Key Figures · Companies · Maker

Skat-Trak

An impeller and pump maker that Group K's comments of 1996 and 1997 credit with swirl props, and whose name the World Finals results of 1999 carry in their title.

The BaddJet shop sells Skat-Trak parts. This page is the archive's record of what the documents say, it links to no product and prints no price, and it follows the same rules as every other company here.

• a year printed above a fact on this page
• a year printed above no fact

Printed above the facts, 1996, 1997, 2005, 2006, 2014 to 2016 and 2022. Printed above none, 1998 to 2004, 2007 to 2013 and 2017 to 2021. 3 facts have no year printed above them and mark no box.

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What it made and sold

1996 and 1997 · Confirmed

Group K, in comments on the magazines printed on its own pages, wrote under the January 1996 issue of WaveRider that Skat Trak now offered a line of smaller-hubbed "Slimline" props and a new line of "Swirl" props, and under the April 1997 issue of Watercraft Power that swirl design props were by then made only by Skat Trak.

Sources: Group K Between the Lines 1996; Group K Between the Lines 1997

Likely

Group K's page on racing modifications for the Kawasaki 750 stand-up recommends a Skat Trak C-75 pump assembly, describes it as a stainless steel, 12-vane, 140 mm unit, names a Skat Trak C-75 9/17 Swirl impeller, and says the Skat Trak stainless steel scoop grate was used on the KMC race team's machines. The page prints no date.

Sources: Group K Kawasaki 750 racing page

2014 · Likely

The Watercraft Journal visited the company's factory for an article of 27 August 2014. It describes impellers, stators and intake grates cast in stainless steel from wax patterns, and Magnum Pumps whose stator and blades were set to a customer's order, and it calls paddle tires the far larger side of the business. It also says the company began offering impellers by the early 1980s, a statement that cites no source.

Sources: Watercraft Journal Skat-Trak visit 2014

Likely

Skat-Trak's own About page, captured in February 1998, presents Skat-Trak Performance Products as a designer of racing and recreational equipment for watercraft and off-road riders and says it makes impellers every day. It closes with Ken Stuart's name and one other. These are the company's own words.

Sources: Skat-Trak About page 1998

The business on record

Confirmed

Three documents print the company's name in the title of the World Finals at Lake Havasu City. The Virginian-Pilot of 15 July 1994 refers to the previous year's Skat-Trak World Finals, so the 1993 event; Personal Watercraft Illustrated headed its 1996 coverage "1996 IJSBA Skat Trak World Finals"; and the association's 1999 results are headed "1999 Skat-Trak World Finals". None of them says on what terms the name was used.

Sources: Virginian-Pilot 15 Jul 1994; PWI 1996 World Finals Grudge match; 1999 World Finals results

2005 and 2006 · Confirmed

The association's associate member directory of 9 March 2005 lists Skat-Trak among its corporate members, and its corporate page captured in February 2006 lists a Skat-Trak representative on its Associate/Aftermarket Committee. Its associate members page, stamped 2017, lists the company again.

Sources: IJSBA associate directory 2005; IJSBA corporate page 2006; IJSBA associate members page

2015 and 2016 · Likely

The Harris Southern California Business Directory lists Skat-Trak Inc. under industrial tires in its 2015 and 2016 editions, with Ken Stuart as President. The directory's search results show the officers' line apart from the company's name, so the join rests on the search and the name.

Sources: Harris directory 2015; Harris directory 2016

2022 · Likely

The Watercraft Journal printed on 21 December 2022 a letter from the company's president saying that Skat-Trak would stop making personal watercraft impellers, pumps, nozzles, intake grates and accessories, that its last day of sales of watercraft products was 9 December 2022, and that its paddle tires for sand use would continue.

Sources: Watercraft Journal Skat-Trak 2022

Names as printed

Skat Trak (Group K Between the Lines 1997); Skat-Trak Performance Products (Skat-Trak About page 1998); SKAT-TRAK INC (Harris directory 2015)

Elsewhere in the archive

• History chapter: The aftermarket: pumps, plates, mats, registers
• History chapter: The aftermarket: hulls, rule books and closures
• Event: IJSBA World Finals
• Organisation: International Jet Sports Boating Association
• Era: The early years, in print
• Era: The makers and their machines
• Era: The rule book years

What the archive has not read (3)

• No document dates Skat-Trak's founding or the year it first made an impeller. The Watercraft Journal's 2014 article gives the business's age in rough terms and cites no source, and the present Skat-Trak paddle-tire website, which calls itself a brand of another corporation, gives 1968 for snowmobile wheel conversion kits and more than 70 years in business, its own claims (searched the archive's mirror and research cache, 2026-10-16).
• No US trademark carries Skat-Trak's name as wordmark or owner (USPTO trademark search, 2026-10-06), and no patent turned up under its name (USPTO Patent Public Search and Google Patents, 2026-10-05). California's business registry was not searched.
• Personal Watercraft Illustrated's new-product pages on Skat-Trak of 1998 and 2001, listed in the Wayback Machine's index, could not be read on 2026-10-16. A February 1988 advertisement line for "Skat Trac" impellers in Personal Watercraft Illustrated names no advertiser, so it is not tied to the company (searched the archive's mirror and research cache, 2026-10-16).

Documents cited on this page

• Group K Between the Lines 1997 (groupk.com): Between The Lines - January 97 to December 97 (Group K, groupk.com), Group K, 1997; enthusiast media, medium. The same shop's comments on the technical items in the PWC magazines of 1997, issue by issue, kept on its site under the heading January 97 to December 97. Read on 2026-10-05 and held as text; the page is current and no earlier capture is held, so the dating rests on the heading and the issue-by-issue layout. Medium as a trade participant's period commentary, cited only for which products it names as existing.
• Group K Between the Lines 1996 (groupk.com): Between The Lines - 1996 (Group K, groupk.com), Group K, 1996; enthusiast media, medium. A tuning shop's comments on the technical items in the PWC magazines of 1995 and 1996, issue by issue, kept on the shop's site under the heading 1996. Read on 2026-10-05 and held as text. It is the shop's current page and no earlier capture is held (searched the archive's mirror and research cache, 2026-10-09), so the dating rests on the heading and on the issue-by-issue layout. Medium as a trade participant's period commentary: the shop sells engine kits and names the parts it uses, and its opinions of other makers' parts are not relied on. Cited only for which products it names as existing. The shop's telephone number and street address are removed from the held copy.
• Group K Kawasaki 750 racing page (groupk.com): Kawasaki SXI Pro 750, Racing Mods (Group K page), Group K; manufacturer primary, medium. The shop's page for its kits for the Kawasaki 750 stand-up, undated and listing a 2002 model: a preface on a 2001 relationship with Kawasaki's race team, the exhaust section that defines the shop's use of dry for a Factory Pipe pipe, and the kit lists. Medium as a seller's description of products it sells; its relationship claims are the shop's own and no Kawasaki document is held (searched the archive's mirror and research cache, 2026-10-09). The held copy omits the site menus.
• Watercraft Journal Skat-Trak visit 2014 (watercraftjournal.com): Spin Doctors: Inside Skat-Trak Performance Products, by Kevin Shaw (The Watercraft Journal, 27 August 2014), The Watercraft Journal, 2014-08-27; enthusiast media, medium. A visit to the company's Calimesa headquarters. Medium as trade press for what the author saw and was told; the company's account of its own age and history is low. The 2014 visit is held as an extract.
• Skat-Trak About page 1998 (web.archive.org): About Skat-Trak, skat-trak.com (Wayback capture of 6 February 1998), Skat-Trak Performance Products; manufacturer primary, medium. The company's own page, closing with the names of those who signed it, Ken Stuart among them. Medium for who signed for the company in 1998; its claims about its championships are the company's own and are not relied on by any page (2026-10-05).
• Virginian-Pilot 15 Jul 1994 (scholar-dev.cloud.lib.vt.edu): JET (SKI) SETTERS, The Virginian-Pilot, Virginia Beach Beacon, 15 July 1994, page 18 (Virginia Tech digital library copy), The Virginian-Pilot (Landmark Communications), 1994-07-15; editorial, high. Period newspaper cover story on the Bud Jet Sports Tour round at Virginia Beach on 9 and 10 July 1994. Names the tour as sanctioned by the IJSBA, the fifth stop of ten and the only ocean race, with closed course, slalom and freestyle, and Nissan, Yamaha, Kawasaki and Budweiser among the professionals' sponsors, as examples.
• PWI 1996 World Finals Grudge match (web.archive.org): Grudge match, by Joel Johnson, PWI Racing News coverage of the 1996 IJSBA Skat Trak World Finals (watercraft.com, captured December 1996), Personal Watercraft Illustrated, 1996-10; editorial, medium. The magazine's day report on the Pro-Am Women Runabout qualifying heats at the 1996 World Finals, written before the class's final motos. Period trade press, so medium; it reports qualifying, not the final.
• 1999 World Finals results (web.archive.org): 1999 Skat-Trak World Finals, overall results by class (PDF, Wayback capture), International Jet Sports Boating Association, 1999; sanctioning body, high. Overall results by class for the World Finals of 10 to 17 October 1999, extracted from the association's PDF. The extract lets the hometown and maker columns drift against the names in places, so only a name and the position printed on the same line are read as one row.
• IJSBA associate directory 2005 (web.archive.org): IJSBA associate members, corporate member directory (Wayback capture of 9 March 2005), International Jet Sports Boating Association, 2005-03-09; sanctioning body, high. The association's own list of companies holding associate membership, as its site showed it on 9 March 2005, each with an address and most with a named contact. High for which companies the association listed and whom it named for each; it gives no title or office for a contact. The held text is an excerpt of the page.
• IJSBA corporate page 2006 (web.archive.org): IJSBA Corporate Information (ijsba.com page, Wayback capture of 11 February 2006), International Jet Sports Boating Association, 2006-02-11; sanctioning body, high. The association's own corporate page as captured on 11 February 2006 (it prints that date and a 2005 copyright line): the Board of Directors with each director's member group and office, and the Technical/Rules, Racer, Affiliate, Manufacturer and Associate/Aftermarket committees. High for who held each post when the page was captured; it does not say when a term began or ended. The held text gives the page's date line, board and committees.
• IJSBA associate members page (ijsba.com): IJSBA Associate Members (IJSBA page), International Jet Sports Boating Association, 2017-03-21; sanctioning body, high. The association's current list of associate members, read live on 5 October 2026; the page carries a last-modified stamp of 21 March 2017, which is the date given here. High for whom the association lists; it gives no office for a named contact. The held copy replaces street addresses, phone numbers and email addresses.
• Harris directory 2015 (archive.org): Harris Southern California Business Directory and Buyer's Guide 2015 (Mergent; read through archive.org's full-text search), Mergent Business Press, item held by the Internet Archive, 2015; editorial, medium. A lending-library item, so it could be read only through the full-text search. Entries for Skat-Trak Inc (Ken Stuart, President) and R & D Racing Products USA Inc (Glenn Dickinson, President; the Vice President's name garbled by the OCR), and Pacific Creations Inc, also called Hydro-Turf, in Anaheim (Arno Olbricht, President). The held copy shares a file with the 2016 edition's search results and has its phone numbers removed.
• Harris directory 2016 (archive.org): 2016 Harris Southern California Business Directory and Buyers Guide (Mergent; read through archive.org's full-text search), Mergent Business Press, item held by the Internet Archive, 2016; editorial, medium. The 2016 edition (ISBN 978-1-63053-834-7), read the same way. Entries for Skat-Trak Inc (Ken Stuart, President) and R & D Racing Products USA Inc (Glenn Dickinson, President; Bill Chapin, Vice President). Same publisher as the 2015 edition, so the two are not independent.
• Watercraft Journal Skat-Trak 2022 (watercraftjournal.com): Skat-Trak Closes its Personal Watercraft Division, by Kevin Shaw (The Watercraft Journal, 21 December 2022), The Watercraft Journal, 2022-12-21; enthusiast media, medium. The magazine's report of the end of the company's personal watercraft division, with the letter signed by its president printed in full. The letter gives 9 December 2022 as the last day of sales and lack of sales, overseas production and the poor economy as the reasons; the editor's own paragraph adds other causes in the magazine's voice. Medium as trade press; the letter inside it is the company's voice. The editor's address is replaced in the held copy.

Cite this page

“Skat-Trak”, BaddJet archive, https://baddjetarchive.com/key-figures/companies/skat-trak/

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