Quandary
Well-Known Member
Not asking for info this time but imparting some which may be useful to someone.
Got the thing out with less trouble than anticipated, the unreachable buried stud at the back turned out to not have a nut on it, however I did get stuck for quite a while when I slipped too far forward with my head down in the anchor locker, struggled for nearly half an hour in considerable discomfort before I got an arm free to push myself up and out. Moral 'make sure somebody knows where you are!'
Brought the windlass home and unscrewed the bottom plate, the void space inside the alloy casing was completely full off bluish white crystalline crud, I presume this is a consequence of the combination of an alloy housing, stainless steel studs and screws mild steel straps and fixings and west coast humidity. The alloy ribs and screw holes had degraded but not as much as the massive bucketful of soggy crystals suggested. The gear train is inside a black plastic case, the gear spindles are restrained by well corroded mild steel machine screws into the cast alloy case, the motor is fully enclosed and held by a rusty mild steel strap. I doubt if any of this will come out intact. The thing might still run if the motor comes out okay but this is complicated by the 'optional free fall' mechanism, a sort of clutch operated by a plastic screw which switches an electrically operated lever, not really essential? If I get it the motor out and it runs (it was running intermittently when I started)I might try to put it together using epoxy to build up the corroded ribs to take the screws. I presume the 'freefall' electric switch can simply be dumped? All the other horizontal windlasses I can find all seem to be the opposite hand so I may reluctantly have to buy another the same, if I do I may take the floor plate off the casting to replace the m.s. bits with stainless and to spray the interior with waxoyl or similar, that voids the warranty but another older thread suggests that the warranty is hard to enforce anyway and it only a year anyway. While it is sold as Australian, I am told they are made in Taiwan, disappointed that they could not do better, their bikes are all right.
The windlass is just 7 years old, they are still sold at the cheap end of the market (£382 in 2010 , now £583) but the combination of metals and the use of mild steel in the internal fixings and electrics is not good, in theory it is watertight but how do you exclude salty humid air?
Got the thing out with less trouble than anticipated, the unreachable buried stud at the back turned out to not have a nut on it, however I did get stuck for quite a while when I slipped too far forward with my head down in the anchor locker, struggled for nearly half an hour in considerable discomfort before I got an arm free to push myself up and out. Moral 'make sure somebody knows where you are!'
Brought the windlass home and unscrewed the bottom plate, the void space inside the alloy casing was completely full off bluish white crystalline crud, I presume this is a consequence of the combination of an alloy housing, stainless steel studs and screws mild steel straps and fixings and west coast humidity. The alloy ribs and screw holes had degraded but not as much as the massive bucketful of soggy crystals suggested. The gear train is inside a black plastic case, the gear spindles are restrained by well corroded mild steel machine screws into the cast alloy case, the motor is fully enclosed and held by a rusty mild steel strap. I doubt if any of this will come out intact. The thing might still run if the motor comes out okay but this is complicated by the 'optional free fall' mechanism, a sort of clutch operated by a plastic screw which switches an electrically operated lever, not really essential? If I get it the motor out and it runs (it was running intermittently when I started)I might try to put it together using epoxy to build up the corroded ribs to take the screws. I presume the 'freefall' electric switch can simply be dumped? All the other horizontal windlasses I can find all seem to be the opposite hand so I may reluctantly have to buy another the same, if I do I may take the floor plate off the casting to replace the m.s. bits with stainless and to spray the interior with waxoyl or similar, that voids the warranty but another older thread suggests that the warranty is hard to enforce anyway and it only a year anyway. While it is sold as Australian, I am told they are made in Taiwan, disappointed that they could not do better, their bikes are all right.
The windlass is just 7 years old, they are still sold at the cheap end of the market (£382 in 2010 , now £583) but the combination of metals and the use of mild steel in the internal fixings and electrics is not good, in theory it is watertight but how do you exclude salty humid air?
