The International Etchells Class is one-design sailboat racing class, designed by American Skip Etchells.
Production
The first 36 boats were built by Skip Etchells and the Old Greenwich Boat Company between 1967 and 1969. Ontario Yachts in Canada, and Robertson and Sons Ltd., David Heritage Racing Yachts and Petticrows Limited, all in the United Kingdom. At the time there were three other molds being used - mold #8 was used by Ontario Yachts; mold #9 by Bashford and then Smidmore; Heritage and Petticrows used mold #10.
The Australian Association proposed basing the new mold on the Heritage one
The justification for this decision was that mold #11 had never been approved by World Sailing, but it also claimed "It has … been discovered by scans and floatation tests of boats from all three moulds that M11 produces boats which have a longer water line, less rocker, are flatter in the middle and fuller in the ends. The differences are material, far greater than can be explained away by minor variances due to manufacturing tolerances."
It emerged that the class association and World Sailing had no records of approval of molds #8, #9 and #10, thus calling into doubt the entitlement of other boats to compete in the class - boats from all current Etchells builders would be affected, including those from Ontario Yachts and David Heritage.
Shillalah performed well at the trials, winning eight of the ten races. Nevertheless, the judges were unable to agree on a winner, and thus a second set of trials was held in Travemünde the following year. For these trials Etchells rebuilt the boat in fiberglass, using the original Shillalah as a plug. As with the first trials, Shillalah II (as the new boat was named) dominated the races, winning ten out of the thirteen that were held, and only just missing out on an eleventh. and the name was changed to "International Etchells" in 1990.
For sailing the boat has a central control console that gathers many of the sail controls. These include the 8:1 mechanical advantage jib halyard, 4:1 Cunningham, 4:1 mainsheet, foreguy and the topping lift. Other controls are led to the cuddy cabin's aft bulkhead, including the 2:1 course jib sheet, 6:1 fine jib tuner, 2:1 barber hauler and the spinnaker halyard. There is also a 6:1 adjustable backstay and a mainsheet traveler.