new to the hobie cat life. just picked up a 77 hobie 16. i need to replace the tramp and and not sure what to go with. mesh or vinal. anybody have any tips, comments, preferences? can anyone compair the two? thanks for any help.

Where are you located? You can go to any Hobie dealer and get a real nice mess or vinyl tramp. I am a dealer located in the Spokane WA./N. Idaho area www.funtosail.com. Go to www.hobiecat.com to find your local dealer. The Hobie tramps are heat welded versus stitched so much longer lasting I think. Go with mess because when your flying a hull the wind can get through the tramp and when you are sitting on vinyl water tends to pool under you when sitting on it.

im in chas, sc. thanks i was thinking of going mesh anyway but have heard they cant take as much tension as a vinal??.

We have a guy up here in Greenville that builds great mesh tramps. They run about $300, built to order and can be customized. I have used them on several of my Hobie's with great results. What makes the tramps unique is that all of the stitching is covered with a second stitched layer of vinyl which gives the original threads ultimate protection from the sun. I like them much better than the Hobie branded ones.

I have purchased numerous tramps from www.slosail.com I have been extremely pleased with the quality of materials and workmanship. I just recently ordered a set of wing tramps for a H-17 and they arrived at my door within a week of the order. I have found there pricing to be about the best bang for the buck. Hobie factory tramps are about the best made and you would need one if racing in Hobie class races, but they are quite pricey especially for a 1977 Hobie 16.

On my Wave I have Vinyl. If a calm day I stay nice and dry, but on wet days the water pools on the tramp.
Mesh allows water in, but lets it out fast.
Vinyl from Hobie is very expensive.
Mesh is cheaper and if you stitch them with sunproof thread they will last a long time.
Our store here on this site is a dealer for SLO, Sunrise, Atomic, Super Sails/Tramps and this one built by the Amish:
http://www.catsailor.com/store/pc/viewPrd.asp?idproduct=30624&idcategory=154

Almost all need to be built after ordered, and spring they all get swamped and delivery is slow. The Amish one above are mostly in stock and ship immediately,
RIck

since SLO was brought up...

A few years ago.. I asked around and heard lots of good things about SLO's products, so i contacted them about a tramp for my Mystere. They said they had never made one for that brand so I sent SLO a tramp from my friends boat as a template .... they never made the tramp as agreed, never returned the trampoline and stopped returning my calls & emails. I ended up calling the BBB and the California State's attorney. They never responded to either, and never resolved the issue

i would recommend you find another dealer

I wouldn't care so much if it was my trampoline.. but it was borrowed

Several other people came out since i posted my experince with similar problems (the company stopped communicating with them)

I LOVE the 2 tramps i have from Sunrise Yacht. They are pricey but the quality is fantastic - http://www.multihullnets.com/

PS i have had a mesh on all 3 of my cats. Don't really care for sitting in puddles of water

Contact info?

You can order them through me, pm me for a quote. He doesn't do credit cards or shipping.

I know that makes him sound flaky - but I'll vouch for him hands down as one of the best in canvas and trampolines...he's quit doing canvas work and is pretty close to retiring all together. I would get your trampolines while you can. He's built several of my trampolines and reinforced nearly every one I've owned...not to mention made me hull and mast covers and reinforced sails for me. He's the reason I don't yet do this work for myself.

My 2 cents..

May be mistaken, but I believe Hobie tramps are all vinyl..one style is just solid while the other is mesh. For Hobie tramps the solid is cheaper, but I believe it is currently only available in white. I've owned both styles of Hobie tramps, and do not believe there is any appreciable difference in how tight they can be laced or how much wind blows through. Don't have any experience with aftermarket tramps, but you can tighten a Hobie mesh tramp plenty tight. I prefer the mesh....sheds water better which also allows sand, etc. to be removed easier......and looks more sporty to me. However, on some windy winter days when the water's flyin' everywhere, the solid is nice!

That said, whatever tramp you get will probably last longer than your boat. No way I'd be buying a brand new tramp for a boat that old. Used ones come up quite often on Ebay and the Hobie and Beachcats classifieds.

thanks for all the info yall. mesh it is! ill post photos when its on.

Agree on Sunrise as well.., very good, but would greatly appreciate ordering through this site's store. Price is the same and you will be helping support this forum, the magazine and this web site.
Thanks

Solid has a major downside, it allows air to get trapped underneath which makes flipping easier and righting harder. I have flipped my H14 over backwards twice now tacking in 20+ kts, 4' waves and getting airborne enough to scoop air under the solid tramp. Combined with my weight in the stern it goes downhill real fast. For this reason I suggest the mesh tramp on a 14 or a 16. On an 18 or a 20 it won't make difference.

The other major benefit of mesh is that it comes in black. This will match (or at least not clash with) any color or pattern of sails you have now or down the road. It also hides dirt and you won't be able to see black marks from sliding around in wetsuit booties.

I'm a Hobie 16 sailor for over 20 years, and have had both types. I don't agree that there's anything to to argument about wind passing through enough to make or break a capsize, as the holes are so small.

But, I will echo those here about cold water spray coming through! The spray will accelerate the mainsheet being washed off the boat. Also agree about the draining vs. pooling.

Mike

This is public service announcement, so people do not forget.

Hobie mesh appears to be vinyl covered polyester. The Hobie solid tramp is vinyl covered polyester, the brand name is something like Seconite. It pretty and easy on the knees. The vinyl starts wearing off after a couple of years and sunlight breaks down the polyester. It's reputation for toughness came from being compared to the boats that used Dacron fishing net or heavy duty lace, a few years before. Any of the harsh methods for cleaning mold off (pure bleach, oven cleaner, 3500 psi pressure washers, etc ) shortens it's life

The plain black mesh most boat use is polypropylene. It is industrial looking and scratchy. There are soft smooth polypropylene meshes. The best I have seen was from Redhead in Australia, it was 3 times as much as a standard. For all practical purposes, polypropylene mesh does not degrade in sunlight. The stitching will wear out, a couple of times before the mesh wears.

Vinyl can be heat sealed. Polypropylene should be stitched, heat sealing makes it brittle. Hobie and others made some heat sealed polypropylene that really sucked, avoid them.

An advantage of the Sunrise tramp is the lack of a center lacing. It has a lacing strip at the rear only. One less place for the main sheet to fall into, less spray coming through and more comfortable. Not class legal if it matters.

Whatever you buy, spend the extra money for the better thread.

The Sunrise tramp comes in Black and Blue.

The OP is going mesh, and that's great, but for the record...

I have personally gathered empirical evidence suggesting that, in conditions similar to those described above, a mesh tramp can produce strikingly similar results. While I have no laboratory data to support it, my hypothesis is that, given the small holes in the mesh, combined with viscosity/surface tension factors and boundary layer/shear issues, the head loss across the mesh material is actually quite high, resulting in the majority of the wind force knocking me on my butt, regardless of the tramp material!

The boat is a 1977 Hobie 16, already 36 years old. Any new tramp he buys will probably out live the boat.

It is reasonable to assume though that his next Hobie 16 will benefit from a new tramp as well.