Hobie 16 pylon replacement.

Hi there. I had an unfortunate accident a few weeks ago, sailing along in my Hobie 16 when the starboard side hull decided to go in a different direction I found out that the previous owner had obviously had a similar accident in the boats past life as he had repaired the rear right pylon by putting a wooden insert inside the pylon. A few years that repair obviously rotted and gave way. Not so good. Anyway my plans are to replace both front and rear pylons. Can anyone give me any hints on how to get the old pylons out of the hull without smashing big holes in the boat? Any help would be greatly appreciated. Cheers.

You cannot do what you want to do for less than the cost of a used replacement hull.

Even if you could, you'd need to cut several access holes.

This is what you're up against:

It's glued at the deck and swaddled in glass at the bottom.

Ahh right looks like a major. What do you think about making an aluminium insert for the pylon and then just adding a new bit of mast section to replace the broken part at the top of the pylon?
Thanks for your help

One option is to cut the top of the pylon off and weld an extension to it (see attached photo). This was done many years ago to my 82H16 before I bought it.

Several years ago when I glued my frame, I had to cut about 3/4 of an inch off the top of this pylon extension since it was too tall.

I did notice that the welder had put a short section from a hobiecat's aluminum boom (which is smaller than a pylon) inside of the old pylon and new extension prior to welding.

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Tim
84 H16
82 H16
87 H14T
Tortola Sails: 115222
Blue Prism Sails: 88863
Clearwater, FL

Apparantly Hobie Europe already manufactures such an insert which has limited availability in the US. You may want to contact Hobie USA or your dealer to see if you can get one.

sm

The welding idea with an insert from Hobie seems the most feasible idea to me. Have to try and contact Hobie Europe and see if they will send one out to New Zealand. Just wondering how the welding would go without burning the boat?
Thanks so much for your help though guys. The pictures and info is a big help.

Cheers.

The sleeves work great. I just put them in all 4 of my pylons this last summer. They are slightly thicker than the original pylon on a '78 boat and are a very tight fit. The down side is it took a couple of months for them to come in. If you want any pictures send me an e-mail and I can send them to you. I don’t have a picture account online to post pictures on this site. Good luck it looks like quite the undertaking.

How much are the inserts?

if you do go the insert route...

in reading that they were a tight fit it made me think of some work i used to do in our truck shop. They purposly designed these pins larger than the opening so after you get them in they ARE NOT coming out. We used to stick the pin in the freezer or in severe cases dry ice. This would shrink the pin enough to slide in easily and after it got back to ambient temp... its in for good.

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'73 hobie 16 restored 2011
'00 Seaswirl fishin boat

Try the following thread. It may answer some of your questions.

viewtopic.php?f=14&t=35901&p=145659&hilit=pylon+shim#p1456

My problem solved for front pylon that came away at the corner casting; thanks to my friend Stuart who almost cut his thumb off in the process!

The top of the pylon had severe wear and corrosion and was fixed by welding a similar shape piece - from an old BOOM - onto the trimmed old one halfway between the hull and the corner casting. The difficult part is digging out the old stuff - aluminum and epoxy - from inside the casting. Difficult as you will have a small, tight space to work above the hull.

Be sure to measure accurately so the new piece is correct length AND sits plumb on the old (now trimmed and ground) section all the way round.

Take it to the welder and have the space/gap welded BUT be sure a collar is then welded on top of that because my welding CRACKED soon after. I had to have it re-welded and now its fine with the collar over the top - 3 welds instead of one and it's held up well around the islands and rough seas here in North Queensland.

However, the other front pylon now needs the same repair. I can hear it cracking!

JohnEltin

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