Sparkman & Stephens S&S 34 Sailboat Review, Specs, and Listings

Design and Hull Form

Viewed from above, the S&S 34 shows a distinct diamond plan with a fine bow and narrow stern, short waterline, and long overhangs that give it a remarkably modern shape for its era along with generous tumblehome and relatively high freeboard. Below the waterline sits a short fin keel with nearly all ballast concentrated amidships and a skeg-hung rudder placed well aft, a layout that preserved the distinct rudder-and-keel separation Olin Stephens had pioneered on the 12 Metre Intrepid. The Mk II variant refined this with a deeper keel carrying a straighter leading edge and better aerofoil profile plus a lower centre of gravity, paired with a curved spade rudder on a smaller skeg to raise hydrodynamic efficiency. At 33 ft 6 in overall, 24 ft 2 in on the waterline, 10 ft 1 in beam, and roughly 9,195 lbs displacement against a 50% ballast ratio, the hull is easily driven and stiff, taking its first reef only at a hefty 25 knots.

Construction and Builders

Original UK boats from Winfield & Partners and Aquafibre carried a deck lowered below the sheerline to form a toerail, with a doghouse and lower forward cabin trunk; Aquafibre hulls were often finished by other yards after Winfield sold one of its two moulds to that firm, which built until 1974. Swarbrick Brothers in Western Australia took the second mould set and, to gain forward headroom, developed their own deck mould with a flush cabin trunk rising flush to the sheerline, an uninterrupted profile that distinguishes the Australian version from the slightly raised doghouse of the English boats. Swarbrick built 34 hulls between 1969 and 1984, Maybrook Marine added four more from 1986, and in 2003 Mike Finn of Cottesloe Yachts returned the moulds west and introduced foam-sandwich vacuum-infusion construction; the resulting Constellation class from 2004 is a 25% lighter hull that is physically stiffer with higher impact strength. The S&S 34 is robust in every detail and forgiving of rough treatment.

Rig and Sail Plan

The S&S 34 carried a relatively tall masthead rig with a high-aspect mainsail and enlarged foresail, a configuration innovative for its day and later ubiquitous among racers. The original S&S specification gave a 40 ft forestay and 35 ft mainsail luff for the short rig, while the Mk 2 tall rig extended the forestay to 43 ft and the luff toward 38 ft, with genoa areas growing from a 395 sq ft No. 1 to a 442 sq ft No. 1 and the tri-radial spinnaker from 836 to 1,031 sq ft. Swarbrick initially offered a straight-trunk Mk 1 with single-spreader cruising rig, later a twin-spreader tall rig, and Maybrook built both cruising and racing tall-rig versions. Forestay termination moved aft of the bow on British and early Australian boats but reached the stem on later Australian hulls, and 1980s boats variously used keel-stepped or deck-stepped masts with larger sections.

Accommodations

The standard Australian cabin provides 6 ft 1 in of headroom tapering to an inch lower at the main bulkhead, with a sea-going quarter berth to port and a navigation station just forward of it. The galley lies to starboard, hanging lockers and a head sit forward of the saloon, and a tight V-berth occupies the forepeak at 5 ft 10 in headroom. The layout is a straightforward offshore cruising interior that puts the navigator’s seat and sea berth where they belong for passagemaking.

Handling and Performance

When introduced, the S&S 34 was regarded as exceptionally fast to windward and in heavy weather, and even today she is hard to beat to windward in more than 10 knots, with owners reporting tacking angles of 80 degrees. The hull is easily driven and only about 20 hp is needed to reach hull speed, though owners claim less in practice, and as she heels the waterline length increases significantly—Olin Stephens’ criteria put the ideal angle at 23.5 degrees. She is wonderfully balanced and can hold a windward course without active steering in suitable sea states, making her easy to handle single-handed.

The Verdict

The S&S 34 is a design that demonstrated Olin Stephens’ belief that a good offshore racer is also a good cruiser, and four decades of solo circumnavigations and club racing confirm it. She is stiff, quick, balanced, and built in variants from solid glass to infused foam without losing the essential diamond-plan hull. The chief penalty is a wet ride, shared with most S&S designs of that period.

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