Kevin,
I'll bet that the great looking dark blue one that was in RI is now sailing in SF Bay; I have had a nice guest sail aboard it while down there for the Strictly Sail show in April.
That blue LPU hull is quite handsome, IMHO. And it drove sooooooo easily in a strong breeze....
On to Tim's comments about the one presently for sale on the right coast... as I was reading this thread, sitting on board our boat with my iBook via the club's new WiFi/Airport set up (way cool, BTW), it occured to me to look again at our own interior. (No comment on the vang -- we scrapped ours in '94 when we bought the boat -- and cushions and running rigging are in the replacement mode due to age on many boats from the eighties.)
When we purchased our "fixer upper" in '94 it had sat in its slip in SF Bay for 3 years and the interior had a lot of mold and mildew. More interesting was the amount (little piles, literally...) of salt crytals in the bilge. I figured that the stuffing box must have allowed water in to then evaporate and leave the minerals behind.
There was no rot or damage to any sole or bulkhead plywood, but... still... there remains a slight discoloration up about an inch at the base of the bulkhead(s) on both ends of the main cabin. When we get to them in our ongoing varnishing program, that discoloration will go away.
After pondering this a while it seems like the problem is that any water ingress of over 10 gallons or so is going to produce water to slosh all around above the sole in ANY boat with an arc-shaped bottom and no "sump" per se. And this would be many many boats built in the last 20 + years.
Thinking back to my trip down to SF several years ago on a Caacade 36, we had water sloshing above the sole for a little while, at 3 am, while three of us were clearing it out with large sponges (!). (The motion was too vigorous to use small cups to capture the water as it moved around.) In that case we were in breaking seas, enjoying 36 hours of gale conditions off Mendocino, and were pooped once which put water in around the laz. seat hatch seals. That model of boat has a very similar bilge and floor timber layout as the Olson. No sump. Bottom of the hull is maybe 5 inches below the sole.
The point to this rambling discourse is that almost any quantity of water that gets in will spend some quality time around the interior woodwork before the pumps catch up with it and/or you sponge it all out. The King-designed 80's Ericsons have a molded in sump, AFAIK, and this is A Good Thing.
I now wonder if there any Olsons, excepting those maintained by fastidious owners, that would not have some sea stains at the base of the bulkheads? FWIW, with a thru-stepped mast the forward bulkhead carries no load at the sole level, and is glassed in at the overhead and sides.
I hope this does not come accross as an overly-sensitive owner defending his particular boat, but the description of the other Olson did get me to thinking, always a risky endevour.
I would have the surveyor *really* concentrate on the cracks and old repairs, however. [Personal Opinion:The thru-bolt overlap hull-deck joint, considered on its own, is arguably more leak-resistant than the inside FRP-covered joint on Ericsons of the same era.]
Loren in PDX
