Hobie Cat Forums

I wonder how tight or how loose to have the dolphin striker?
my H20 it is tight no play without load, and my H17 has some play in it.
what is correct? and how do you know how tight is tight?

The 17 crossbar is a lot thinner an more flexible than the 20 crossbar. If you over-tension the dolphin striker, you'll just put more bend in the crossbar. I'd say tighten it to the point that it doesn't rattle then tighten it a little more and you should be fine. I've actually tightend up the dolphin striker on my boat then tightened the trampoline and then gone back and checked the dolphin striker and it was loose (because the crossbar had compressed and bent slightly just from the tramp tension).

sm

Now that makes sense. I thought it was tight when I bought the boat. since then I have tightened the tramp and...
Thanks

It won't take you too long to figure out you have a problem.

You can't tighten the 17's dolphin striker without taking the crossbar off the boat. Even then, you'll need a deep-well socket, an extension and a universal to get to it.

If it's not too bad, then you can do it with the two nuts that fix the post (just move the post down). Don't do that too much, though or the mast base will start scraping the crossbar.

Also, adjusting the height of the mast ball will effect the tension on the dolphen striker. Oh, and shrouds

Tighten it until when you hit it it goes 'booooiiiing', not rattle, rattle, rattle.

J