always see it that way since I obviously would like to
sell them a kayak.

> Lastly, Matt said "As for a kayak test Czar (even if it was me and had
> paddled over 500 different sea kayaks) I think at best that still only
> gives one kayaker's opinion."  That is a nice egalitarian thought but,
> with all due respect, Matt, some kayakers' opinions count more than
> others because of their wide experience, knowledge of design,
> comparative hands-on contact with many models, and a realistic
> expectation of what kayaks can or should do.
>
many of the kayak testers have paddled dozens of kayaks and have a pretty
good idea of the range of handling performance with which to place the
present kayak they are testing. Knowledge of kayak design is not a
prerequisite to knowing how a kayak paddles and feels. In fact one of the
early problems in the reviews was that the testers were trying to explain
why a kayak performed as it did. Two problems I saw with this. One, the
testers often got the explanation wrong, which would tend to mislead the
readers they were trying to help. Secondly if a tester looks at a kayak and
believes it will perform a certain way because of certain features he or she
will bias themselves to look for those characteristics that they are
expecting. I suspect the testers still sometimes make judgments about the
"why" but they usually get edited out of the final review article. Just the
facts, maam. Short of disguising the entire kayak so the testers are blind
to what they are paddling I don't see how their biases can be removed.
For instance in a recent post a Paddlewiser (Dave Williams) liked the way
the Wilderness Systems Cape Horn punched through breakers. Dave guessed that
there must be something about the kayaks bow shape that made it do this.
First, I'd like to know how much experience Dave has had in breakers because
most kayaks punch through them if caught by the dumping wave (and they have
enough momentum to get through). best I could get from his post was he knew
what a Sea Lion would have done. Assuming that the Cape Horn did punch
through at the ideal point (and did this repeatedly in a wide variety of
waves and times of hitting the break). For the sake of argument lets assume
that the Shaman is ideal for this. I think Dave may have missed his guess as
to the reason it worked so well. In fact, I think he may have been looking
to the wrong end of the kayak for an explanation. This kayak has a very
unique stern that is both buoyant and blunt. The buoyancy would resist
sinking under as the bow lifted and thus not allow the bow to point too high
(and get dumped over backwards, as is about to happen in one companies often
used advertising photo--of a needle ended kayak in the surf). That blunt
stern on the Cape Horn may also be serving another function that I have
thought about incorporating into a dedicated surfing kayak. It may be
resisting going in reverse by essentially holding the kayak in place as the
wave sweeps over and past it.  This may be due to the very blunt stern
sections both through buoyancy pushing up (maybe even somewhat in the
direction of the bow as the kayak stands on its tail somewhat--as well as
holding the kayak at a shallower angle than a stern that could sink) and the
blunt end which could not easily slice through the water in reverse so
resists going backwards mechanically as well. My point is the reader doesn't
necessarily need to know why it works just that it does.

> Which gets us back to how this all started.  Matt had said that the
> reviews on the web page that was cited should be taken with a grain of
> salt.  Fundamentally because we don't know who the reviewers are, their
> experience and, if they are owners of the model, their possibly wanting
> to justify to themselves their purchase.  And then added that the
> reviews in Sea Kayaker are better or more trustworthy or something, I
> forget the exact term used.

I said a verrrrry large grain. The reviewers were self selected and we
readers have no idea of their motivations or skills. Some looked to me like
shills for the companies ad departments. A lot of flowery prose and puffery
that sounded good but didn't tell me anything made me suspicious in some
instances that maybe the reviewers actually were the companies admen in
disguise. Maybe a reporter type could try to track the reviewers down and
search for connections to the manufacturers to see if there may be a scandal
brewing here.
Sea kayaker appears to be making an attempt to find expert paddlers with
wide experience and then insulate them from the advertisers (but I think
I've figured out about 1/2 of them from the initials, sex and sizes given,
its kind of a game with me, but I hadn't suspected KW until he gave himself
away on this list--maybe they should have given them all code names and
forbidden them to paddle with any manufacturer or dealer when they are
testing a kayak).
I obviously can't be a tester for Sea Kayaker because I am a designer and
dealer. Even if I could be objective it wouldn't look good.
Of course, this didn't stop Canoe Magazine several years back when they
tested some doubles (under a prior editor). The head tester worked for (and
owed a lot to) the manufacturer of one of the kayaks being tested and the
editor was also good friend of that companies owners. The readers were never
told this. The kayak apparently didn't do so well in the tests but you would
have never known it by the flowery say nothing prose that was printed. The
review of that particular kayak looked to be written by the companies ad
man, what a real puff piece. I thought it all bordered on being criminal
fraud. Sea Kayaker's reviews are far from perfect but they are head and
shoulders above any other kayak reviews out there (at least that I know of).

Finally, I have been meaning to ask John Winters what his suggestions were
for objective tests that Sea Kayaker should do. It would be a lot easier for
us readers to judge their value to us and if they were practical and
relevant if we knew what he actually proposed.

Matt Broze
http://www.marinerkayaks.com




>

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