The Hobie 16 is a popular catamaran manufactured by the Hobie Cat Company for racing and day sailing. The craft was the driving force behind the popularization of beach cats and was recently inducted into the Sailing Hall Of Fame.

Hobie 16

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• Hobie16

Introduced in the late 1970's, the Hobie 16 is the second largest boat fleet in existence with over 108,000 boats built to date. Second only to the Laser. It is a one-design catamaran class that is the boat of choice for the ISAF youth world championships.

The boat is distictly recognised for its "banana" shaped hulls, designed to be efficient in moving through waves.

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The Rig The Hobie 16 can carry up to 3 sails, the Mainsail, Jib, and Spinnaker (bag or chute)(optional). The deck of the boat sits on a raised platform above the two hulls and consists of a trampoline mesh; tensioned to give the boat its rigidity.

The boat has two trapeze wires either side to allow both the helm and crew to trapeze. The rudder assembly consist of two rudders on either hull connected to automatically releasing stock for when they hit ground to avoid damage. they are connected to two tillers and a connecting rod, and a tiller extension for operation while trapeezing.

The sheets: The mainsheet is typically of a 6:1 purchase for fine tuning and has a traveller that allows movement over the entire aft sectional beam of the boat. The jib sheets are of a 2:1 purchase typically and sit on the front beams with their own travellers operated by an elasic system.

Tuning: The boat has a 3:1 purchase downhaul (upgradable to 6:1) to bring tension to the mainsail and an outhaul (standard 1:1, upgradable to 2:1). Both the mainsail and jib are fully battened to allow for further tuning.

Statistics: Length: 5,05 m, Width: 2,43 m, Mast height: 7,92 m, Weight ca: 145 kg, Mainsail area: 13,77 m², Jib area: 5,12 m², Spi area (option): 15 m², Crew: 1-2, EC homologation category C, ISAF International class