Easy jib rigging

Hey everybody, I received an H20 last year for free! It has needed some work but it has good bones. No soft spots! Replaced the comptip, tramp, standing rigging, and most of the running rigging. Needed all cam cleats rebuilt and so on and so forth. I have taken it out a couple of times and I just love it. Found out that it's pretty tough to right w/o a boat lifting the mast tip out of the water. I love that you can have a lot of weight on it and it handles it quite well. I owe it to all of you guys on this forum for all of the information on how to sail and rig.

My first question has to do with cleaning up the tramp. I have the stock jib setup and it really takes a lot of room. I may get into racing in the future but for right now I'm just learning the basics and trying to get some of my family into it. Any easy ways to clean up the tramp? I thought about putting a cam cleat with a fairlead on each side of the mast on the front crossbeam about halfway between the mast and the end of the crossbeam. That would leave quite a bit of room open in the front. I know that I wouldn't be able to fine tune things nearly as much but would allow me to more easily fit 3 people on it w/o having so much to cut your knees on. This a good idea or no?

My next question has to do with the mainsail. I'm pretty sure it's the original '92 sail and it unfortunately tore along the seam that contains the bolt rope. It tore from the bottom about 1/4 of the way up. The bolt rope even came out at one spot. Worth fixing? Or would I be better off just biting the bullet and getting a new one? Or if anyone has a used one they're looking to part with that would be great!

Thanks everyone

Mounting the jib blocks on the front crossbar is not going to work unless you also have a sailmaker modify the jib. Since the trailing edge of the jib (leech) overlaps the mast, the jib blocks need to be positioned aft of the mast. One thing that you could do would be to mount the jib blocks directly to the fore/aft sliders in the tramp tracks and remove the wire inboard/outboard traveler system. This would make the arrangement similar to the H18 setup. You wouldn’t be able to point as high upwind without the jib luffing, but the forward tramp area would be a lot cleaner.

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This may be a little late, but the racing fleet has simplified the jib adjustments. One dyneema line across between the two jib cars, and fixed mounting points for the jib at the hiking strap, and edge are a nice basic place to start. get rid of the pulley and cleat off of the car, and the extra bungee and line for continuous adjustment.

You should be able to right the boat with 300 lbs and a righting line tied to the dolphin striker. One of our racers in Santa Cruz modified one of our Murrays righting pole systems to work well on his 20, and loves it. I've got a few extra mainsails that would work for play. SLO Sail has a good aftermarket sail for messing around for about 1500 and a new Hobie main is close to 3k.

Hey, Just saw the post from Monocasta08 regarding Hobie 20 jib rigging. I'm a 16 sailor, but a friend recently bought a Hobie 20 and he mistakenly called me to help him rig and set the sails - I have to tell you "20" folks, that rigging totally baffles me! Anyway, in your response regarding the Jib rigging you mentioned a modified conversion to simplify and clear the deck: I am hoping you may be able to point me to a picture or schematic (I need visual) that is available to help me better understand how to do this?

Also, one additional question - How the heck do you hook that halyard ring to the top of the mast???

Where is my 16...? Thanks in advance.

Halyard ring FAQ. https://www.hobie.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=371

The main thing is to have the boat pointed directly into the wind. One person pulls the halyard from behind the boat. Other person stands at the mast base facing aft. Person on halyard pulls the sail up above the hook until it stops. Person at the mast grabs the rotation bar and pulls it 90 degrees so the hook turns to the sail and holds it there. Person on the halyard releases the halyard so the ring can drop onto the hook. Once hooked, the person at the mast releases the rotator. Dropping the main is the same process but you rotate the hook away from the sail so it disengages the ring.

Again, it is critical that the boat is directly head to wind for this to work.

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Thank you much for the directions on hooking the Halyard Ring! One other question about this:

Neither I nor the boat owner are sure how to connect the rope to the cable so the ring will fall on to the hook. We may have had it right the first time we hoisted the main but we had to tip the poor cat over to unhook... And, if we did have it right, it was shear luck... Not to be repeated

I appreciate your help!!!
Parker

Hi All -
Im still looking for some pics of the racing fleet's simplified the jib adjustments for the Hobie 20. If anyone can direct me to a page that shows this it would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks,
Parker

Look at the H20 parts guide up at the top of this site where it shows the jib adjustment system. Ditch the wire. Picture the jib car adjustment line and the 4-way bungee as one piece of line, but now it has 4 loops in it. One loop on each side is near the hiking straps ( where the jib cleats are now in your normal upwind mode) and one loop on each side is near the edge of the hull for heavy air sailing. This one single line should be dyneema because it’s going too see a lot of load. You should also lash this line to the track car plates for easy tightening vs just using a bowline, you will need to take the slack out as much as possible and even the dyneema will move after the first few sails. On my non-racing 20, I took off the pulleys and cleats on the adjustment plates that run on the tramp rails, less things to stub your ties on.