Electric windlass and starter battery

[Cspirit]

I'm fitting a Lofrans Cayman windlass to my boat. When I fitted the same windlass to a previous boat, I made the connections to the services battery bank. However, on this boat (a Westerly Corsair) the engine start battery is in the engine compartment and would be easier to access for cabling to the bow. Any reason why I shouldn't do this? My reasoning is that I will only be using the windlass when I'm running the engne.

 

[pvb]

No reason why you shouldn't do that. Make sure you protect the cable at the battery end with a suitable breaker.

 

[saltwater_gypsy]

I agree with your logic that since the engine will be running there should be little actual discharge from the battery.Some people like to have a small, high current , low capacity battery like Red Alert for the windlass but that is more space blocking diodes etc.
What you have should be OK but no doubt someone will come along in a minute with the "what if" disaster scenario.

 

[1955patric]

Make sure you protect the new cable with an adequately rated fuse.