# Schock Santana questions



## TSOJOURNER (Dec 16, 1999)

I''m a little confused. . . not unusual.

There appears to exist sailboat models known as the Santana 35 and Schock 35. I think they were built by the same yard(?). To confuse matters (at least for me) sellers sometimes list their boats as Schock Santana 35.

Will someone fimiliar with the Schock boats provide some clarification? How do the Santana 35 & Schock 35 differ? Please comment on the sailing characteristics of the boats. How do these boats rate in quality of construction?

What about the Santana 37 and the Schock 34 (again, there appear to be two 34ft designs - one more cruising oriented, the other more of a racer)?


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## e-27 sailor (Oct 1, 2003)

W.D. Schock is a So. California manufacture that has produced a long line of 1D sailboats since 1946, including Santanas & Schocks. They''ve produced some ledgions on the left coast. 

http://www.wdschock.com/history/boatlist.htm 

The Santana 35 was produced in the late 70''s, has a shorter waterline, is a little beamer, lighter and has a smaller sail area, than the Schock 35, which went into production in ''87. 

As far a specs & performance go, the Shock 35 is more closely matched to the J/35.

While I''ve crewed on the Santana 35, I can''t speak to construction quality, although when you rack & stack them against similar boats, they are priced about $10k below others.


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## Jeff_H (Feb 26, 2000)

This is not that hard. Schock is the boat building company. They built several lines of boats; Schock, Santana and Wavelength to name a few in much the same way that Pearson built Ensigns, Tritons and Vanguards or Beneteau builds Oceanis, Idylle and Firsts. Santanas were generally the more hardcore race boats. The original Snad Turner designed Santana 35 was an IOR influenced out and out race boat. You could rightly call these boats Schock Santana 35''s in much the same way that you can call a Vanguard a Pearson Vanguard. In its original form the Santana 35 was extremely light for its day, (8500 lbs) and lightly ballasted. They came with a fractional rig and a great racing cockpit. Ergonomically these were great boats to race. Build quality was something less than top notch. While they were not ideal offshore boats for a lot of reasons they have done well racing in windy venues and Francis Stokes raced one single-handed in the Ostar transatlantic race in the late 1970''s. The Santana 35 became a successful West Coast one design class. 

The Schock 35 was an updated version of the Santana 35 which uses the same hull and a slightly altered deck mold. In much the same way as the J-35 was a masthead non-rule based version of the J-36, the Schock 35 had a little nicer interior, a masthead rig, a different internal structure and much more ballast and weight. Similar to the Santana 35 there is a separate active West Coast one design class for the Schock 35''s. The Schock 35 with its higher stability and larger sail plan is generally considered to be significantly faster than the Santana 35 but in many areas of the country the Santana 35 has an easier time sailing to its more generous PHRF rating. 

The Schock 34 PC was intended to be a Performance Cruiser although I believe that there are also full race versions of this design. They are a later design than the Schock 35 and were intended to be more cruising oriented. They had a jazzier interior layout and a slightly better build quality than the 35''s. They were comparatively lightly ballasted for their heft and sail area. The Schock 34 PC''s were substanially slower than the Schock 35''s and slightly slower then the Sanatana 35''s.

Jeff


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## Jeff_H (Feb 26, 2000)

Oh Yeah, the 37 is an older Gary Mull design. It is slower and more cruising oriented than the other three. 

Jeff


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## TSOJOURNER (Dec 16, 1999)

Thanks for the information and links. I think I have an idea of what I''m looking at now re Schock/Santana.

These boats are available on the west coast (NW) and appear to fit our basic requirements (34-38 footer, performance oriented, basic cruising accommodations, $50,000 budget). I do wish the comments had indicated "better than average construction." I suppose that''s why the asking prices are less than some other boats in the same basic category. Maybe we need to boost the budget.

Other suggestions?


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## Jeff_H (Feb 26, 2000)

My experience with Schocks of the era you are considering is that they were not all that well built. They clearly are not "better than average construction." I looked at several when I was looking to buy my current boat and my previous boat and found a range of basic fiberglass issues (including a transom that was separaring from the topsides). These boats have always had a reputation for being a little flimsey.

A couple boats that might suit your needs that are a little better built and which can be purchased in your price range:
Frers 36
F3 36
Farr 11.6 (Farr 38)
Farr 1104
Farr 1020
J-35
J-36
Soverel 39 (Tartan built)
Tripp 36

If you boost your budget, the Express 37 and Express 34 are super boats. Olsen built a well rounded 34 footer. J-boats built a couple nice performance cruisers J-34c and J-35c. 

Jeff


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## TSOJOURNER (Dec 16, 1999)

As usual agree with Jeff - and he offered a good list. I raced a Santana 35 in a Swiftsure race (Puget Sound)in the 80''s. It was a dog in the light stuff but a fun boat in a breeze. An acquaintance raced one for years on San Francisco Bay and recall him telling me about bulkheads coming adrift. The Schock 35 is faster all around and better screwed together.


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## paulk (Jun 2, 2000)

There seems to be a decent fleet of J/36''s in the Puget Sound area. We sail ours on Long Island Sound (right coast) and have found the price and performance are both great.


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## TSOJOURNER (Dec 16, 1999)

*Shock Santana questions*

I bought a shock santana 21, and can't find a trailer to fit her.  My adjustable won't adjust enough. I want to build a cradle and insert it in my existing trailer. But I can't find the hull dimensions anywhere on line. Can anyone help me with links or any other way to find out the dimensions I need (without taking her out of the water)?

Thanks.


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## sailingdog (Mar 19, 2006)

LMPI-

You really shouldn't hijack a dead thread... since your question is basically unrelated, you'd be much better off starting your own thread.


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## truesdell (Jun 16, 2017)

I was part of the whole Santana 35/Schock 35 evolution. I built some of the tooling for the Santana 35 in the factory on S. Greenville St in Santa Ana, CA, and raced extensively with Tom Schock and Steve Schock. 

The Santana 35 is a Shad Turner design and is a direct evolution from successful Santana 20 one-design (875 built.) 

Right from the beginning the Santana 35 ran into some problems: It came in overweight, it didn't have enough sail area for So California (especially the fractional kites), and it tended to be sticky downwind. So all those negatives and the boat had a punitive IOR rating--way above one-ton. The boat's contemporaries in the IOR arena were the Farr quadruplets (Red Lion, Jenny H, Mr. JumpA, and Smir-Nof-Agen) and compared to those, the Santana 35 had less sail area, shorter LOA and LWL, a blunter entry, but lighter displacement. And it owed one-tonners a "ton" of time. In general it was a fun boat to sail. We loaded one up in Long Beach (more wind than Newport Beach) with college kids with lots of small boat experience and were able to win a series or two. Good times and somewhere I probably have the photos to prove it! The whole time we were racing it we were discussing how to make it faster. It kept coming back to (a) more sail area, (b) longer waterline, and (c) a finer entry. But us youngsters didn't and the money or pull to implement that. Meanwhile, the Santana 35 did quite well in handicap and one-design fleets on San Francisco Bay where the wind is consirably stronger than So. California. However, they did start coming unglued here and there. 

The next large project was the Bill Cook design, New York 36, which pretty much directly solved (a), (b), and (c) of the Santana 35, sailed faster, and rated lower. 

Since most of the NY36 were sold on the east coast (NYYC members), WD did a cost study on how much it cost to truck them out there and decided to build them on the east coast. He bought some land in Bradenton (south of St. Petersburg and Tampa) and yanked his youngest son out of college to run the factory in Florida. They loaded up trailers with NY36 tooling along with a few other boats. Steve is the engineer of the family and a smart, thoughtful guy. WD was clever enough and financially pretty savvy while Tom's forte was customer interaction and sales. They cut Steve loose in Florida with minimal supervision, telling him: "Just sell boats!" Steve liked what he saw in the local MORC fleets and acquired rights to a few Paul Lindenberg designs (Schock's Wavelength series) which were moderately successful, mostly the Wavelength 24. 

As orders for the NY36 tapered off, Steve found himself staring at the molds for the Santana 35 and remembering those conversations we all had while sailing. So one day he layed-up a hull, braced it up, then attacked the bow with a chain saw. His bow redesign was very straight-forward: Mock up a more vertical stem, then fair straight back to tangents on the original hull. Really just straight lines from the new stem to where they touched the hull. Did a little selective reinforcement and drew up a masthead rig and a bigger keel with 1,200 more lbs of lead. Added about a foot to the J and lopped off an equal amount from the E. Left out most of the interior bits forward of the main bulkhead. 

The planking artifacts from the plug are the same on both the Santana 35 and the Schock 35 and both need to be massaged out if you want a fast bottom. But that's another story.


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## JimsCAL (May 23, 2007)

Great first post truesdell! Interesting info.


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## Jeff_H (Feb 26, 2000)

truesdell said:


> I was part of the whole Santana 35/Schock 35 evolution. I built some of the tooling for the Santana 35 in the factory on S. Greenville St in Santa Ana, CA, and raced extensively with Tom Schock and Steve Schock.
> 
> Since most of the NY36 were sold on the east coast (NYYC members), WD did a cost study on how much it cost to truck them out there and decided to build them on the east coast. He bought some land in Bradenton (south of St. Petersburg and Tampa) and yanked his youngest son out of college to run the factory in Florida. They loaded up trailers with NY36 tooling along with a few other boats. Steve is the engineer of the family and a smart, thoughtful guy. WD was clever enough and financially pretty savvy while Tom's forte was customer interaction and sales. They cut Steve loose in Florida with minimal supervision, telling him: "Just sell boats!" Steve liked what he saw in the local MORC fleets and acquired rights to a few Paul Lindenberg designs (Schock's Wavelength series) which were moderately successful, mostly the Wavelength 24.
> 
> As orders for the NY36 tapered off, Steve found himself staring at the molds for the Santana 35 and remembering those conversations we all had while sailing. So one day he layed-up a hull, braced it up, then attacked the bow with a chain saw. His bow redesign was very straight-forward: Mock up a more vertical stem, then fair straight back to tangents on the original hull. Really just straight lines from the new stem to where they touched the hull. Did a little selective reinforcement and drew up a masthead rig and a bigger keel with 1,200 more lbs of lead. Added about a foot to the J and lopped off an equal amount from the E. Left out most of the interior bits forward of the main bulkhead.


That is a great write up. I really appreciate hearing the inside story. I am something of a boat history junkie. I wanted to ask you if you can corroborate or correct a few details for me. I had an acquaintance who worked with Paul Lindenberg and then later for Schock. He told me this story.

To begin with, initially the Schocks leased Paul Luindenberg's facility and used Lindenberg's staff to build the NY 36 rather than try to put together an entire plant just to build the NY 36. At some point, Schock bought Lindenberg out. Paul remained at the plant for a period after Schock came into the picture and after Shock absorbed the Lindenberg production line into the Schock line up as a part of the course of the process.

The NY 36's were intended to race under the IOR race and one design keel boats, but quickly after being introduced became obsolte under IOR rule changes and had limited appeal beyond one design since they did not do well under PHRF, especially as some of the newer designs like the J-35/36 and Express 37's were showing up in PHRF fleets. Facing that reality and in need os a more general appeal design it was thought that the Santana 35 was a better platform to get adapted to the PHRF reality.

The version of the story that I heard was that there was a Santana 35 in Florida which was badly damaged. (I think that boat was called something like 'Blew Bayou') and the insurance decision was made to replace the hull and transfer everything else over to the new hull, which was done at the Lindenberg facility, and which left the old hull intact. It was my understanding that this hull was beefed up and cut up to become the plug for the Schock 35.

I also understand that Lindenberg actually drew the lines for the new bow and that a separate plug was made for the redesigned bow and that was grafted onto the hull from the damaged race boat to make the completed mold. Then I had conflicting information about what happened next. One version said that Schock was working with Nelson-Marek at this point and that Nelson-Marek actually drew the new keel, rudder, and rig. The other version said that Paul Lindenberg drew them. One version said the transom was shortened, another sayd it was left untouched.

Can you shed any light on this?

Thank you, 
Jeff


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## Faster (Sep 13, 2005)

JimsCAL said:


> Great first post truesdell! Interesting info.


Indeed!

Our son raced several seasons on a local Santana 35, and currently owns a Schock 35 and is doing pretty well.

Having spent some time under the boat when it was on the hard, one comment is that the extended bow does not appear truly 'tangential' in transition, but is a fairly distinct turn when viewed from astern. But that's merely a nitpick..

Clearly the modifications were successful, the boat is much faster, rates much faster and seems able to sail to the ratings.


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## olson34 (Oct 13, 2000)

While this thread is rather old, the information is really interesting, almost "shocking" to coin a pun.
Apropos of whatever, our little YC has two of these rare New York 36's in it.
I have sailed to windward in light air, close hulled to the max with one, and darned if he didn't slowly sail.... over.... me...


Nothin' goes to weather like a good IOR hull form with those balanced water lines. 
(Different story off the wind, but the NY-36 seems like a decent boat.)

If shopping, be sure that the interior layout of the NY 36 suites you. The Schock 34 is more conventional.


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## SHNOOL (Jun 7, 2007)

**** some wavelengths are just plain cows  ****

Great history in this thread.


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## Santana35 (Jan 23, 2018)

I'm looking at a 79 model of the Santana 35. Needs lots of cosmetic work, but the structure is very sound. I have been sailing dingies and other friends boats for decades. This will be my first large boat and I will berth it in the San Francisco Bay. My weekend warrior hobbie. Any advice? Like run the other way.


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## Faster (Sep 13, 2005)

They are a good boat, fairly quick (but not nearly as quick as the near-sister the Schock 35 - with its longer waterline, deeper keel and masthead rig) Large cockpit and the smaller frac rig will probably serve you well in the windy SF bay. I find the deck nonskid a bit coarse, but it works well until you're kneeling on in wearing shorts... the toerail ramps are nice for the railmeat.

They are a bit dark below with the small ports and a fair bit of teak, and the galley is somewhat marginal. 

A decent PHRF racer, but I know owners who have coastal-cruised them quite extensively. Just look for the normal 40-yr-old boat issues - wet cores, cracked floors, leaky ports etc.


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## Santana35 (Jan 23, 2018)

Thanks for the info. I am looking for a cruiser and like the lines of the Santana. The boat has been setting in marina along a river leading into the San Francisco Bay, and according to the owner, the boat has not been sailed in six years. Lots of cosmetic issues, including a new headliner, and a serious scrub down.


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## Jeff_H (Feb 26, 2000)

For what it is worth, back in the late 1970's or early 1980's, Francis Stokes raced a Santana 35 in one of the Ostar single-handed transatlantic races before doing the round the world race in a Southern Cross. I interviewed him after that race. His only gripe with the Santana was that there is no bilge so everything and everywhere in the cabin ended up getting wet as bilge water sloshed everywhere. Stokes was a Schock dealer and while the boat was modified for the race, I don't recall how much it was modified. 

These boats were super light for their day (i.e. in stock form nearly 2000 lbs lighter than a J-35) and carried a lot of sail area. That large sail plan is actually an advantage because they can sail reasonably well smaller headsails. I always thought that Shad Turner was a really skilled designer, who was largely underrated. My sense is that these were well rounded designs for an IOR boat. 

Back then Schock was not known for particularly robust construction, but the few older Santana 36's that I have seen seemed to be in pretty good condition. 

Jeff

Edit: Oh wait! What the heck? This is the same thread that I discussed the Santana 35 on way back when.


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