Steve, you make a good point. The more I think about it, it's questionable what difference the jib would make upwind - the uni is already a very fast boat. If I had to stab a guess, the crew weight (~360 lbs) and the fact that my fiancee likes to sit smack in the middle of the tramp despite my efforts to balance the weight onto a single hull, have a lot more to do with speed than any lack of sail area!

Tacking/turning is remarkably easy with the 5.5u, at least in comparison to the hobie 14 and my sunfish.

Where did you find the boomless spinnaker? If you see it again, do let me know! It sounds like it would be faster to rig, and perhaps easier to use also?

Another question - completely off topic.

I found the pole that should be used to right the catamaran (attached to the underside).

Where should I store this when I'm sailing?

Yes--Kirt Simmons, who posts under a variety of different user IDs, including "Kirt" and "Arsailor"--he has been testing a pole-less spinnaker on his Taipan. There was a thread about it way back on the F16 forum with photos.

Don't add a jib.

First, it will compromise your upwind performance, as jibs are useful really only for reaching. A jib, upwind, creates more drag than lift and you can't point as high. The sail area isn't enough to be really useful sailing deep downwind. That's why all these people add chutes.

If you note, a lot of the 'hot' new designs are going with the unirig configuration with a chute. Best of both worlds. Reference Marstrom 20, I-17, Javelin, etc.

As for your under-trampoline pole, that's a 'righting pole' and you stow it by drawing the pole up under the tramp and bungee-ing the pole somewhere on the aft crossbar.

Tami,
I did a search in the F-16 discussion for "poleless" and it came up with nothing. I made sure I was searching all posts. Could it be in another discussion? I'd really like to see some pictures of that setup.
-Rob V.
Panama City

Here's my post-
web page
I had Goodall make a spi just for this purpose but unfortunately they cut the luff too long so I'm still dealing with that-
Another option for "turbocharging" a uni is to just add a roller furling jib- If it gets really light air, your crew weight goes up, or whenever you go downwind it helps a lot IMO.

Kirt