[quote=Dogboy]Having the jib battens hang up on the mast is just one of those little "quirks" of the Hobie 16. There are some things you can do to help reduce the problem, but in light wind, you'll pretty much always have the top batten hang up to some degree and need to "pop" it across. To pop the batten free, pull down & push the sail forward and away from the mast to get the batten unstuck (the batten actually hangs up on the jib halyard). You may even need to stand up to do this.
First thing to do, lay your jib out on the ground and tension the battens. Now look at how much excess batten length is sticking out past the leech of the sail. You only want the very tip the batten adjuster exposed. Trim off as much batten length as possible while still being able to properly tension the batten. The less batten sticking out, the less chance for a hangup.
You can also route the halyards away from the front of the mast to help reduce hangups. After the mainsail is hoisted and locked, walk the main halyard around the side of the boat, outside the shroud, and back to the mast and cleat it off. This will help hold hold the halyard to the side. You can also route the jib halyard to the side of the mast, but this may cause uneven mast rotation.
Trimming the battens and knowing how to pop the jib free will eliminate most hang up problems, but as a last resort, you can purchase Hobie "super battens" which are more flexible than stock battens to even further reduce the chance of a hangup.
sm[/quote]
No HTML tags allowed (except inside [code][/code] tags)
