Hi Todd, I just sold my Hobie 18 this spring after owning on since 1980. I have had a roller furling headsail on it and it was much faster than a spinnaker rigged H-18 sailed by Rick White and Mary Wells at the time. There are quite a few boats that were close to minimum weight - mine was a 1985 model that weighed 407# at the last Continentals we attended last year and several were lighter. I also had used a larger, mylar mainsail on the 18 for open racing which was a cut down Mystere 6.0 main. It was a giant killer that beat twenty footers boat for boat in light to medium wind. It was nick- named the Mystobie.
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<br>And this is why I can not get personally enthused about the formula classes being discussed so much lately. To me it seems more like a sure fire way to halt the prgress of speed development in beach cat offerings because of the high minimum weights in the formulas. The main improvement I would desire in a bigger boat (18 or 20 footer) is significantly reduced weight. That cannot happen with the formula rule. I'll keep sailing the little boat for now. If I'm going to spend the big bucks on a new boat, I'm going to want something that is much lighter and faster than my old boats. The 16 formula rule looks much better because of the much lower min. weight. Go for that or look for a bigger mylar mainsail to give your old H-18 a real turbo boost! You could probably find a deal on a good second-hand twenty footer mainsail and have a sailmaker cut the top triangle off for a big, squarehead, mylar H-18 main that will be really fast for a small investment. And the only gear you might want is a higher purchase downhaul. It is much cheaper than a new boat that, as you have noted, is not much different from what you already have.
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<br>Mike Fahle<br><br>Mystere 6.0. , Mystere 4.3 , 2 Hobie Waves