Has anyone else had issues with Swamp Ratt Mud Motors?
I bought two of them and a buddy of mine bought one a couple of weeks into the Missouri Duck season this year to put on our new Four Rivers Layout Boats which I might mention are great boats but we have had nothing but problems with these motors.
I was stranded 3-4 miles from the truck multiple times when these units completely failed and it has not just been one motor but every motor has had issues.
The first time out all three motors emergency kill switches quit working.
The first time on a boat my buddies transom clamp bracket bent while tightening it into a piece of Oak plywood on the transom of the Four Rivers Boat.
The second or third time out one of the motors had a shaft bearing blow apart and lock the entire shaft up. This motor was replaced with a new unit which has not ran right from day one.
The second original motor mounting bracket broke off and allowed the entire motor to fall off of the boat and had we not caught it it would have ended up on the ground.The very next day the bolt which holds the U-joint yoke to the motor shaft flew out and allowed the key stock which never was secure in the shaft to fly completely out and the shaft spun in the yoke heating the motor up so bad that it started making all kinds of noise.(I was told that these bolts had Loc-tite on them but when I checked my buddies motor and my second motor none of the motors had Loc-tite on them and the bolts were not tight at all.)
The handle mounting brackets on all of the motors bent in half while I was running the motors.

These guys advertise that the motor spins 180 degrees into boat for transport but they told me that the mounting bracket broke because I was hauling my boats with the motors attached even though I have fully supported the transoms.
I have spent hundreds of dollars on fuel as well as countless numbers of hours waiting on parts or being towed to the truck when I should have been hunting.
After so many issues I requested that the owners of this company take their motors back and refund our money since I had some type of issues with these motors over 65% of the time I used them and I did not try to hunt every day of season(I can not even imagine trying to use them every day of season). These guys are wanting to accept no responsibility for the failures and have even called the individual I bought the boats from and asked him if I had torn the boats up and implied that I have been tearing their motors up on purpose. (That would be real real smart on my part to try to strand myself miles from the truck just so I could tear their motors up and the thing that is even more impressive is that the fiberglass Four Rivers Boats have held up to me but these motors can not handle what the boat can) I guess we can call it a difference in quality control and we can contribute it to the fact that the boats were proven before they were marketed but the guys making the motors saw a chance to make some quick money and marketed a product that should still be in R&D stages.

These guys have assured me that they will fix or replace the motors but when 4 of 4 have failed I do not get warm fuzzy feelings running out into the marsh or onto Truman Lake with anything that these guys have made. (They are refusing to refund our money and told me to get their motors fixed and sell them to someone else so they do not mind having their junk pawned off on someone else but I do not feel good about selling my problem to someone else so I guess we can call it an issue of integrity.
The guys at Swamp Ratt assure me that I am the only one having problems with their product (every time I have issues they have a new and improved part so someone else must be complaining) so I wanted to personally ask if anyone else is having issues similar to the ones I have described and if you are have these guys tried to say that the problem is not their issue and blame it on you?

I am not wanting to hound on this company but I also do not want others to deal with what I am dealing with since we spent well over $4000 on motors less than 60 days ago and of the 30 or so times that I tried to hunt I only got to hunt about 10-12 times without a motor problem of some type.

(You can't kill ducks if you can't get to where they wanna be)

Isn't the guy that owns that company that fireman asshole that got mad at me for rooting out the trolls? Only to discover that he had been trolling on this site ever since he joined. Ain't seen him around much since he got called out. Looks like he wants to tuck his tail and run out on his customers also.

This right here is why you should be careful who you do business with. Especially when dealing with these little po-dunk companies. He got mad at me for recommending reputable companies....This is why I do that.

Sorry you got put in this situation. Hopefully you can get it worked out.

They were local and seemed to be good guys but I am not nearly as impressed now that they have my money!

Wish I had found this site before I purchased the motors!
I would have never made the mistake!

Bad deal for sure, sorry to hear you had a bad experience. I have looked at his motors and look pretty good (standing on the ramp). I hear ya on the R&D at the expence of full paying customers. Hope it works out for you. You wouldn't be in the KC area would you? I would like to get a closer look at thses motors if you wouldn't mind.

Pat

Yes I am actually in the Lee's Summit area
The motors look OK but the engineering,quality control, reliability, and customer satisfaction do not match what you see on the surface.
I would be happy to meet with you some time.
I am supposed to be getting contact info on a guy in Kearney Mo who makes a good motor so hopefully we can get a local motor company who has good quality so that we can have the best layout boats and a good strong mud motor company at our door step.

Hunt4riv. ,

Truth be known, I live in Kearney and started a new MM company last year. Were you working on a house in LS last week for a friend of mine? Funny if that is you.

i have a buddy that bought two of there motors.nice guys,smiled the whole time he was handing them money.we found out the hard way the kill switch doesnt work.handle brackets bend,and berrings blow up when your miles from no where.when we called them thay told us its because the berrings are the cheapest that can be bought.and there plan is to not reorder them after there stock is used up.i want to remove straps from trailer one day and had the of the motors come crashing down on me on the loading ramp.the main steel plate that holds the motor had broke where the weld was.we called them once again and was told "iam hunting up there to day and i will bring you parts to fix it.i will be there at noon"this was six in the morning.so at three therty that after noon he showed up with the part.and started to tell me how stupid i was for leaving my motor on the boat when transported it.when i first got the motors i was told just leave them attached to the boat.now im stupid for leaving them attached.so after being a total asshole and pressing his luck with me,he tell me about a guy in missippi that his motor fail off in the middle of the hi-way and was destroyed.and now thay use a thicker bracket because of the cracking problem.dont get my wrong i like getting fucked.just not by these assholes and not while im paying them money.so please take it from me save your self money,time and anger.go some where else and buy a good one.

This sucks!! Thats why I build my own. I trust mine more than any other factory built motor. That being said I looked at these motors and thought they were junk at first glance. I could never buy a new mud motor because with my luck this is what would happen. And If the builder was local I'd throw 3 of those motors through his fuckin door and shove the 4th one up his ass!! Then do my best to bang his wife!! JMO!!

Are these the new aluminuim models? I just bought a older steel frame only from them a month ago.

Just googled them, they look like junk. So much so I deleted them off my history screen. Lol. Sorry for your luck guys but you may have saved some of your fellow hunters the same PITA y'all are going through.

Academy??????????/

Fireman, you should have driven out to him to give him the replacement. As for your 3 long years of R&D I've never heard of this happening so severly to one person from any other company. I would suggest machining your own parts. Your transom mounts look real cheesy. You should refund his money on the motors and let the poor guy have a fresh start at buying from someone else. First he wasn't satisfied with your product, secondly it still broke down after fixing it numerous times, thirdly it would be the right thing to do!

Man I just read this and I mean all of it. I am sorry for your bad luck guys. I went to there site and looked at there mud motors. They look cheap and they have nothing to make them standout from any other company. At least backwater has a bad ass cavatation plate. If this guy can't make a quality mud motor maybe he should stick to putting out fires. It's all fine and great that you brought the man the parts but what if he was in another state. Then what? I be damn if you would talk to me like that if your pos left me stranded. That shit don't fly down here in Texas. You would be walking with 3 feet. Two of your own and one of mine up your ass.

This thread has got some of the longest gosh damn paragraphs, shit, i'm tired of reading....lmao

yah, lots of readin.

two things he posted to defend his porduct.
1- most of the issues were with parts produced by other manufactures, that he put on his motor.
if you use out souurced parts YOU have to stand behind them or else get a better source. thats no defence.
that would not be a good slogan, WE BUILD GREAT MOTORS WITH SHIT PARTS.

2- he replaced the broken parts with improved parts.
well it would appear he is R&Ding on the customers dime.

i can understand redesignes. that usally makes a product better, not a fix for problems that have occurred. they need to be reliable first. then you make changes to to make the product better.

Ya u totally agree,

That fireman dude should be banned, being he is a MM manufacturer

damn......id have to talk to a lawyer and look at a civil court case....maybe the lemon law would apply to this situation. If there are others out there that have had such poor performance from this mudmotor, new, fixed or refixed then there is the possibility to do a class action which would prolly bankrupt him and put him out of business so he dosent scam anyone else. I would have to say that unless you take him to civil court then there is not a chance in hell you will see any of your money and will be stuck with a broke mm. Have a lawyer send them a letter first, requesting them take back their pos and refund your money. Also have that lawyer go through ever legal action you can take and you personally write a confirmed delivery letter detailing what your options are and what you will be doing if the refund is not met by a certain date. File complaints with the bbb and with your state attorney general......That will prolly cause them to cave......lawyers aint cheap and taking the time to defend yourself in court aint either. But for an individual, lawyers will write letters and consult with you at a pretty fair price. Better to spend a couple hundred dollars to recoup a couple thousand.

I'm glad that I was able to find this discussion. I was actually about to order one of these motors within the week. I was going to buy their MM because I like the set up but also because of the customer service.

I will take what I have read from this form and make a purchase else where.

If anyone could suggest a good LT MM manufacture I would greatly appreciate it!!??

Holy shit my eyes hurt after reading this shit.

Go Devil x 2