Wake Tractor (WT-1) by Heyday Boats
 

Hey guys, just wondering if anyone has seen or ridden this thing? it's a little intriguing, especially the price.. who else is interested in this thing? if you've ridden it let me know, thanks!


http://heydayinboards.com/

You just opened a can of worms. It tends to get a lot of hate. I personally have nothing against it if it is what you like. My only problem is that for the same price point, you could buy a decent used wake boat and probably have a better wake and more seating room, storage, etc. The center console position is also weird to me. seems it would be harder to slightly turn to see the rider. Plus nowhere to put a rear view mirror. Honestly, to me, the only logical reason to buy this boat, would be if you live on a lake that has any type of restrictions on lengths of boats allowed on the water (specifically "under 20 feet long").

Agreed. If I'm looking for a cheaper boat I can't see how this is a better option than the Moomba Helix.... unless I need <20'

I have heard that it performs well in terms of wake, but I just don't think the seating would work well. And the engine box looks awful to work in.

For $40k you can get a NICE used Axis A20 with a couple hundred hours.

I bought one back at the end of march and love it so far. I ride on the river a lot and it fits 5 comfortably. I love how it has no carpet and minimal interior pieces. It is super easy to clean up at the end of the weekend. A lot of people in our crew all have boats so we typically roll about 3-6 deep in each boat. I like how it still has mechanical switches so you dont rely on a screen for controls. It has under the floor ballast. The front storage is actually very big and I also have the engine tray storage. In the front storage I have a subwoofer box, 200 pounds of led, anchor, life jacket brick, 2 surfboards, 4 bumpers, tie up ropes, and still have some room to spare. In the engine storage tray I keep riding vests, wakeboard and surf ropes, and peoples bags they may bring. I keep a cooler behind the drivers seat. People tell me it feels a lot more roomy than it looks and almost everyone that gets in it is impressed. If there is just 2 of us in the boat I fill the stock ballast and put a 600 sack on each of the driver. When the rider cuts out you feel no pull on the boat. The engine feels real peppy being in a smaller boat with 350hp. In real choppy water it cruises good around 22 mph but anything more and it porpoises. The stock mirror is also cheesy so I took it off. So far I am happy with it

Thanks for the review, I was hoping one would pop up soon. Like the delivery or hate it, more budget oriented wake boats aren't a bad thing.

Any pictures of it in action?

Nice! Glad to hear people are enjoying them.

I'm all for this boat, I think it's a great idea. It's not exactly how I would have gone about executing it, but the concept is there. I had a long discussion with the rep about why a center console is a bad idea for a wakeboard boat, and he listened, so we will see if they make changes going further

What's the wake like?

I don't have any hands on experience, but I like the idea of a affordable boat that comes with factory warranties. I can also see the appeal in making new boat to compete with the used market. What I don't like is that it is < 20'. It seems the new market is all bigger so I would think at least a 21' boat would do better.

For pics in action yall can check out my instagram lawmaster891
The wake is real nice for what it is. The wake is much wider at 70 feet on stock ballast than what I am used to. So with stock ballast I ride at 60-65 ft at 22.5 mph. With the 600 sacks on each side of the driver I can comfortably ride at 70 ft. The wake kind of reminds me of a smaller xstar wake. I will try and start uploading more instagram pictures of me wakeboarding behind it. I wakeboard with a bunch of people on the river but it has been flooded so I have been out with some other friends on the lake that are more surf oriented. I have mainly been wakeboarding in the mornings with one other rider so it has been difficult to get more pics riding lately.

HeyDay WT-1 questions
 

I recently purchased a 2017 WT-1 demo without instructions...maybe you can assist.
You mentioned 200 lbs lead up front and a 600 sack on each side of the driver. Exactly what are 600 sacks and why the need. Has it anything to do with minimizing the porpoising. The porpoising is irritating when water skiing....how best to minimize it. I also have an optional rear elevator plate that is controlled by an actuator that has a total travel of maybe 3 inches...I have no idea how best to utilize it...seems worthless to me with the little travel...maybe 10 degrees up & down at best.

It is my impression the only need for taking on ballast is when wake surfing...not wake boarding or straight skiing.

Any assistance will be appreciated...the dealer has been worthless in providing insights on how to use the boat.

Regards,
Brent

BrentL I've never been on a HeyDay but I'll help with your general questions.

Lead in the nose will help with porpoising but its' probably more for the add weight in the back. By his two 600 sacks. (Sacks are just ballast bags, 600 sacks would be 600 pound ballast sacks) go to wakemakers.com if you want ballast bags.

https://www.leadwake.com/

^I use this guy's lead weight bags, It's free shipping.




The elevator plate put all the way down when you start going. Then raise it up after your on plane. If you start porpoising put it back down some.

You should be running full weight for surfing and wakeboarding not skiing.

Thanks for the response jonblarc7.
Lawmaster 891 had the 600# bags to each side of the driver which is about mid-ships...is it best located there or further forward/aft for the best wake during either wake boarding or surfing?
By "full weight:" ...does that mean full ballast tanks & sacks, if available?
I'll have to wait until next year to try the suggested elevator plate operation, but the current up/down length of travel does not give me confidence that there will be a meaningful effect.
Is it just the WT-1 that exhibits porpoising, or is it a factor in all wake boats due to hull shape...it really is a high annoyance during water skiing (no water ballast)...placing additional ballast up front could also help in reducing the bigger wake that some of the water skiers, especially beginners) have difficulty with...am I correct here?
Thanks again.
Brent

all boats will porpoise if not loaded properly. some will porpoise more than others due to hull shape. dropping your wake plate should help keep the bow down.
full weight: all bags full
adding weight to a boat will generally result in a bigger wake. however, weighting the front will also change it's shape. may or may not be a good idea, haven't skied in 30 years.

3" inches of travel is quite a bit for a plate. will make more difference than you think.

I saw one in the wide last month, very strange, the owner was really nice, he bought a raffle ticket at a charity event. the dealer was (supposedly) using the ticket purchase to cover the boat cost. Long story short, he tried to sell it but had no luck so we is using it. It was at the gas station, filling up

I would see if the Russians are building boats, if not, then maybe buy a Heyday

I have no doubt that the boats can perform well for their size. I just personally believe if you buy one you're going to have a hell of a time trying to sell it in future and would stay away just based on that alone.

If you can get one for 15k, or something reasonable, maybe 20k and are willing to lose every penny you spend, go for it, if the dealers cant give them away, and are raffling them to recoup cost, you can probably count on one hand how many have been sold in the states.

there are people buying these boats. You can see what they are selling for here https://www.onlyinboards.com/SoldBoats.aspx

I'm not saying it's the most popular boat on the site, or even close... but the listings for Heyday boats do generate leads.

cool, prices are holding up pretty well. would be nice to have another player in the market

saw one in the dark the other night coming back from mead.
hoping to run into them one of these days and either get a ride or a tow.
intrigued but I think i'd spend my money on a used known than that new.
kinda surprised bayliner didn't change the brand/name to their own brand for some recognition although I know their attempt at an inboard years ago didn't garner a lot of interest/sales.

wait, bayliner? is that who's actually making these?

Yep it's Bayliner. They're ugly AF, resale is terrible & the wave looks small & weak. I'm pretty sure if a Heyday owner rode a Malibu / Axis, Supra, MB wave they'd sell it as fast as they could to upgrade. The only person I ever hear online talking the boat up is a guy who owns a dealership in the south.

Demoed one last week for kicks. Surfed my Centurion all day then went and surfed the Heyday. I would never in my life pay for one of these. The bow was absurdly high out of the water and the wave was trash. Nice concept making a budget boat but wow. Not for me.

Must have been set up wrong. I surfed one last weekend at the wake 9 polar bear and the wake surprised me. Boat used a suck gate and the wake was amazingly good.

If that’s the case buy a good used boat and put a suck gate on it.

I have a fi25 on order and just sold my fi23 so ill pass but believe it or not that Stupid boat out surfed boats twice its price

Now to get you in a bunch I also surfed the supra sl 550 and did not think the wake was much better than the tractor

Post some video of you surfing....

This boat will help all of us. as people buy it, it will never hold value in the wake boat market, and will drive used boats value up. Now, with that said, boat prices are totally out of control.

I like the idea of having a budget boat out there for people to buy if they don't want to spend $70+ on a budget boat like Axis or Moomba. But DAMN, that thing is ugly. You mean to tell me they couldn't make it more attractive and keep the price the same? I would bet i could design that boat to look way better than that dumpster fire.

your fi did? or the tractor?

Why would your opinion matter to me? Your entitled to it.


I could say the same thing about your FI but I don't buy boats based on surf waves!!!! :cool:

I wakeboard! Good Day.

You assume that any boat with a suck gate will outperform the Heyday. That's not true. The Heyday is ugly but they got the hull design right for surfing. Weight it right and it will throw up a surprising wake.

No you couldn't.

The Fi's through a very good wakeboard wake.

So they designed the Hey Dey hull to work well with a suck gate? OK

And yes I could say the FI doesn't "throw" not "through" a good wakeboard wake, because I know a few guys who have ridden it.


It's still opinions!! If you like it, by all means go by it. He asked for opinions and that's all they are.

I have an Enzo. Works great listed and works great with a suck gate. It's really personal preference and whether you want to list or weight evenly.

I've wakeboarded behind an Fi. It's comparable to anything out there. Good chance it wasn't weighted right or you're talking out of your butt.

“Go by it”? You mean, “buy”? Careful when correcting grammar. Log vs speck.

Ok guys no need to get upset. The boat I rode was the 25' tractor. Yes it is ugly No I would never buy one I was just reporting my experience riding behind the boat. The design is Stupid but the one I rode was 60k out the door. It had the mercruiser 6.2 , digital touch screen dash nice Rockford stereo with sub plus 2500 lbs of ballast. Lots of the design features are quirky and novel at best but I think there is a market for this boat. The boat I rode used a suck gate and the wake surprised me. It was reminiscent of the older listed centurion wakes long, clean,lots of push and a nice defined lip. The dealer said more ballast and a surf system were a option. I'm not telling anyone to run out and buy one I'm just saying this boat works wake wise.

When are they going to release the results of the Polar Bear? I always enjoy watching the review videos.

Never knew Heyday had a 25' boat. I had to look. How is it possible they made a 25' boat that has less seating and storage than a 20' boat? The boat has the worst interior layout of any boat I've ever seen. I can't imagine how it could be worse. The engineers really had to work hard to make a seating layout that inefficient. No way that boat is 25' with that little room. I suspect the 25' length includes the 2' platform. If the boat is actually a 23' boat, it still has less usable space and less storage than a 20' boat.

Lots of guys that want an easy to balance wakeboard boat, without the need to go 24mph, or to have the abrupt transition that the Ri's and Fi's have.

No doubt the deep v hull design really makes for an excellent surf wave and ride....... but they aren't "comparable to anything out there" on wakeboard wakes. They have very specific wake attributes, that are not preffered by most riders.

To deny that they possess those attributes, and that they somehow defy the physics of a deep v hull, would be "talking out your butt".

^ that

I only want a steep ass wake when it’s small to medium, and even still it has to balance easy.
Side to side balance is what keeps the G21 from being a truly great boat to me, let alone these deep V wakesurf tanks.

The wakes also crumble when you load the boat up too much


Flat hull> v Hull for wakeboarding (at the stern)

The Opti-V isn't a true deep V in the same way that my Enzo is a deep V. The outside area flattens out which affects the wakeboard wake. So yes, it is comparable. The transition isn't jarring at all.

You guys should really just go demo an Ri.

I demo’d the Fi23, the Ri237, and the Ri257. They all exhibited the typical characteristics.....

Which one should I demo that doesn’t?

Define "comparable" to anything on the market. There are some really good wakes out there so it better be damn good.

Did your demo person weight the boat correctly? Bow weight? Center tab setting? All affect the wakeboard wake. The Fi's and the Ri's are highly tunable. Some people actually knock them for that. Spend the time and you will be rewareded.

Lake Powell with an Ri257 and a G23. The Ri had a bit of a learning curve to set up but the wake was comparable. Mostly surf on these trips but there are always five or six of us that wakeboard. The Ri got a good workout and no one was complaining.

Post a pic of your transom that will tell us most of what we need to know.

Yea, tige’s Are highly tunable too but they’re a bastard to get perfect, and once someone breaths, all bets are off.

And was it even enough weight to get real boosty? How do we know you’re a good judge if you “mostly surf”?

I don't own an Ri. I own an Enzo. Feel free to do a web search on your own if you want a shot of the transom.

I'm old, fat, and oft injured so I mostly surf now but I started wakeboarding when Darin Shapiro was the man. Yes know a good wakeboard wake when I see/ride one.

This is part of what I am actually talking about. That’s called “finicky”

Why can’t you just push a button, take off when ballast is full, balance the boat quick with a few seconds of ballast offset, and that’s it...... you know, like you can in a G23, a new XStar, pretty much any Malibu/Axis ever made, several Supra models, etc.....

And no matter what we did, it was still very abrupt. There wasn’t anything we could seem to do, to get a nice long transition.

Either way, it doesn’t much matter. I really loved the boats, and really wanted to try one out for the 2018 season. They surfed fantastic, and were overall very awesome boats. However, I still wakeboard quite a lot, so that was too important. I was coming from my third G23, and was not prepared to step down from a wake that wasn’t as good, or better.

I didn't find it finicky. It didn't take long to dial and the preset was saved for later. Didn't complain much about weight moving around either.

The push a button and surf or wakeboard thing is great for some people. For others it kind of sucks. Those Ri/Fi's can literally do any kind of surf wave but there's a bit of a learning curve initially. Once you've got it figured out it's easy to go to your presets and tweak on the fly if necessary. It's super cool to go from a massive surf style wave to a killer skim wave at the touch of a button. It's the same with wakeboarding. Little bit of a learning curve but once it's dialed you're golden.

I've been in this game a long time and get to play with a lot of different boats. All of them have different personalities so there will always be a room for personal preference. However, the opti-V has upped Centurions wakeboard game considerably.

Man you are getting way too excited. We are all giving opinions, including you. NOT sure what you mean by talking out your BUTT.

You are right, it is personal preference. That is why so many boat companies are in business, everyone likes something different.

With that said, I've been lucky enough to be around a few pro riders ( Danny Harf, Parks B, JD Webb and Josh Palma) and I can assure you the RI and FI never comes up in the conversation of best wakeboard boat. Not even comparable, sorry to tell you that. The G always comes up next is the X-star and then the Supra SA or SE.