I've got an 85 H16 That spent most of this past summer on the beach at a friends lake home close to my house. I didn't get a chance to do much racing this last summer so it worked out well for me to leave it set up there. (I live in the middle of dirt, and dis-like dealing with impatient power boaters at the public launch). A friend has a 77 H16 he wants to sell, but the jib has been mangled by mice. (The main is brand new). My plan is to leave the 77 at the lake, and use my 85 for racing. I was thinking of adding a furling jib to it just to make life even easier. Is there any loss of power, due to not having any battens in the jib? The hulls are solid, and it needs a fairly large amount of TLC, and I think I can get it for a good price. Plus I can update some things on my 85, and use the parts on the 77. Or am I just lazy? 
I used a furling jib when I had a H16 and there is some performance loss, but a big gain in convenience. Since there aren't any battens, the sail is cut much differently. Here is a photo of my H16 furling jib, on top of a standard H16 jib.
![[Linked Image]](http://users.adelphia.net/~jmhoying/jibs.jpg)
There is some performance loss due to the smaller size of the jib and (in lighter air) the flatter shape. Without the battens the wind needs to hold the sail to the appropriate shape.
If you are not racing, it's no big deal. The convienience factor more than outweighs the performance decrease.
As a newbie to the Hobie scene I cannot speak to the performance loss of the furling jib with any great experience. But I can say that after sailing on H16`s with both setups, I could detect NO difference in performance. This is exactly what I was told to expect prior to installing the furler setup. I am sure that experienced racers could probably notice the differences, but I could not.
As for the convenience of the furler, I cannot say enough. I really, really like it. At the dock, on the beach, or on the water - depowering quickly and easily is a big convenience that I wouldn`t want to be without.
Dave
Wow! That looks like it is signifigantly smaller. I can't imagine that gets hung up on the mast in even the slowest of tacks, especially without battens. Do those work as roller/reefers, or just furling? Thanks for the info. I think my laziness will prevail and I will get one if I do buy another boat.
I used it with a Harken furler and upper swivel. Had to buy a shorter pigtail for up top also.
![[Linked Image]](http://users.adelphia.net/~jmhoying/newjib3.jpg)
Jack