We have two great new accessories for Hobie Islands!

Jim, I have the jib head attached to the jib halyard that is attached to some canvas I had sewn into the sail. Anyone could sail a jib thought by just tying a line to the mast head as I demonstrate in this video.





I really don't want to give up the jib or any sail so I will have to tease out the simplest setup I can. There is always a way, I just need to keep looking.

I see a couple possibilities with the way I have rigged the sails. One, I can release the tack of the jib and flip the jib back onto the main hooking the jib's tack to the the clew of the main. They then overlap each other and become one sail with no reefing issues. The other is just to learn to fly all three sails at once. I flew all three successfully yesterday but did not attempt jibing with all three sails out. I'll need a calmer day to do that. I suspect if I partially reef the main and jib into each other, the jibe should not be an issue.

One unexpected thing I discovered yesterday was that that if I sail with both the reacher and the main out, I get the best performance with the main tightened as though I were on a close reach. If the main is relaxed like we normally do downwind, you begin to cancel out the reacher and the boats overall performance drops. It's as though the reacher is feeding wing to the main? I thought that I would use a barber hauler on the main and get even better speed but that did not happen. Unfortunately my GPS was not working yesterday and I was not able to record speeds but without a doubt I felt the boost the reacher provided.

I was having so much fun I kept forgetting to extend the reacher sheet around the distal Aka knob. I suspect I won't be the only one that does that. I makes a notable difference when you do it though.

_________________
Greg

2016 AI - Spinn & Jib

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

Vetgam:
I hear you loud and clear on all the rigging time when you convert the TI into a complex boat (complex boat meaning multiple sails and rigging). If I didn't have the ability to just leave everything completely rigged, and just lay my sails down across the hull for transport, I would have given it all up a long time ago. With what I have currently it takes me an extra five minutes to rig over everyone else, that is worth it to me to have the extra capability (I don't do 3 mph very happily (just sayin)). On my stock TI I kept getting blown out to sea and couldn't get back in (over and over and over again, lol)
Actually my heavy duty spray skirts really come in handy, I just fold them over the bow when I go on the highway, and they contain all my sails and rigging, keeps all that stuff from shredding on the highway, on the trailer.
FE

FE I have been tempted by your design. It would be a better setup if I did not fish off the boat. The extra forestays create issues when the fish crosses in front of the boat and you need to bring your fishing rod around the bow. All these designs are good for everyone to see because no one design is going to serve everyone. Love the simple furlers.

_________________
Greg

2016 AI - Spinn & Jib

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

Vetgam:

Here is the problem you described about the halyard line getting tangled
http://s1281.photobucket.com/user/offsh ... g.html?o=0

Just a suggestion (somethin to try). If you take a 6" or 8" long length of 3/8" dia PVC pipe (or as long as neccessary), drill a small hole in one end, and tie that to the front of your mast topper so it doesn't fall (gravity). Run your halyard line thru that tube. This helps prevent the Halyard line from snagging on the top of the main when you furl/unfurl the main.
Just a suggestion only (somethin to try)
FE

I just finished installing the Spinnaker kit on my Tandem Island last night. Some additional tips besides the one above:

2. Make sure you have a good powerful drill. My Milwaukee M28 made short work of the self-taping screws
3. The brace for the Aka on the Tandem Island is on the same side (rear side) where you are drilling hardware for the Spinnaker. This is the opposite case for the AI. So, on the TI, if you go the full 4 inches of clearance for the swivel pulley, you could get interference with the plastic piece that helps with storing the Aka.
4. Because of item 2 above, you also need to be careful where you put in the middle "eyelet" post because there is another piece of plastic for Aka storage that is close to the middle eyelet piece mounting location.
5. Due to the massive length of the halyard line on the Tandem Island, I found mounting the "eyelet" guides on the hull for guiding the halyard line mandatory.
6. The TI Spinnaker is bigger, but ,the snorkel stuff bag is the same size as the AI stuff bag. I found the sail hard to stuff back into the stuff bag. I hope it get easier on the water and when wet.
7. For Car topping: I stuffed the sail into the snorkel bag; I left the sheet lines hooked to the sail; I rolled the sheet lines up and stuffed them into the snorkel bag; I untied the traveler pulley line and Halyard line from the sail; I rolled the Halyard line up and tied it to the snorkel bag; I stuffed the traveler pulley assembly under the hatch bungees; I folded the snorkel bag in half, and threw it into the back of the truck; Note: I left both sail eyelets for the Halyard line and traveler pulley line at the front of the snorkel bag, so, they are easy to find and tie up next time.

I am taking it out today, so, I will give it a try.

Here is what the mast head looks like when you furl the main with the reacher attached. Normally the lines do not tangle.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XD2RCFU ... TikIO7ILSQ

_________________
Greg

2016 AI - Spinn & Jib

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

Vetgam:
Around here there a ton of canals and rivers along the intercoastal (literally gazzilians), down pretty much ever river and canal there are really nice restaurants/bars with docks, some a couple miles inland. They all have one thing in common (tons of low bridges), some of these places are renouned (like Phillippi creek Oyster bar). Some of these canals go on for miles like on Long boat key.
The ideal TI setup is if you can leave all your rigging setup, if you come up on a low bridge, just relax a couple lines and you pop the mainsail out and lay the whole works down (all the sails laying down on the tramps and along the gunwales, In our case we then fold our AMA's in, and walla I'm now a kayak. To keep the AMA's from dragging (keep in mind my AKA's are lengthened and my boat is now 12 ft wide, so I have a little more play in my AKA's), what I do then is just cinch my AMA's together, pulling the AMA's completely out of the water, so they don't drag (well I do that sometimes, if I'm using my motor, I don't care if they drag). Sometimes these places are a mile or more upriver, to be honest I typically don't pedal all that way, I typically drop one of my motors in the water, and putt putt to the restaurant docks (yea I cheat). When were done and we want to go out in big water, we just open everything up once we are clear of the low bridges and walla we are now a very capable big sailboat, some days we'll go 30-40 miles along the intercoastal to meet up with friends.
Obviously we are TI fanatics ( lol), and need therapy....
However I'll be perfectly honest, we have zero desire to go out into rough water and high winds, 7 mph winds is our max (which is 90% of the time around here), I don't do well with 3mph (just bein honest).

Sorry for the long leadin (technical crap is hard to describe ( lol))

The only reason for mentioning all this is, you talked about fishing, and not liking the sails up when fishing, maybe setup your rig so everything can just be pulled down just by pulling the main down (just one simple lever), takes 30 seconds. Just a thought.
Everybody beats to a different drum.
FE
EDIT:
one serious problem I have with twin engines and my super high pitch props when I go down canals and rivers, is with both motors just idling (just high enough to engage the clutches) and no sails the boat travels 6-8mph (too fast for canals), so I have to kill one motor and pull it up. But on a positive note I get 3-4 hrs of runtime on each 1 quart tank.

I can just furl the main/jib together to work the fish with the current rigging I have. This currently is easier than it would be to drop the mast, especially with a big fish on the line. Furling itself is difficult when fighting with a fish on one hand and furling with the other.

_________________
Greg

2016 AI - Spinn & Jib

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

Vetgam:
sawing off the ends of your battons (shortening them) is defintely goin to help.
You could also add a short piece of PVC pipe to the rear side of the mast topper as well, to keep those lines from wrapping around the mast. just a suggestion.
If you look at the pics of mine, I have that rear PVC pipe around 8-10 ft long (makes it much easier to keep all the lines from tangling and becoming hopeless knots).
FE

On the TI, the halyard line is tight when the Spinnaker is stuffed in the bag. Yes, it seems like you would have to partially deploy the Spinnaker to get enough slack to lift the mask and lower it. It does not seem like you would have to disconnect any of the lines to the Spinnaker sail, but, I have not tried it..

viz: http://outdoorchannel.com/article.aspx?id=13400

(assuming the grey boat with the orange sail is Jim Czarnowski's)

Would that sail be a jib? Genoa? Spinnaker? Reacher? SpinKit prototype?

_________________
2015 AI in "Dune" - "The Grey Pig"
2017 Trailex 450 Trailer
Pre-September 2015 cradles
(anybody want to buy a slightly-used AI SpinKit?)
eMail: [email protected]

Thats the prototype code zero reacher, that is now released.
Fe

I eagerly await your comparison between the performance under the SpinKit and performance under your Hobie Kayak sail/jib setup as per viewtopic.php?f=71&t=47170&start=15#p206988.

_________________
2015 AI in "Dune" - "The Grey Pig"
2017 Trailex 450 Trailer
Pre-September 2015 cradles
(anybody want to buy a slightly-used AI SpinKit?)
eMail: [email protected]

Thanks for the explanation and video link Greg.


I was wondering how those aka knobs would work out ... nice that everything works fine even if the sheet doesn't wrap around the outer one. Should be interesting to see what kind of tweaks and modifications people make.

Pete, that was one of my many experiments with different sails but technically, I really didn't know what I was doing so there could be no comparison to the professionally designed spinnaker Hobie just introduced.

It was fun experimenting and there were some minor speed benefits but also negative factors like complexity from too many lines and increased drag and wind resistance from the extra stuff hanging off the AI. However the new Hobie spinnaker looks to be like something that will significantly increase performance and the fun factor.

Thanks - That's good for me - one less choice.... -)

All I need now to complete my rationalization for ordering the SpinKit is somebody's SpeedPuck numbers with and without the spinnaker deployed.

_________________
2015 AI in "Dune" - "The Grey Pig"
2017 Trailex 450 Trailer
Pre-September 2015 cradles
(anybody want to buy a slightly-used AI SpinKit?)
eMail: [email protected]