Anyone know the Lofrans story

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I gave in to crew demands and went looking for a Lofrans Kobra windlass to replace a manual Royal on my 36ft boat. You just ca'nt get good people anymore! The windlass is (somewhat unusually) fitted on a vertical bulkhead in the bow anchor locker in a Malo 36, and apparently the Kobra slots in nicely to the space and geometry.

I am widely told the Lofrans factory has shut down on a temporary basis due to problems with Navico, but is essentially sound and is expected to re-open. In the meantime Lofrans product is unavailable.

Anyone know the full story? Is this a UK thing, confined to the UK agents, in which case I could try a mainland Europe agent, or is the factory actually shut?

I am not in an immediate rush, but would like to get the work done before re-commisioning for next season.

I await the wisdom of the forum.
 
As Lofrans were part of the Navimo group (Nothing wrong with Navico! :) ) the ability to get hold of Lofrans product at the moment is in Limbo until we find out the actual situation with the takeover.

Uk operation of Plastimo as part of the Navimo group has been "temporarily" closed down while the takeover of Navimo goes through....all enquiries about what is actually happening now seem to disappear off into the smoke....

It really is a big murky pool as far as the Navimo group of companies is concerned.
 
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Not sure of the latest situation re Navimo, but I experienced the same problem in August trying to get a replacement Cayman 88 and there were none in the UK, but did get one from "somewhere" in Europe through Marine Megastore.

The importer for UK is EC Smith and it might be worth calling them. They were quite open about the lack of supply at the time, but it was clouded a bit by being at the time of the annual factory shut down. Longer term Lofrans is likely to survive because although they have lost ground recently, their products are still highly regarded.
 
AFAIK E.C.Smith still buy via Plastimo/Navimo though, at least that's what I got told when trying to source through E.C.Smith in a business capacity.

Though, I may not be 100% correct on that, it seems things are fluid....
 
That was fast! Thanks for the info. Jimmy Green contacted EC Smith on my behalf to be told that Lofrans are not currently available, and offered an Ital windlass as an alternative.

Since I know the Lofrans Kobra will slot straight in I think I will wait and see and rely on the brute force and ignorance approach in the meantime.
 
FishyInverness said:
AFAIK E.C.Smith still buy via Plastimo/Navimo though, at least that's what I got told when trying to source through E.C.Smith in a business capacity.

Though, I may not be 100% correct on that, it seems things are fluid....
Click to expand...

E C Smith used to deal direct with Lofrans until Lofrans were taken over by Navimo, that's when the supply problems started and in one case I had to deal direct with Lofrans to get spares. Their Tech Director actually commented "we severe problems which need sorting out" and that was around 18 months ago. Reading between the lines, I got the impression they weren't too happy with the Navimo regime.
 
Logan's

I fitted one to our Malo 36 it works well, the nice people at Malo had even put in the heavy duty wires and also the control solenoid wires.

Just for your info the mounting bulkhead is about 25mm thick and very substantial! I decided to fabricate additional before I drilled through.

On later Malo models they mount it the right way up and use a roller to provide correct "lead" into the gypsy.

Good luck with it
 
Thanks for the additional info. When you say on later models they mount it right way up, do I take this to mean on the Malo 36 it went in upside down? Unfortunately no wiring in place on my 36, but I plan to wire from the batteries, no fuse, through a circuit breaker near the battery isolation switch, with a safety isolation switch for the remote control at the nav table. The control box should fit forward, beside the windlass.The Royal windlass is mounted diectly on the bulkhead so i did not plan to re-inforce, but as it has a slightly different mounting hole footprint, I plan a stainless strap behind the holes which need to be slightly offset from the old ones. I would be grateful for your comments. In the meantime I am checking to see if I can buy a Kobrs from an italian supplier.
 
Just a final report. No luck until I called Lofrans and talked to Luca Rivolta, Technical Manager. They have been running on a skeleton staff waiting for the new owners of Navimo to act. He is hopeful they will return to full production soon. In the meantime he put me on to SVB in Bremen who are supplying me with a Lofrans Kobra windlass. So a result, given it is the only one that will slot in to my Malo 36
 
I recently wanted to get spares for my Cayman 88 and got seals from EC Smith but no bearings. However, you can get the part numbers from the Lofrans diagram and parts list, and the bearings are mostly standard and can be obtained from www.bearingboys.co.uk
 
I understand that Lofrans and Max Power (thrusters) have been acquired from Navimo by the same Netherlands company, and that it will take about a month of unravelling. So early new year?
 
Where did that knowledge come from Cofe?
I have heard a very different rumour regarding Lofrans and the interest of another major marine Manufacturer/Distributor, but nothing firm as yet. The last news was that Alliance definitely weren't picking up Lofrans, MaxPower, or Nuovorade though....
 
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I’ve been struggling to obtain parts price and availability info for a client’s damaged MaxPower thruster; the info stream from Navimo UK, and direct from MaxPower in France simply dried up. A trusted contact returned from METS with the info in my previous post. I know nothing more I’m afraid; I just have to believe that I’ve found the right person to help me, and be patient. My contact doesn’t deal in Lofrans, but I thought the info might be of interest to readers of this thread.
 
Probably not new news to some, but Max-Power Thrusters and Lofrans were apparently acquired by Lazilas. Supply situation (at least for Max-Power) still rather fuzzy.
 
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