In going through all my safety gear, I went ahead and took my Zodiac coastal (6 person) liferaft down to Vane Brothers to get inspected and repacked. I had it done it two years ago as well. It's usually around $500 to inspect and repack the thing.
They called and told me the thing failed it's pressure/inflation test and was leaking at some of the seams as well as through parts of the fabric. They said the fabric appeared to be deteriorating. The prognoses was it would cost as much to repair the life raft as just buy a new one. This raft is 10 years old and he said they typical life expectancy for a raft was 10-15 years.
I'm going to go pick up the old raft from them next week as well as buy a new one... but a couple of thoughts..
These things are obviously not something you can buy and forget about. Can you imagine the feeling of pulling the painter line to inflate only to discover the damn thing won't hold air? Also.. it's hard to say it gave me 10 years of good service as I never used it... but... is what it is...
I'm going to bring the old one home and blow it up in the shop just to see what the things are like since I've never been in one.. might be a fun thing to use to practice on once in a while...
Also, my old one had to be inspected annually to get certified and he said the new ones only need to be serviced every 3 years so it'll save some $$ there.
They called and told me the thing failed it's pressure/inflation test and was leaking at some of the seams as well as through parts of the fabric. They said the fabric appeared to be deteriorating. The prognoses was it would cost as much to repair the life raft as just buy a new one. This raft is 10 years old and he said they typical life expectancy for a raft was 10-15 years.
I'm going to go pick up the old raft from them next week as well as buy a new one... but a couple of thoughts..
These things are obviously not something you can buy and forget about. Can you imagine the feeling of pulling the painter line to inflate only to discover the damn thing won't hold air? Also.. it's hard to say it gave me 10 years of good service as I never used it... but... is what it is...
I'm going to bring the old one home and blow it up in the shop just to see what the things are like since I've never been in one.. might be a fun thing to use to practice on once in a while...
Also, my old one had to be inspected annually to get certified and he said the new ones only need to be serviced every 3 years so it'll save some $$ there.
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