Ok, Nordic officianados, I have questions that appear to be systemic and they may have occured on your boats:

Rust coming off the back of the sundeck area. It's where the grab rails go across the transom. I can tell if it's coming from those bolts or from non stainless staples under the sundeck?

Sun/Stress Cracks - I've seen these on the sides, behind the drivers seat and passenger seat, next to the windshield. Is this from being out in the sun or the previous owner beating on the boat?

Storage - with five kids, skis, kneeboard, wakeboard, etc. the boat has limited storage. The wife thinks cargo nets on the sides down in the mid-cabin but i'm not sure how to secure something like that without it looking like !@# Ideas?

The wife also thinks a cocktail table up in the open bow area would be a good idea. It doesn't sound difficult given the in floor motorhome type of temporary table. Has anyone done this?

Thanks for your help and I'll be showing up at Travis soon for those of you in coyote country.

XX14,
Every boat I have ever owned needed more storage, including my Heat. To answer that part of your question, I brought up a thread ("storage") detailing some of the mods some of us have done to address the issue.
Regards,
Steve

One other thing I forgot is I have a small chip in the back of the boat at the transom and the bottom. It's about the size of a nickle. What's the best product to use to patch a small area like this? It's white gelcoat and I can see a small area of black. Thanks

Here's that thread for everyone else:

http://www.offshoreonly.com/forums/n...1-storage.html

I have an 02 & never seen any rust. Maybe someone replaced bolts somewhere. I think everything should be stainless. Staples should be stainless as well. I've seen stress cracks on mine around anchor locker, but I don't think any used boat will be without some, I think it's caused from use, not sun. The sun will yellow the gelcoat a little after years.

No stress cracks in mine and its an 05 like yours. I am at about 295 hours on my supercharged 496. Always stored inside. The only time my boat is in the sun is when I am driving it.

I just took one of my Cleats off of my 2001 Rage to measure the hole centers. I was disappointed to see that Nordic did not use stainless hardware to install and I also have rust showing. The studs that they mounted the cleats were steel with stainless nuts.