Hello again



I went down to the coast for some training on my hobie 16. The winds were up to 25nots (GREAT FUN). My crew and I kept on swoping positions and when i was crew i noticed the boat kept on trying to nose dive even if im going up wind which confused me. We ended up trapezing off the back of the boat all the time, up and down the wind. So I was just wondering how does a hobie 16 nose dive when going up wind and how can i prevent this? I weight about 68Kgs and so does he so we weigh 136Kg together. We did actually cart wheel the boat and we were runing the boat as fast as we could. Since i was crew i was the first one to go and when my skipper went the boat almost landed on him but i pulled him out off the way just in time. After the incident we just laught all the way in.



From Jules

You have been initiated into the wonderful world of the pitchpole. this is a problem that as far as I know has been pretty exclusive to the hobie 16 because of the tapered nature of the bows of each hull. this is a problem that will forever plague you to some degree or another as long as you have the boat. the quickest and most surefire way to avoid this is to buy some anti pitchpole hydrofoils and install them on the bow of each hull. With these installed those bows will never again bury themselves in the water. However, a true skilled cat sailor would never be caught with those on his boat......

The aquatic car wreck known as the pitchpole takes place for one very simple reason. You have a Jib. there are several remedies that can alleviate your boats tendency to do this on whatever tack you are taking. Some say the best remedy is to Rake your mast back even further and this will prevent it from happening I have tried this and in moderate winds it helps but if you love high winds then it doesn't do much of anything. my personal remedy has been the jib travelers. the problem is that in high winds there is so much force being exerted on the jib that it is pushing the nose of the boat right down into the water.. so to fix this you need to spill some of the air off the jib at a greater rate without losing any of the speed that the jib brings to the boat. Hence the travelers. the best way to get the feel for it is to loosen the jib at first and sacrifice the speed as you learn the best way to position the travelers. the further out you go with them the more air spills off the jib and lifts the bow, but you can also lose speed, so you need your crew to be experimenting with that sweet spot where you are spilling enough air to keep the bow from diving but are right on the razors edge where you can keep the best speed both tacking up into the wind and downwind.

The travelers have been the best solution I have come up with for avoiding that problem but even they are not fool proof. just the other day I pitchpoled right out into the jib and watched the boat roll over on its side. But to me that is just fun you are not really having a good time sailing if you are not constantly flirting with disaster. So play with different remedies and see what works best for you and your crew, the thing about Sailing a 16 is that it is a constant evolution of fine tuning to get the best possible experience.. Good luck and I hope this helps.

Ah I understand how to avoid it now, ill try to play the jib next time I go for sailing(SUNDAY IS TO FAR AWAY). But I was wondering how does it pitchpole into the wind, i understand it going with the wind (down the wind) thats easy but into the wind I cant realy see how it works. Another thing is since my crew and i just reach the weight limit wehn we go down wind i noticed we were nose diving heaps and only bearly recovered each one except we went over once where the wind was at its best. So is there some way of trapezing differently that will help it not nose diving or is there some other way??

Well thanks for all your help its been great I dont know what I would do with out uses!!!!!!!!!



From Jules

The pitchpole can actually be worse when sailing upwind than downwind.. the reason for this is that as I am sure you know you are never sailing straight into the wind when sailing upwind. the boat is always pointing in at least a 45 degree angle to the wind. therefore the wind is driving into your jib and mainsail even harder when going upwind because it is multiplied by whatever speed your boat is achieving. the upwind pitchpole requires the same remedy... you have to spill some of that air off the jib to reduce the downforce it is causing on the bow.

Usually Trapezing techniques only help if you are sailing solo. when you get more than one person on a 16 and together you are both pretty heavy it only complicates the pitchpole problem because for one the hulls are riding lower in the water and the bows are that much closer to diving, and if you are pitchpoling while flying a hull then you have that much more weight pushing down on the leeward hull even if you both are out on trapeze lines. Pitchpoling is never fully going to be remedied with a Hobie 16 but it can be controlled. it all comes down to how much force is being asserted on that jib.

As an object lesson next time you rig up your boat in moderate to high winds, while on the beach turn your boat up into the wind as you would be facing on an upwind tack. release your main completely but Haul your jib in close on a close traveler. move to the back of the tramp and if the wind is not already lifting the stern of the boat you will be able to lift it yourself with very little effort. This will help you see how much downforce on the bow the jib creates at different reaches and traveler positions. The Jib is absolutely necessary on the 16 in order to achieve the speeds we love so much and to tack in high winds, but the flip side of that is that it pushes those bows deep in the water in the high winds so you have to learn to play with it constantly. Keep at it soon you will get the feel for what the right jib and traveler reaches are for your best sail.

None of the replies you received to this post mentioned crew position.



This is very important. The faster the boat goes the more the nose buries itself. This doesn't occur only with Hobies but with all quick cats. On the homepage of my website there is a lovely photo of a Taipan 4.9 doing just what you described. See:



http://www.users.bigpond.com/robandheath/atca



The upshot is the faster you go the more the bows want to bury. Watch the water level on the bow and as the bows start to get lower move your weight towards the back of the boat. You need to make sure that you don't overdo it of course and sail with your sterns dragging and your bows too high. It is a constant adjustment backward and forward along the hull as the speed of the boat changes.



If you feel the bow start to pitchpole easing the jib and main will help it back up but the main adjustment you need to make is where you place yourself along the hull.



May I suggest you get yourself a copy of the very excellent book written by the guy who owns the forum we are talking on.



It's called "Catamaran Racing for the 90's" by Rick White and Mary Wells. You can order it off http://www.catsailor.com or just go to a big sailing shop. I picked my copy up at the local chandler in Cairns Australia.



Berthos.