Hans is at it again! This time a uni-rig with a screacher. The deck-lip is gone again, like on the Mk I, and it looks like there are a set of Dotan Sampson 25 rudders on the back The bows are swept up for better surf performance and resistance to pitchpoling.

Hmmm... I'm going to give him a call and see if I can't take it out for a test-sail

I psoted a couple of pix at the SEACATS website

www.seacats.org

David Mosley

Not sure if this boat is but I was talking to him about the 5.0 and for production he's leaning toward plastic hulls like the Wave.

Mike

It will be REAL heavy, especially with the V hull in the sand!!

Bob

Catman- I can only get the last picture to load.

Bob- It's a 260 pound boat. 100 pounds less than the Mark II. I wish he'd make it out of Kevlar

Let me clarify....

Rotomolded Hobie wave, 13' = 230lbs

If he plans to go that route it will be heavy or not durable for the planned 260.

Bob (many-many t-shirts)

Okay, I just talked to Hans on the phone and he says he has not even considered making his boats out of rotomolded plastic. The initial tooling is VERY expensive and with the current rotomolding technology the boats would be way too heavy. He says the only to get the boats to 260-270 pounds is by doing hand-laid-up fiberglass.

He doesn't know how the rotomold rumor got started, but y'all can put it to rest.

And, by the way, he says he is going to race his new 5.0 in the Liberty Race off Dunedin Causeway this weekend. He doesn't have a Portsmouth number yet for the boat, but he is going to do it for fun with or without a number.

Mary,
I talked to him on the causeway about two months ago and he was talking like he was very interested in trying to make it from the plastic. The reason was simple,less production time. He may have found out that it wouldn't work.

I know I'm aging but my ears still work.

Mike

I think you are probably right. He found out it isn't feasible.

I got the skinny on the boat from Hans today, heres the details.

Lenght 16'8"
Width 8'6
Weight 260 #
Main 153 sq ft
Screacher 152 sq ft

Draft 18"
Mast 28 x 4.5

David Mosley
www.seacats.org

The whole story and specs are in the May-June issue of Catamaran Sailor magazine.

Mary...did the topic ever come up about why Hans didn't try to design the Mk III within the F16HP box rules? Seems like if the boat lost 4" of length, 3" of width and modified its sail plan it could have been the first US production F16HP built. I would be interested to hear why he didn't go that route? Was it that the boat was designed prior to the class forming? Did he feel the box rules were to restrictive? Did he have doubts about the class getting off the ground? (On the water?...) Inquiring minds want to know...LOL

What are the chances of you inticing him on the forum here to give us the skinny first hand on his new boat?

Hans is going to start posting on this forum. He asked me this morning how to go about registering. So maybe he will answer your question about why he did not design it for the Formula 16 class. I asked him that question when he first told me about this new model, but now I can't remember what he said. I'm getting old.

I sail a G-Cat 5.7 in the ocean off of Palm Beach. My G-Cat is 20 years old and until recently it was still the fastest boat around. In my past conversations with Hans he was out of the boat business. My comment is WELCOME back HANS. G-Cats rule...Mike Shappell

How do we get more information from Hans is there a GCat website again?

We have a fleet of G's here in Columbia SC, from 5 16's 2 18's and a 21. More information is at our website.

David Mosley
www.seacats.org

Well the MK III has the same hull as the MK I and II. New materials and methods allow it to be built lighter while keeping it strong, and going back to a one-piece hull removes the deck-lip. The original 5.0 Mk I had a one-piece hull with oval sections of epoxied-plywood making up large sections of the deck. I believe it was the first-ever catamaran with a one-piece hull design. He had one for sale at the factory in St. Pete when he installed the Dotan rudders on my 5.7M.

So that would be why it's 3" too long to be a FH16- the hull design isn't entirely new. However, the "old" hull design is an excellent design and still very competitive.