Interesting new competitor

This company came up in my Facebook feed today. I humored them and watched the video. Interestingly enough they claim to be the fastest pedal powered boat on the water. Lol!
http://wavewalkerboats.com/

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Theres are a lot of makers getting into it now.

Lots of moving parts in pedal boats, lots can go wrong so you need ongoing access to parts and service. That network is going to be hard to match.

Will be interesting to see how many stick around and how many are overnight sensations

Not new. These guys have been around a long time and most all of the new kayak guys use the same basic prop drive that has been available since about the 1990's.

Started with Hydro Bike over 25 years ago. We had one here before the MirageDrive came about.

Not much has changed since then.

May be faster at the top end as they can tweak the prop pitch and put it on a narrow set of hulls, but low end and reverse always suck.

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Matt Miller
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The inherent problem with human prop driven craft regards the inability for the average human to generate enough power to turn a high pitch prop, or enough speed to turn a low pitch prop faster. The Hobie Drive takes advantage of a more efficient system to allow frail humans to actually translate what power we can generate into practical power and speed. There is a reason that God didn't put a propellor on a penguin's ass...

Lol!

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2015 Hobie Tandem Island Hibiscus
"Third Normal Form"

• Trampolines
• Hobie cover
• Davis Spar Fly
• Kayakbob's Sprayskirts
• Spine Board Hakas

Pedal powered watercraft have been around since at least the early 1980's, associated more with cycling than boating or fishing. There was peak in interest in this kind of watercraft following the American cycling success in the 1984 Los Angeles Olympic games and Greg Lemond's victories in the Tour de France. The idea was to build the fastest human powered watercraft, the speed record distances are similar to traditional cycling events.

I don't think WaveWalker boats are competing with Hobie Mirage kayaks on any level. WaveWalker boats are geared towards the fitness/cycling/recreation market, not weekend fishermen. Cyclists are a dedicated bunch, they will buy pedal powered anything. Pedal powered watercraft hold many of the world speed records for human powered watercraft. Harry Howard, the engineer behind WaveWalker, is the brother of John Howard, an influential cyclist who once held the world speed record for bicycles at 152 mph.

One of these pedal powered boats may very well be the fastest "commercially available" watercraft available. A lot depends on who's pedaling. I believe the human powered speed record for water is about 20 mph. They weren't heading to a fishing spot.

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Some of the higher end sail drives use variable pitch props. I think it's more of a function of feathering for drag though, and not so much power.

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2015 Hobie Tandem Island Hibiscus
"Third Normal Form"

• Trampolines
• Hobie cover
• Davis Spar Fly
• Kayakbob's Sprayskirts
• Spine Board Hakas

Quote for the Ages

Definitely a big part (and unique as far as recreational kayaking goes)!

Wow, I just watched their assembly video, and thats a whole lot of steps to assemble and dissemble their product. I would lose interest in using it, purely from the fact of what it takes to assemble it alone, not even thinking of be tired from a day on the water and having to disassemble and pack it away!

Here is a new pedal drive and Torqeedo system called Helix from Wilderness that looks interesting also.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kSyzdgUxVFY



Here is an article about it ( http://www.yakangler.com/kayaks-and-gea ... icast-2016 )

Interesting they are saying "patent pending", I thought it was illegal to state "patent pending" on anything anymore.

Lots of cool stuff coming out, I'm not planning on buying any of it, I'll stick with my Hobies.

FE

all these clunky drive systems... poor buyers. my dad used to think his propel was the best, it has reverse he said LOL guess i have to sell both our PA's to get a 2017 with reverse