Rebuttal to PS's New Boat Review of Hunter 320

[Sam Marks]

This is provided to all Hunter owners for general information. It is our response to Practical Sailor's October New Boat Review of the Hunter 320:"Dan - Just finished reviewing the 1 October New Boat Review of the Hunter 320. What struck us most was not the information contained in the article, which was probably very true, but the arrogance and condescending tone of the article.The reviewer seems to think that production boats are not worth the material to build them and that anybody who owns one is not worthy to be called a sailor. Some people are content to own a sailboat which is only intended for inshore or coastal sailing. Many Hunter owners turn into high-performance sailors after getting experience with coastal sailing!We are proud Hunter owners. Not everyone can afford a custom yacht. Hunter (and other production boat manufacturers) has made it possible to own a nice sailboat without mortgaging our souls. The boats are reasonably priced, well made and believe it or not can be raced, in spite of what your reviewer thinks. Hunter owners race their boats quite admirably and win a good portion of the time. Owners of larger Hunter sailboats take them to the Caribbean, across the Atlantic and other far-flung places. As for the Hunter 320 not being an offshore boat, we are sure Hunter agrees.As one of the two largest builders of sailboats in the US, we guess Hunter is doing something right.Next time you review a "production boat" please stick to the facts and keep the innuendoes and disparaging remarks for the editorial room."If you feel the same way we do and subscribe to PS, please let Dan Spurr know your feelings. His email address is: PSBelvoir@aol.com

 

[Carl Dupre]

One Factual Error

We also read the review. We probably did not sense the condescending "production boat" tone quite as strongly as you did (maybe we have just gotten immune to it at this point), but we did pick up one very significant factual error in the review that we plan to send in to PS. In the review they noted that none of the deck hardware had backing plates, only extra plies of fiberglass, which they cited as a "serious ommission". In fact, what they apparently believed to be "extra plies" was really embedded aluminum plates encapsulated within the fiberglass. The existance of these embedded backing plates is known to both Hunter owners and dealers, and it surprised us that PS never bothered to check that point out, especially since it was the only point in the entire review that they specifically cited as a "serious ommission". Since this was the only "serious ommission" issue in the review we believe that they SHOULD have made some attempt to verify the point; maybe the failure to verify is where that "condescending attutide" really shows itself!It's really a shame. We respect and rely on PS evaluations and reviews quite a bit because they are one of the few publications that isn't suspected of selling its soul for advertising $$$. I hope that this rather glaring error gets reported to them from numerous directions and perhaps causes them to reflect on their reviewing procedures a bit.

 

[Bruce Grant]

Yet Another reason why I gave up my subscription

I think the biggest reason that I gave up my subscription to PS is the attitude described.I also found it interesting how when they made a mistake and it was pointed out by the manufacturer or user of a product, they would down play the error in their testing.Overall, I didn't feel that the reporting that they did was all that beneficial, I actually found that doing my own homework turned up important items that were either left unclear by the report or totally missed.I guess I choose to vote with my dollars and my vote was to spend my money elsewhere.My 2 cents worth (of which PS will see 0)Regards.Bruce.Neon Moon (Proud Hunter 320 Owner)