Sea Rover
This Product Has Been Discontinued
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Sea Rover Description
The Sea Rover is a kayak brought to you by Point 65 Sweden. Read Sea Rover reviews or submit your own review to share with the paddling community. Check out a few other kayak recommendations below or explore all kayaks to find the perfect one for you!
Point 65 Sweden
Sea Rover Reviews
Read reviews for the Sea Rover by Point 65 Sweden as submitted by your fellow paddlers. All of the reviews are created and written by paddlers like you, so be sure to submit your own review and be part of the community!
I bought a used Sea Rover in…
I bought a used Sea Rover in fiberglass. I was told owner died before he paddled it and either this is true or it has very few miles on it.
Initial impressions are it is a beautiful boat to look at and has a tall, angled foredeck allowing for plenty of stretch room and paddle clearance.
I did not find an issue with the recessed deck fittings. I didn’t look at them but it hasn’t caught my attention under the deck. Mine has no rudder but I don’t feel a sense of loss.
This is a very large boat. I’m 6’1” and 225lbs and it feels too large for me. I will have to pad out the boat for a better fit. The cockpit opening is huge and I would prefer smaller Keyhole entry. Older paddlers or long legs may enjoy this. For such a large kayak I was surprised and slightly dismayed at how little usable space there is for storage. My Telkwa Sport seems like it holds a third again as much. The skeg takes up space, and the dual day hatches while novel seem to eat into the load. The large angled foredeck doesn’t seem to extend into the bow storage compartment.I’m ambivalent about day hatches. If you like them maybe two is better than one?
Paddling the boat shows rock solid initial stability. I haven’t yet tested secondary hard since my fit is sloppy. I was worried about weather cocking with the high deck but it behaved no more or less than any other boat in 15-25mph winds. Once correct skeg deployment is found the boat tracks true. The boat seems fast for a 25” beam. It’s not a racing boat but you can keep up.
Build quality on my boat seems beautiful, without all the QC issues others report. I have a small leak from the skeg box I need to track down but it is more nuisance than serious.
Final verdict? I like this boat and it’s stability. I had it in moderately rough seas and high wind and it never showed any bad habits. This is not a lively boat, but a rock solid cruiser. If you are a mountain of a human and struggle to fit all of yourself into an NDK, or want a big comfortable stable ride consider this boat.
Boat basics: Point 65 Sea-Rover in carbon-kevlar lay-up 17'3". Roomy cockpit will fit…
Roomy cockpit will fit large paddlers, and has stability to instill confidence in any paddler new or experienced. The body design makes for a fast, quiet moving boat that is lightweight yet rigid. Boasts 4 hatches, including 2 day hatches. The flanges on my model apparently did not take well to the curing process for the carbon-kevlar, as there are about a thousand hairline cracks running radially around the surface where they contact the boat. This has NOT led to any water leakage, but I am concerned about them propagating in the future.
The boat comes with a skeg and a rudder. I have never seen another boat that offers both skeg and rudder, and I am still questioning the need for this. The skeg is sturdy and has a nice flush deck mounted operating control. The Cype Gear made rudder, by contrast is about as poorly planned and designed as possible. First, the rudder comes un-assembled / detached from the boat with no mounting instructions. I should have guessed I would have had a problem with mounting it when I discovered that my boat was delivered without the mounting ferrule for the rudder! After exchanging for a new boat I came up with problem #2… the control cable for deploying the rudder is too short. Furthermore, the bungee-style elastic springs that are used on the rudder for deployment don't allow enough "throw" to retract it only half way out of the water… not fully retracted. The matched tip-toe steering foot-pedals, also supplied by Cype Gear are a poor choice for this boat.
The deck rigging for the boat is flush mounted, thus there are bulges and hardware protruding inside the cockpit area. The foot-pedals hit these in about a third of the usable positions. And also like the Cype Gear rudder, the bungee on the foot-pedals are so tight, it allows for only about a half inch of movement, which when translated to the rudder means nothing. The control lines inside the cockpit hit some of the recessed hardware as well. I recommend installing washers behind the foot-pedal mounting bolts, as the tiny cap-screw heads will easily rip through the hull if any serious pressure is applied to the foot pedals. (It should be noted that I tried contacting Cype Gear and Point 65 several times by e-mail, through their web page and by snail-mail and have had no feedback whatsoever) My suggestion... Forget the rudder.
The seat is a very basic affair. There is no fancy rigging on the back band, and it will pinch your bottom horribly if you lean your weight back (I learned this the hard way more than once). I am installing a block of minicell foam under the back-band to prevent this downward movement.
There is a metal pin behind the cockpit which looked like a security cleat, but it is mounted so close to the deck you cannot pass a lock behind it. I don’t think you could even squeeze a #2 pencil under there it’s so close. So it looks impressive but is useless.
If this was a $400 boat, I would be raving about the weight and handling and such. But being that it was closer to $4000 I don’t think I should have ANY of these issues. I think this was a great design concept that was handed off and poorly executed at the factory.