I'd like to know if my Pacific Boats constructed Olson 911S was one of the late ones constructed. Hull # is
PCX910270787. Does anyone know this?
Elliott Rosenberg
Hey, Bob and gang,
As the first Ericson-built O911S hull owner, I can confirm that there was a photocopy brochure from Ericson for a 'Olson 30', but unless it was built prior to 1988, there were no hulls under that name. My hull number for the Ericson Olson911S was ERY91101A888 (I'm surprised I remembered!), the first of the series. I think Ericson briefly toy with that designation but abandoned that idea. Certainly, in my having Carl Shumacher (naval architect) out on my boat more than once on SF BAy, he mentioned the Capo 30 and the Olson 30s from Pacific Boats, but never led me to believe that any Ericson hulls existed before my boat.
--wilt wong
-----Original Message-----
From: rizmirian@comcast.net
To: Roger Shepley <rshepley@dyerbrown.com>
Cc: olson911@SailPix.com
Sent: Mon, 14 Jan 2008 3:13 pm
Subject: Re: names
Roger, there's a lot of confusion about the names, and what I'm about to say is not first hand knowlege by any means.
The boat started life as a modified Capo 30 and was called an Olson 911S, playing off of the name of a particularly fast Porsche of the time. These boats were built by Pacific Boats (George Olson) in Santa Cruz. CA and were light, fast and well built. They were sandwich cored, typically rod rigged and carried Ballenger spars. Pacific Boats went bankrupt. The molds were shipped to Ericson.
Ericson built a series of boats using the molds but made the boat more of a cruiser/racer than the other way around. It was a single-skinned boat, quite a bit heavier (roughly 8700 pounds vs. 7400 pounds displacement) with a bit more in the way of creature comforts, a SparCraft rig and wire rigging. I am told that Ericson marketed this boat as an Olson 911S and also as an Olson 30--the latter a strange name given there was already a high performance Olson 30 on the market. I have a brochure from Ericson describing it as an Olson 30, so that much I know to be fact.
Sales of the Ericson-built 911S were not brisk, eitehr because of the price point or the weight of the boats, so Ericson simplified the interior of the boat (thereby slighly lightening it) and called the later versions of it the Olson 911SE, with the "E" standing perhaps for economy or express. Most of the Ericson-built boats are "SE"s. Ericson eventually also went bankrupt, marking the end of manufacturing of this boat.
Given a choice I would buy the Pacific-built version if I were going to race it seriously. Its build quality more than makes up for its age. My boat is an Ericson built O911S and it is a perfectly good boat which is fun to sail and race. It's just not as quick, stiff or agile as its older sibling, and in heavy air conditions will not get on a wave as readily to surf. On SF Bay our respective PHRF numbers are 126 for the Pacific built and 132 for the Ericson built boats (both versions).
Good luck finding a boat. They remain a sought after commodity.
Bob
Jane Doe
28555
Can anyone summarize the difference between the 911, 911s, 911se, and any other versions