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power winches

1K views 7 replies 8 participants last post by  outbound 
#1 ·
Education & Training

What is there to know about power winches.

Can you tell if they are working too hard by their sound?

What if in a storm it is so loud you can't hear the winch very well.

In short, what safety and usage tips do you have for a power winch?
 
#2 ·
Good questions. Yes, I can tell if the winch is loading up by the sound. It also slows down a bit. Perhaps that might be a way of assessing it during a noisy blow. There is, however, a few things that I do. One is that I can feel the tension by bouncing my hand against the line. It's really easy and tells me immediately if I have a lot of tension. Hopefully I do not get to that point. A major idea is to go very slowly. That gives the system time to adjust to different sail tensions. So I find that if I pull out for a few feet of line and then let it sit for a minute, then repeat, it works well. This seems to be more of a factor when the wind is above 20 knots or so. I'm also careful to let the boom tilt upward a bit. I do not find the line getting tension when furling in.

I found that I was getting more tension than usual a few weeks ago. I played with the system at the dock, and ended up relaxing the halyard tension a bit. The sail now rolls out much more easily, as it had in the previous few years. It seems to be fine now.
 
#3 ·
We have friends with power winches. They aren't sufficiently careful with them. In one episode, they tore their bimini with the mainsheet by pulling it in too far. Oops. Drop a boat unit. In another, they got their son's fiancée stuck at the masthead with an override that took about an hour for them to undo. Oops. Don't drop the fiancée! Other friends (more careful, but still...) have managed to tear their r/f mainsail inside the boom when a batten got rolled up without being parallel to the slot. For an anchor rode, a power windlass can be a wonderful thing, but it is essentially single-purpose and simple. Broadening the applications by being able to run any line to a power winch, and before you know it there are lots of opportunities for mistakes and dangerously high loads to develop.
 
#6 ·
Electric winches and windlasses have essentially the same characteristics in that they will groan when overloaded. I've been amazed at the number of stories I hear about people burning up the windlass while trying to extract their anchor from the mud. Same is true with winches, especially during heavy weather when the sails are really heavily loaded. Unfortunately, manufacturers never had the forethought to install an overload warning light on the winch or windlass to tell the operator they were applying too much pressure for the winch's capacity.

Good luck,

Gary :cool:
 
#7 ·
Our 65's would tear the clew out of the jib in a heartbeat. Always monitor what you are doing and if using selftailers be ready to pop it out of the ST if the switch hangs up. These winches can be VERY dangerous if not monitored carefully. If they can tear the clew out of a sail, imagine what they could do to someone's hair, scarf, hood tie on foulies or fingers. We do not use gloves with these winches!
Ours are two speed and down shift when the load increases. It's a noticeable audible change. When under extreme load we only push the button for a few seconds at a time, but when tacking we use them steadily until they load up.
The OP told me that he had to rebuild the motors every year, but we haven't had to do it once on either in 6 years of heavy use. We ALWAYS cover them with a plastic bag AND a winch cover when they are not in use, so perhaps that is the secret?
When I was single handing and still when under extreme circumstances (like a super strong off dock current or wind) they can pull the boat to the dock nicely, so they can be very helpful for things other than sailing.
I would suggest you service the winch part frequently; a well lubricated winch puts less strain on the motor.
 
#8 ·
This covering or leaving them uncovered is an interesting topic.

Some have told best to cover and others best not to. Some think a fresh water wash is a good thing whether it comes from a hose or rain and that leaving them under cover to have the salt bake out of boarding spray bake into the grease is a bad thing. Some think sitting in the sun heats up the grease and being in the cool shade under a cover is better. Some think there's so much dust in the air ( think Sahara wind) that covering just makes sense.

Know winches at mast need cleaning and regreasing often. Two under dodger very rarely and grease still the nice light brown/tan. Ones around cockpit also can go a good long while. Think if they are horizontal so less likely to completely drain and in frequent salt spray is hard on them. Think that's more important than if they are covered.
 
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