Northwest Fishing Reports

I've seen a lot of smoker crafts for sale and was wondering what kind of quality they are? I had an Alaskan way back that leaked like a bear at the rivets. Just wondering if this is typical?

A friend of mine had a 2004 16' Smoker "Millentia" or some name like that, that after 3 years held water like swiss cheese. I see the newer fish/ski smokercrafts are at least welded at the seams

Any riveted boat can have issues - especially if you dont have good zincs. Smoker Craft had a bad rep on their riveted boats a few years back.

I dont know if all their boats are riveted now or not. We bought a Phantom 202 two years ago and its been great. We love it. Its all welded and the thicknesses they used are industry standard and the welds look great to me.

The only issues we have had have been with the fuel gauge being intermittent on rare occasions and some bubbles in the paint that showed up about 6 months after we bought it. They took it back and repainted the entire thing with no hassle at all. They even fixed a small ding we put in it running into a dock.

On the fuel gauge, I dont know if its the gauge (Sierra) or the sender, but lately it gets stuck sometimes for a few hours or minutes and then starts working again and works fine for weeks or months.

They offered to fix it even though its now out of warranty (because we reported it when it was in warranty) if we brought it back in, but we have been too lazy to do that. I get more accurate fuel info from my sounder anyway, so Im not all that bothered.

The Lunds, WeldCraft and some of the other big name boats come with better features and accessories but you are going to pay a good bit extra for that.

Having worked on and sold smoker crafts for a local dealer, I can say that if it's used gently they are fine. The worst of it usually occurs when salt gets under the floor boards and begins to cause corrosion and some times electrolysis at riveted points.
On the newer models the welds seem to be ok and have heard good things from prior customers. The first welded smokers were actually contract hulls built by alumaweld and rigged and outfitted by smoker in there Oregon facility which I do believe is all but closed now. If you have other questions pm me and I can give ya more details.

Thanks guys for the input. Think I'll avoid them.