New Spinnaker Fix

Google up "backstay flicker"

This is standard kit on many, many racing boats, and virtually every boat with a fat headed mainsail.

The cheap Home Depot pultruded rod is adequate, but sail batten material has a more stable mounting surface and far less torsional flex, which stabilizes things when the mast is shaken about. I never used a block to turn the backstay - usually just a stainless or carbon hoop held captive in an eyestrap fixed to the batten.

Matt, you could easily add a flicker to your spin kit and it would not alter the performance or integrity of the kit at all.

Sorry, but I have to call you out on that suggestion. A "backstay flicker" is designed to correct an entirely different issue. It is designed to prevent the "roach" of the mainsail getting caught. The roach is that part of the mainsail which projects beyond a straight line between the head and the clew, supported by >horizontal< battens. This area is down in the middle of the back edge of the sail

The Islands have virtually vertical battens,, and zero roach. Instead, they have relatively huge horizontal top sections,

In addition, most importantly, a backstay flicker is designed to only work when the backstay is released. The Island design is such that this would also release the spinnaker halyard, which will NOT result in the backstay slackening much due to the spinnaker still drawing.

http://rarerarebird.blogspot.com/2014/0 ... uster.html

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Tony Stott
2012 Tandem Island "SIC EM" with Hobie spinnaker

Actually... yes there is. The roach is the sail area outside a straight line between clew and head. There is a lot of roach. Especially at the head (it is a fat head rather than what is referred to as pinhead)

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Matt Miller
Former - Director of Parts and Accessory Sales
Warranty and Technical Support
Hobie Cat USA
(Retired 11/7/2022)

I'll forward to Jim again for review. A longer topper is a major change... all new tooling and I suspect there would be a considerable higher load on the part.

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Matt Miller
Former - Director of Parts and Accessory Sales
Warranty and Technical Support
Hobie Cat USA
(Retired 11/7/2022)

If you are going to bother asking Jim to review another "fix"...why not start from the ground up and redesign the mast base so you can put a stiffer mast on the boat and go after the root issue...with a stiff enough mast you won't even need the backstay. Granted, it is bedded in soft plastic, so that might lead to a much beefier reinforced mast base.

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R/Thom
SeaRail 19
Triak
BMW C600
Formerly Getaway with Custom Spinnakers
Formerly raced F24 Mk II

Not gonna happen.

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Matt Miller
Former - Director of Parts and Accessory Sales
Warranty and Technical Support
Hobie Cat USA
(Retired 11/7/2022)

Of course not...after all, it is so much more fun to do it over and over and over incorrectly instead of right the first time! Engineering by increments...what a concept!

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R/Thom
SeaRail 19
Triak
BMW C600
Formerly Getaway with Custom Spinnakers
Formerly raced F24 Mk II

you are correct (of course) Matt, but I guess my point is that backstay flickers are designed to work only when spinnaker halyard tension is managed separately on another halyard. Being able to temporarily loosen the backstay with a flicker on an Island would cause hassles with the spinnaker. It would be much easier to simply partly furl the mainsail until the big batten is under the shadow of the masthead fitting.

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Tony Stott
2012 Tandem Island "SIC EM" with Hobie spinnaker

No need to change the mast. It's perfect for the this boat. I doubt anyone wants a heavy mast and the problems a stiff mast brings to the table. I sail this particular boat because setup and take down is so easy.

The successful pex tubing mod seems to put no more stress on the current mast topper and does not distort the way the spinnaker hangs from the halyard. The flex memory lifts the halyard away from the mast when tension is released thus preventing the snags.

I remain very grateful that Hobie built this wonderful spinnaker. The snuffing system is fantastic. The topper can be improved but is easily modified to prevent the snags. I would buy it again in a heartbeat.

Greg

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Greg

2016 AI - Spinn & Jib

“Out of sight of land the sailor feels safe. It is the beach that worries him.”
– Charles G. Davis

Don't want to disagree too much Greg, but a Weta mast is stiff enough and it is also light enough for easy rigging. Granted, the Hobie preference for soft plastic boats makes it difficult to have a mast base that is robust, but it would have been do'able if they weren't wedded to flexible masts-which were a good idea for fast boats in the 1980s, but everyone else in the world is going stiffer this century. Heck, they intentionally created a carbon fiber mast that was flexible--can't believe they did that; might as well have used pultruded fiberglass. It worked OK until everyone wanted a spinnaker, then the true drawback to the boat became more obvious. Like Rube Goldberg, you can make anything work no matter how hacked up. Oh well, not my boat, nor my problem; but while the Islands are interesting for novice sailors; they leave a lot to be desired if you have a lot of sailing experience.

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R/Thom
SeaRail 19
Triak
BMW C600
Formerly Getaway with Custom Spinnakers
Formerly raced F24 Mk II

What Greg said!



Thanks for that BL2, I wasn’t aware of a backstay flicker. It’s given me a couple of ideas I might try.

Thank you Matt. That' what we're after. We're not speculating about what works. We know and have demonstrated that a longer topper solves the problem. We just don't want Hobie thinking that the problem is solved and needs no more attention.

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Greg

2016 AI - Spinn & Jib

“Out of sight of land the sailor feels safe. It is the beach that worries him.”
– Charles G. Davis

All my stuff is just too different from Hobies, I'm pretty sure I won't be able to help here, just confusing things.... so I'll keep quiet.
FE

Cripes, this is getting into a world of craziness.

Instead of all these way out there ideas (a "mizzen mast" to hold the backstay clear?), why not tackle the problem at the source, and cut the whole square top of the sail off completely??? Then there is nothing to catch on the backstay in the first place…..

OR


Adapt your sailing technique to live with the consequences of the extra sail area that a squaretop provides, carrying out commonsense minor modifications like adding a short length of lightweight PVC on the backstay to deter tangles, and shortening the big batten so it is tucked inside the squaretop of the sai.


It is of course true that adding a spinnaker to a sailboat where once a simple boomless sail on a stayless mast didn't require much thought, is always going to add complexity, so anyone after a no-brainer improvement to downwind travel might be better off to just add an outboard motor

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Tony Stott
2012 Tandem Island "SIC EM" with Hobie spinnaker

My understanding was that the back half of the halyard (i.e. quasi "backstay" ) was a hassle when the kite was down- thus the use of a flicker. With that line tight, the batten should snap thru fine if the knot/batten end have been smoothed.

Another minor point- while the added sail area up high of the fat head is handy in light air, it actually eats up a lot of righting moment relative to that area. Where the fathead really shines is in the fact that the induced drag of the sail (drag created as a result of the sail moving thru the free air stream) is far lower than that of a triangle shape. It tricks the drag into acting like a higher aspect sail. Doing away with it would slow the boat considerably.