The H-17 eats wind for breakfast!! Although I have an H-20 and a NACRA I17R I grew up on an H17 and still love this boat!! It really comes alive in 15-25. I consider this my "heavy air" boat, I don't carry a jib and so mainsail only and trapping off the wings allows you to take a lot of wind.
With no jib, it's a bit of a pig downwind in lighter air. It's also a bit of a pig with two people, I really don't recommend it although a jib would help in this regaard. The hulls don't handle a lot of weight and unless you go boomless, it's difficult for two people to tack/jibe as the boom exits the mast so low you need to be at the back of the boat to cross to the other side, need to take turns. With no jib, easy to go into irons while tacking, especially in chop, roll tacking and being prepared to backwind the main/reverse the rudders works well. The wings really keep you out of the chop, lessen your chances of getting knocked off the boat.
The simplicity of this boat is it's best feature, I can rig it in 15 minutes by myself. The 17 mast will stay up with only one of the bridles attached so looping the main halyard around the top of the mast and connecting the twist shackle to one of the bow tangs and then pulling the halyard tight and tying off to a cleat on the front of the mast allows one to raise the mast by oneself. Truly a singlehanded boat, slave to nobody. Once rigged, the tramp is clean, not too many strings to pull. I weigh about 170-175 and have had no problems righting the boat when the winds blowing. If I go over in lighter air, righting is more of a problem, but we never go over in light air.....RIGHT!
Most of my sailing done on lakes in the Midwest where we never get more than 3-4 foot of chop in heavy air plus you can always find the flat H20 on the windward side of the lake, the boat does well in these conditions. Have also sailed it a lot in the Corpus area and off the Mississippi coast. The spring loaded, minimal centerboards are ideal in these shallow waters, the thought of hitting a sandbar with boards down on the I17R is too painful to think about.
Advice is well taken about keeping water from freezing in the wing wells, difficult area to repair cracks/holes. Really requires installing portholes to lay glass if these crack. Attaching a penlight to a hanger works well for inspection and have been able to patch some smaller holes with creative use of epoxy on the end of a hanger. Also, inspect/change the centerboard pulls frequently cause' if these break you could loose both a spring and/or centerboard.
The H-17 is really a tough little boat, putting a couple of foot straps on the back of the wings is a must. Trapped out off the back of the wing on a beam reach in a blow, it doesn't get much better! I have owned 4 of these boats over the last 15 years and have literally broken everything that can be broken, I know this boat intimately. Any more specific questions about anything I'm glad to share my experience. Enjoy, I definitely recommend the boat.
