Hopefully that picture displays properly.
So I broke down and got the Spring Creek stabilizers. I bought the "Mango" color after reading on this forum that it was closer to Hobie's Papaya color than Spring Creek's yellow. Its NOT an exact match, but its not bad. The Universal receiver and the other hardware is quite sturdy! The amas are stout as well and feel like the same material as the kayak hull.
Other than the color, I noticed two things right away:
1. Whereas the Hobie Sidekicks can swing fore-to-aft, the SpringCreeks can rotate port-to-starboard given that they are mounted on round aluminum pipe. Not sure how I feel about this, but when clamped down they require some force to rotate. It will probably be ok on the water.
2. The brackets for the universal receiver (the housing bar in the center) require through hull drilling and recommend nut, bolt, and washers to held everything in place. HOWEVER, I cannot reach the underside of the deck (neither from mid nor aft hatches) where I am mounting the brackets to use the supplied nut. Spring creek supplies some sort of expanding rubber plug to use in this case with supplied screws, but now you need to drill 1/2" holes instead of 1/4". I will proceed cautiously.
15mph winds predicted for Sunday, might be ok for a brief test of the new setup.
