Is It Worth It?
“The good news is you won’t need to reef often,” Bob Perry wrote me recently of my new-to-me boat Spica. “The bad news is, of course, the boat will be a slug in light air. That sail area to displacement (SA/D) is disastrously low!”
*Sigh*
When Mia and I bought our 1971 Olle Enderlein 36 (“new” Spica), I knew this SA/D was going to be a problem. Our first Spica, a 1977 Norlin 34 “special,” and a full two points higher on the SA/D scale (15.8 v. 13.8) was probably the best pure sailboat I’ve ever owned—she sailed so beautifully in all breezes, light on the helm and fast to accelerate through maneuvers. I loved that boat.
We sold old Spica in the fall to a friend at our local sailing club because she needed a lot of fundamentally structural maintenance work that I didn’t have the time, skill, or desire to do myself nor the budget to have a boatyard do professionally (think soft balsa-cored decks, new thru-hulls, etc.). The new Spica, another 70s boat, had already been refit from the keel bolts up—I’m writing from her beautifully refurbished interior, the satin varnished dark mahogany bulkheads contrasting quite pleasingly with the white overhead and bookshelves port and starboard. She’s a beautiful boat inside and out, a major upgrade to the “camping” feel of the old Spica. But she’s slow.
I knew we’d need to address the rig and sails, that much was apparent the day we trial sailed the boat last fall, but I was smart enough not to commit to anything until we’d sailed her for a season. That didn’t stop me from looking at rig designs though in the meantime. Thanks to Bob, we have several iterations of a new rig and sail plan for Spica, the final version of which brings that “disastrously low” SA/D of 13.8 up to a sporty 18.3. But a new rig and new sails are going to cost me, even with industry discounts, upwards of $20,000…we only paid $39,000 for the entire boat.
“Seems like an incredibly expensive upgrade for a boat that probably isn’t worth it,” wrote Quarterdeck member and former 59º North Svalbard crew Jordan B. “Why not get a boat with more performance designed-in?”
Why not indeed? Jordan’s question, of course, is the crux of this column—when is it “worth it” to make expensive changes on old, relatively cheap boats?
I’ve spent the summer trying to answer that question for myself, spending way too much time comparing boats on sailboatdata.com (there’s probably an entire column about this website alone). Was there another boat out there that would satisfy my desire for better light-air performance, but that also was refitted to the extent that the OE36 is, and would make a fun family cruising platform and fit inside our shed for the winter at our home sailing club in Sweden? I compared everything from a modern X-35 (with an almost silly SA/D of 25.1) to old Spica’s big sistership, the Norlin 37 (16.6), but when it came down to it, none of them would be a) as nicely fitted out for cruising as the OE is, or b) fit in the shed.
As the summer went on, new Spica grew on me. In a breeze, she sails beautifully sweet. Her underwater profile, with long fin keel and aft skeg-hung rudder is very similar to our S&S Swan 48 Isbjørn, an all-time great sailing boat. That awesome aft deck outside the cockpit coaming for lounging while underway or drying off after a swim to keep the cockpit dry; the clever folding salon table where Axel eats his oatmeal breakfast every morning; the beautiful helm station with its varnished wooden wheel and perfect sight lines forward for driving.
Still, she’s underpowered and literally like 95% of the summer here in Sweden there have been less than 10 knots of true wind, So if we keep her, we gotta do something about that. And by the way, I’m not the only person to say this; the original builder of the boat, Sten Brycker, in the 70s stuck a mast on his personal OE36 that was a full 10 feet taller than original spec! “She is not a light-wind boat,” he explained in an old magazine article I dredged up. “And sailing is more fun with a high rig.”
So, I’m doing it. This fall, when we de-rig to put the boat in the shed for the long Swedish winter, we’ll take the final measurements and make the final spec on a new rig. Taller mast. Longer boom. More sail area. More fun.
Will it be worth it? Definitely not! That is, of course, if you define worth it in purely financial terms. But here’s the thing: owning a sailboat, any sailboat, is never worth it by that definition! No matter what you do to a boat over the course of your ownership, you’d be extremely lucky to get back what you originally paid for it, and you’ll never get back anything you spent above that.
To me, the value is two-fold. One, I want to enjoy the boat I have to its fullest potential; and two, boats will always be both beautiful objects to behold and living things with a soul.
If you love the boat, it’s always worth it.
October 2025
