This is a great find. The only disappointing thing was the size of the box it was delivered in from B & H Photo:

Couldn’t it have been sent in a bubble mailer? 😕

Disassembly & Prep

If you’re looking to gently take off your original jack, it (dis)assembles the same way as the replacement.

My old jack was bent, so there was no point in saving it. I cut the wire but made sure to not cut the strain relief sleeve. Alas I realized you must disassemble the old jack to get the strain relief sleeve out anyway.

Once it’s free, drop the sleeve into the new replacement casing.

Put the sleeve and casing on the wire, followed by the included clear insulation sleeve.

It’s imperative you put these on before soldering, because you can’t put them on after soldering 😬

Carefully strip the outer cable sheath. It’s very flexible and rubbery. Inside the three wires don’t have traditional insulation. They have a braided insulation that is similar to the wire itself. Separate them and wet your fingers to keep the twists tight.

Soldering

To keep everything together, pre-tin the wires.

Here’s the layout of the jack. I double checked with a multimeter before soldering.

I started by soldering the sleeve wire. Then I used a tweezers to thread the other wires through the holes.

Test & Final Assembly

With all wires soldered, but before crimping, test it out. I carefully plugged the headphones into a computer and verified sound in both ears and double checked correct left-right balance.

With everything confirmed working, we can now button it all up. First crimp the jack to the cable sheath with a needle nose pliers.

Then slip the insulation sleeve over the jack.

Screw on the outer casing and enjoy!

I liked the features of two kayaks: the Perception Joyride 10 and the Pelican Mustang 100X. Both still recreational boats but with some extra stuff for fishing.

My friend Joe has a Perception Swifty and I really like how solidly built it is. I started leaning towards the Perception Joyride, but as other reviewer note – it is too expensive! So I subscribed to Dick’s sale notifications via text and waited…

Finally the price listed was “view price in cart” so I did and checked out, saving almost $200 off the regular price.

How is it?

Construction, like the Swifty, is very sturdy. The handles are molded into the boat so they’re indestructible. For car transportation, I’d normally use the handle eyelets to run an extra strap to the rear hitch. The handles are too big for my normal strap hooks. I’ll have to add some rope or something. Bringing it home from the store was unnerving because the van has no sunroof and normally the handle strapping is what lets me know the kayak is still up there.

What I sort of forgot was that to equip fishing rod holders, I’d be investing another $100 in ram mount equipment. If you just want a couple of holes to drop your rod into, the Swifty and Mustang options are good choices.

The boat itself is great. It tracks very nicely. Strangely there’s no drain plug like on my cheapo Menards rig, so when the cockpit gets rain inside, it can be tricky to dump. I got a huge car wash sponge from Walmart to assist. I’ll likely buy a cockpit cover to keep water out during storage.

The back compartment is completely sealed from the cockpit, which is nice. In my old kayak any water inside the boat was going to get to the back too.

New Paddle Too

Like the kayak itself, I over-analyzed what to get. Deciding on length seemed to be the hang-up. I found this Paddling.com article to be helpful.

But there are several ways to measure. My torso is 30.5″ which calls for 210-230cm. My height is 5’10” and the boat is 29.5″ wide which calls for a 240cm paddle.

Having spent too much money at Dick’s on the kayak, I had a $20 reward to put towards a paddle. The Vibe Journey Paddle is the one that is in stock at every store, and it was on sale for $37 so I could get it for less than $20 with my reward. But it only comes in 230cm 🤔

Ultimately it didn’t matter because compared to the hardware store paddle I had, it was larger. 😎

On the water

On the lake it tracks very nicely. Not that the Menards one was bad, but this is clearly a step up. It’s got a nice place to hold my phone (put it in a dry bag!) and a water bottle, plus an indent to rest the paddle.

The problem that I have is not with the kayak, it’s with my nearest waterbody. I wish is that Moore Lake wasn’t bisected by a state highway 😞 It’s so easy to go down there, but it’s not as relaxing as it could be. The noise from the cars nearby is unrelenting. It’s especially bad if you want to go for a quick paddle after work, when everyone is battling their way through rush hour.