"I'm sure I'll be corrected here by a Hobie history buff, but they raised the tramp on rails on the H16 when they realized that they'd but in the water a good deal of time on that boat."
The 14 & 16 have always had raised rails.
There is a school of thought that says be careful how tight you make the tramp. You could stretch it to the point that it will meet in the middle, and you would no longer be able to take away the slack. For that reason, I wouldn't recommend squeezing in the side rails.
I have no idea what a boot hook is, but on my 16 (laces up the middle and across the back), I use two combination wrenches and several pairs of vice grips. Make a "T" with the wrenches, use the open end of the larger one to twist the line. Use the vice grips to hold the line at the grommets as you work your way down. No matter what, your back is usually in pain after adjusting a tramp.
Mike
If the two halves come together, you have other problems.
Strapping the rails within reason will do no harm and can only help. Just take a trailer rachet strap and run it around and hook it together under the tramp. Synch it down until you can see an inch of bow on each side. It looks bad, but it works.
Now, lace the tramp as tight as you can accross the back. Do the same for the middle, but you don't need to overdo it at this point. You should use knots at each end of the lacing that can be adjusted later, such as half hitches. Don't terminate with a bowline because you won't be able to adjust it.
Then, make sure the boat is securley tied to the trailer to prevent it from moving forward.
Now run your winch cable hook back and hook it into the center lacing about 2/3rds of the way back and crank it on good. You will see it pull a lot of slack out of the center lacing which wasn't there before.
Now take your vice grip and clamp it on the line at the last grommet past the hook.
Slack the winch cable and move it forward several grommets and do this again and again until you reach the front beam. Tie it off with a few half hitches and relase the strap around the side beams.
You can also use light line (1/16")to make a truckers hitch in the lacing at the rear on each side, to do a quick and dirty snugging. Wrap it about 6-8 times between several lacing points (on the line, not through the grommets) and you can really synch it down.
Watch the various grommets to prevent pulling them out, but a tramp in decent shape should be fine.
Tight is always a good thing!
