Windlass choices revisited

S

Sneaks

New member
The first major addition to my soon to be realized C-22 is an anchor windlass. I've read much in both this group and the MSN C-Dory site and two brands come up consistently. The Horizon 600 and the Aries 500.

The Horizon appears to work flawlessly, but it appears the Aries needs constant "fiddling" to get past the chain/rode transition and "pops it's cover" far too often. Something I'm unwilling to deal with. Another windlass, the Power winch Sportfishing 450 has not been mentioned and appears to be a near duplicate of the Horizon, though at lower cost and power.

The US distributor of the Aries has told me the problem with the chain/rode transition is the quality of tapered splice and they don't get the problem with Plastimo rodes from their stock. In fact, they guarantee it.

Bottom line, before simply biting the bullet and getting a Horizon 600, I would like to hear from any C-Dory owners who successfully use the Aries 500 or the Power Winch (USA) windlass.

Thanks

Sneaks (C-Dory Delivery in September, nail biting in August)
 
Hi Don,

I'll try to be as helpful as I can, but I'll condition the "quality" of my reply by saying upfront that I'm mostly repeating what others have told me. I just installed a windlass on my 22 Cruiser.

If I'm not mistaken Lewmar/Simpson makes both the Horizon and and the Sprint windlass, among many others. You most likely know, of course, that the Horizon is a horizontal windlass which means (1) it's basically a box mounted to the top of your deck and (2) the rode makes a 90-degree wrap--or quarter turn--around the gypsy before passing through the deck pipe into the locker below. C-Dorians love the Horizon 600 and it would undoubtedly be a fine choice for you. However, reading between the lines of your question, I, perhaps like you, wanted a flush-mounted vertical windlass. VW's (to my mind) have two advantages (1) the windlass motor is mounted below deck resulting in cleaner lines and less vision obstruction and (2) the rode make a 180-degree wrap around the gypsy before passing the rode to the locker. But the below-deck motor also consumes part of your preciously limited rode locker. To address this (potential) problem I increased and contained the rode locker size by fashioning and extention. The extension bolts to the face of the current fiberglass partition. It basically goes up (to provide enough toe room at the forward point of the vee berth), makes an "L" to expand the anchor rode locker about 6" back into the berth area, then makes another "L" and rises vertically again. This at least doubled the contained area of the rode locker. It can also be removed for easy future access. Care must be taken so that there are no protrusions into the rode locker on which anything could catch. Use stainless carriage bolts epoxied from the the inside facing out, then cap nuts on the outside (berth side).

I posed much the same question to this and the C-DOG site a couple of months ago and Les Lampman (affectionally regarded by most everyone in the Pacific Northwest to be the definitive CD expert) recommended that I install the Lewmar Sprint 400. This is a vertical windlass much like the Aires without the reputation for Aires fussiness. With Les' recommendation I simply stopped looking further and installed a Sprint. However I chose to move up to the Sprint 600 because the 400 has a plastic gypsy and chain fairly quickly wears down a plastic gypsy. The 600 draws more current but as TyBoo was kind enough to point out to me, amp draw is more a function of load placed on the motor than motor capacity. The load is a constant. I believe Lampman pointed out that while weighing anchor the engines are running anyway, effectively reducing the draw on the batteries. Finally, I elected to use Optima dual purpose batteries which have a bit more bottom than cranking batteries while being easier to recharge than deep cycle batteries. In any event, I was told the amp draw of a 600 is a non-event.

Hopes this helps. If I've made any mistatements based on what others have told me, the mistakes are mine, not theirs. Sorry if i explained more than you needed to know.

Best,

C-Trial
 
I run the Powerwinch 450, works great, costs less and freefalls down. It is physically larger than the Horizon windlass.
 
The Horizon 600 worked so well on our first boat, that we have the same model on the second. If for some reason we got another one, it would be the same model. The low profile of the vertical windlass is attractive, but I am the type who likes to have things out if the open, so sitting on the deck is best for me.

I have to say this about the Plastimo rode, though. I don't like it. It kinks and curls and doesn't hold as well in the gypsy as the S/L brand I used before. It also piles up in tighter coils in the locker and doesn't spread out to use all the space. Consequently, there is often no room for the chain on top of the pile, causing it to jam. About the only thing the Plastimo has going for it is being a hundred bucks cheaper. I had the Simpson Lawrence rode in the last boat, and never once had any trouble.

One of these days when I have some time to kill on the water, I think I will try paying out almost all the 300' of rope and giving it a few jerks against the set anchor. maybe that, along with getting the entire length wet, will jerk some of the kinks out of it. I have a good swivel on the end of the chain, so I don't think it is twisting on it's own. It is a pain when paying out a loose line and a kink gets jammed in the windlass. Or, if a kink does make it through, it sometimes flips the rope off the side of the bow roller and I have to go up front to fix it before I can retrieve. It is windlass grade rope, but I think it is poorly layed.

Just my opinion: Get the Horizon 600 windlass, spend the extra hundred bucks for the S/L windlass grade rode, slap a pivoting bow roller on the front, and never leave the helm seat during anchoring operations.

Oh, and one more thing. The S/L rode with 300' rope and 15' chain will all fit into the standard CD22 anchor locker the third time you use it. When it is dry and fluffy, it won't look like it will fit, but once it gets wet and settles in, she'll do fine.
 
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