I scored big time today on P16 abandoned at a small town storage yard. Picked it up for $50.
I was expecting it to be pretty bad but it is in very good shape. I knew it had a good mast which was the main reason I was looking at it but it has everything except the sails and blocks as they were not stored with the boat.
It is a 1976 red. Someone did som lazy bottom work on it but it will sand down ok. There is one pencil sized hole in the outside. This model has no ports and the tramp is in excellent shape.
The decks are solid. I have not fully inspected the sides for delam but I am very optimistic. There is some waviness on the inside hulls but still felt hard. Even th rigging looks very good. It has wire luff jib halyard and the only P16 jib I have is zipper so I'll have to figure that out.
Rudders have some chips but everything is there. The trailer was in bad shape I could not move it so took the boat home on my trailer. I will go back for the trailer later. Guy said he would keep it for me if he knew I was coming for it.
-- Dustin Finlinson • Magna, UT
Member: Utah Sailing Association 1982Prindle 18 1986 Hobie 17
1982 Prindle 16
1980 Prindle 16(mostly)
1976 Prindle 16(mostly)
Check out "Prindle Sailors" on Facebook. --
I have a set of P16 sails and blocks already but the jib is a zipper luff so I'll have to use a different forestay or find a wire luff jib. I am not sure if I would like the wire luff any better but I am comfortable with the zipper style and they must have moved that way for a reason.
The ringing is kind of odd in it looked like hey had no adjuster plates on the shrouds at all only on the forestay. This seems very strange to me but maybe it was how the early ones were or someone just was rigging differently. I wonder if this means the wire rigging is longer.
I will likely replace the rigging as soon as can anyway but what is there looks to be in pretty good shape.
Another odd thing I noticed is there does not seem to be any hinge mechanism on the mast bottom at all. I have no idea how they stepped this thing.
Edited by Quarath on May 13, 2012 - 12:31 PM.
-- Dustin Finlinson • Magna, UT
Member: Utah Sailing Association 1982Prindle 18 1986 Hobie 17
1982 Prindle 16
1980 Prindle 16(mostly)
1976 Prindle 16(mostly)
Check out "Prindle Sailors" on Facebook. --
No hinge? That's bizarre! I can almost see not having chainplates on the side stays if it pre-dates when people started experimenting with mast rake. (Though I agree - I'd change out the rigging as soon as I could!) But the no hinge on the mast is a puzzler.
Mind taking pictures of the mast and pivot? I'm curious what this looks like. Any chance someone stuck some other boat's mast base on in place of the stock Prindle?
Tom
-- Tom Benedict
Island of Hawaii
P-Cat 18 / Sail# 361 / HA 7633 H / "Smilodon" --
NONE of the early Prindles OR Hobies had hinges. I just sent an old mast base to a guy in Utah or Idaho cause his old base was cracked and new ones are back ordered til late summer from Murrays. You simply have your crew tie a short line around base to crossbar holding line with one hand while pushing down with other hand as skipper raises mast. Simply put a 16'2" 1/8 wire similar to your shrouds thru the closed zipper & tie thimble to cringles on either end of sail to end up with wire luff jib. Wire luff jibs are much easier to raise & lower, but .01% slower. And I always have chain plates. Pete
I wonder why the early Hobies and Prindles didn't have a hinge. My P-Cat pre-dates both of them by a fair bit, and it's got a hinge. Hobie sailed a P-Cat before he developed his own line of cats. I wonder why that particular feature didn't make the cut, only to be re-introduced at a later date.
Tom
-- Tom Benedict
Island of Hawaii
P-Cat 18 / Sail# 361 / HA 7633 H / "Smilodon" --
Ya went and looked the mast step on the hinge and it is smooth. I have a more modern base for the beam and casting for the mast off another mast that is bent. Or I might just swap out the beams off one of the other Prindles in my back yard providing I get the bolts holding the beams to the hulls out. The traveler track is a little different as well.
I took some pictures I just need to get them off my phone and posted.
-- Dustin Finlinson • Magna, UT
Member: Utah Sailing Association 1982Prindle 18 1986 Hobie 17
1982 Prindle 16
1980 Prindle 16(mostly)
1976 Prindle 16(mostly)
Check out "Prindle Sailors" on Facebook. --
Until I started restoring a 1973 Hobie 14 I had thought that all Hobie 14's used the mast link like the newer ones, I knew they had changed link designs but thought the mast was always raised by putting the mast into the base and then pushing it up.
But the base on the 1973 original mast didn't have a sign of a hole for a link and neither did the mast step casting. Then I got to reading the Hobie 14 assembly manual and discovered the original method for raising the mast... Just pick it up and put it into the base. easy-peasy
The Hobie 14 mast is so light that I can see this as a viable method, haven't tried it yet, but it seems to me you would need to have the boat on the ground (beach) and not still on the trailer like most of us raise a mast.
I may be talking out of my ear... but I think I have a new never used non hinge mast casting. I picked one up locally from a dusty back room in a local marina but the holes didn't line up with mine. Let me know if you want it.
-- Bob Miller
1983 P16 Sail # 7312
"Miller Time" A work in progress; out of the water for 16 years
Barnegat Bay NJ
Beach Cat Lesson #1 - A free cat isn't
Find more Prindles on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/groups/173120656090532/ --
Thats how I always did the '76 14 I learned on. Without the beard though. I stepped it with the shrouds and forestay already hooked too. Can't do that on the 18, though.
Thats how I always did the '76 14 I learned on. Without the beard though. I stepped it with the shrouds and forestay already hooked too. Can't do that on the 18, though.
Did you need to loosen a stay to do it with all three connected?
Did you do this while the boat was on the trailer or always on the ground?