Hobie Cat Forums

I have a 16' older Hobie. I am thinking about buying a 17' or an 18' used Hobie. From one of the topics, I saw a comment about having more than 300# on a 17' and how you became a submarine captain. I will be sailing mostly with my beautiful red headed cat woman and together we weigh about 340# what can I expect as far a performance with a 17' v.s. a 16 or even an 18'. Help if you can. Thanks.

Speaking of Cat Women, my favorite artist, Frank Frazetta, lives and has a museum in East Stroudsburg. If you get a chance, I highly recommend checking it out. One of his more famous paintings is "Cat Woman". Check out www.frazettartgallery.com. You might recognize his stuff from the Molly Hatchet album covers, and lots of books by Robert E. Howard (Conan), and Edgar Rice Burroughs (Tarzan), among many others.

The king of comic art. I have framed copies of Carson of Venus and the Moon Maiden- which my own personal lovely made me take down until the kids are old enough to not be "frightened by or corrupted" by their content Good stuff- thanks for the link.

(anybody want some used Conan comics?)

I'm selling my H17 for that reason. Two people onboard drops performance significantly. Soon as mine sells, I'm going to a Hobie Getaway.

The 17 was designed as a single handed boat. The Sport version was an attempt to accomodate two people - no boom (very hard to get under just with one person) and a jib (more horsepower to overcome the extra weight of another person). It still didn't solve the problem of "there's not enough hull underneath you."

Bottom line - the 17 performs best with a crew weight of 160 - 175 lbs. Even at that, it's a slug in light air, especially downwind. On the flip side, practically nothing short of an A cat can keep up with it going upwind in a blow. It's a hoot!

Given your combined weight, you're better off with a Getaway or even a 20. Used 20's are quite reasonable $ and much higher performance than the G'way.

I sailed a 16 for 20 years before buying a 2000 H-17sport last year. I perfer to sail solo, but when it blows in excess of ~18 knots, I like to put a second person aboard. I weigh 210 lbs so I look for a crew of 140 lbs or less (350 lbs total wing weight). I don't know where the submarine captain remark comes from. I haven't had that problem, but I'm also very consious of the weight distribution on the boat (the 16 pitch poled much more readily than the 17 even with the combined 350 lbs). I didn't choose a larger boat because of my soloing preference. Even at my weight it is too easy to get overpowered in a larger boat and riting becomes an issue. If performance isn't your first choice and you are more of a social creature, a Getaway is a good choice. I rented one on Maui and even though poorly tuned (rentals!) it sailed well and with the added flotation could make for a good party boat.