I have just started sailing my Hobie 16, I have found that my mast doesnt seem to rotate well. I have been pushing it round a bit but this is a pain. The base seems to be rubbing pretty bad I am not sure if there is meant to be a washer or someithing to make it rotate better?

Hobie-Murrays sells a 3-chip teflon disc set. The individual discs sit in the mast base so the mast can rotate freely from tack to tack. Also, make sure your shrouds are the same length.

Happy Holidays!

Bob Curry

the disks sound like a good idea, does anyone know where I would get one in Australia, Brisbane. thanks for the tip on length of rigging.

Gday Brendan,
SPeak to Mal Gray at Sunstate Hobie 54476317 for any bits and pieces.
Of course you are training up for the Hobie 16 nationals in a few days time at Manly??.

Thanks, for the tip. not sure if I am quite up to the hobie 16 nationals. I am still pretty new into the whole thing but will go down and check them out. I dont even have constant crew as yet.

Definately come down brendan as there's more than 60 hobie 16s registered already with a few world and national champions racing to show us all whats what. I'll be on an all yellow boat sail No 107902 so give me a yell if you're lurking around. As for crew there's a crews register on the Qld Hobie assn web site with quite a few people volunteering for crew spots.
Another thing you can do with the mast step is get a plastic coke bottle top and sit it in the socket, the mast will squish it into a good washer, (cheap an nasty but it works).
Happy Sailing
Phil Palmer

Thanks for the tip of the coke bottle lid it worked an absolute treat. No more scraping and grinding noise! thanks again Philthy.

I've found that a whiffle golf ball cut in half makes a good bearing. That is the hollow plastic golf ball used for practice. I would also add a little marine grease.
Greg
H14, H16

And if you REALLY want to save some money, especially after you splurged on a bottle of Coke,...When your wires need replacing, just go over to the pasture outside of town, and with a wire cutter, cut 3-20 foot sections out of the barbed-wire fence. It works great, but don't lean on the shrouds.

Call me crasy or cheap or both, but I have been cutting mast shims out of the rounded edge of Margarine containers for years. They are thinner than the real shims and wear out a little more often, but hey, there's more where they came from. You can cut about 6 out of one container. I have even cut them out of the flat side part and cut a V in the middle so it forms a cone. Works great! and I don't care how cheap you think I am.

You can even use a quarter...but use a canadian. That way it really only costs you a dime 'eh? They will form themselves into a dish and they really work pretty well...in a pinch.

What are you people doing that is wearing out the disks so fast??? My replacement rate is not that high. I use the real thing, but that still shouldn't make that much difference. I do leave my mast up and only take it down for maintenance reasons. Are you guys scoring or grooving the metal when putting up your masts? Maybe smoothing out the metal would reduce the wear rate on disks.

Dear Jeff, I'll tactfully avoid the replacement shroud theory and confess that even though the coke bottle top is good enough I do actually use the 'hobie' teflon chips. Mine last around 6months of normal use, if they don't get spat out. I've been using alot of rig tension lately with a high crew weight and that does seem to chew them up, I killed one and a half chips over 6 days at the Aus nationals. My biggest destroyer of chips is when they get spat out so if you have any theories on how to keep them in place I'd like to know. My best effort has been the use of contact cement on the under side of the chip just before raising the mast, that chip lasted 6 months and only got spat out after a couple of strong wind races. Any other ideas?
Cheers Phil

Have any of you tried "PTex" It's the plastic that they use on the bottom of skis and snowboards. It comes in sticks from the ski shop to use for repairs. They call them Ptex candles, because you light the end of the stick on fire and melt the PTex until it drips into the scratch or gouge in the ski base. You can then base grind the excess away for a slick repair. So your thinking, hmm, what does this have to do with Mast rotation. Well, you can lightly sand the bottom of your mast step and melt Ptex into it. A couple of layers (each layer melts into the other) and away you go. I find that this sticks in the step, and last longer that anything else. If you really want to get tricky, you can melt some in the step and quickly drop a chip on top of it, that'll stick-um.

If you have trouble with mast chips spitting out. Check your mast pivot bottom for sharp areas. If you feel any, clean them up with a file. Also you can cut 4 small darts in the teflon chip 90 degrees apart. This will help the chip form the cup shape.

Avoid very thick mast chips because it lifts the mast up so that the mast stops barely hit which I think causes them to wear quicker.

cheers
Bill J