Anchor windlass

[paulwitney]

I'm looking to purchase an anchor winch for my yacht, 33ft moderate displacement (Northshore 33). Back and muscles aren't quite as young as they were!!! Does anyone have experience with either Lewmar 1000 or South Pacific 800 freefall. I can buy the Lewmar from the US for about A$1000 including freight and the South Pacific sells for A$950 in Australia. Both of these are deck mounted and quite compact.
I often sail singlehanded and getting the anchor up from around 15 metres out of mud is no longer fun!!!!!!!

 

[AndrewB]

Sorry, can't help with either of these but certainly sympathise with the need to get one. I found it really made anchoring so much easier, it was possible to use heavier ground tackle, and I began to anchor a lot more often.

One tip - do make sure its powerful enough. Pick one that is rated to cope easily with the maximum load you are likely to apply. The SP 800 might be a bit marginal. There is a useful guide HERE.

 

[GMac]

The Sth Pacific is a Aussie winch and looks to be cheaper on the main Island (NZ) than the West Island (AUS), that's weird

Both are lower powered than most others so if you get either don't push the (suspect) load numbers published.

You will also find the local Lewmar people will not do anything under a US warrenty. The same applies over here with parallel imported gear, so watch out for that as well. Don't forget Duty in the landed cost. You have a quite protected ecomony and I would be very surprised if Muir don't have some protection in the way of a nice duty. Oh yeah GST could be in there as well. People often forget these 2 things.

Neither will run on Silver or polyprop rope if you have that. The Sth Pac likes a nice medium lay nylon and the Lemar a very nice but costly type66 nylon. Other ropes will work but only short term. Neither run 8 braid at all well.

Buying purely on price is often false economy so consider spending a little more to get improvement in performance and back-up support.

Easy options in Aus:
Muir of Tasmainia
Maxwell of NZ
Lofrans of Italy
Quick of Italy
All have nice horizontal winches and I'd be happy saying all will work better than your current 2 options.

 

[paulwitney]

There is no duty or GST which is good... just have to pick the best day for exchange rates US$ v A$ for buying from the states. Also will be in NZ in a few weeks so maybe will look around Auckland!!!! Still no rush, can get the anchor up just, a pain at times.

 

[kengill]

I Use the Lofrans vertical axis Airon. When I bought it it had a greater static pull then the Lewmar and was about 10% quicker on hoisting under load.

I've had it for about five years now with the Mizar radio control - a great help when single handed - and am convinced of the effectiveness of the system.

You pays your money and takes your pick.