Multi gear winches or electric winch?

[Bilopete]

Hi all,

I'm trying to make my boat a bit more easier to handle on my own so That I will take it out more often when I don't have a deckhand around.

I've just put on the trailer a ezi-tow jockey wheel to manouvere the boat around the yard and now I am thinking of changing my winch from a single gear to a multi-gear or even electric winch.

I see there are multigear winches around that $100 mark with 3 different ratios. I have also seen at BCF / Supercheap and also on ebay, basic electric winches for $100. I only have a 4.3m tinnie and 35hp engine so I don't expect to need a heavy winch.

I was wondering if anyone has been down this path and whether the multigear winch would be preferable to electric winches.

Any advice would be appreciated!

Cheers

[johncar]

A 2 speed manual winch 1:1 and 3 or 5:1 should be more than ample for a 4.3 Tinnie. An electric winch would be an overkill I feel.
Just make sure that your trailer is set up best you can and it should be simple to load and unload.

Rollers and skids working properly and adjusted up. Some type of centering device at the first roller to hold the boat in place will make life easier while you get up to the winch position. A synthetic winch rope is much nicer too rather than wire or strap.

[Bilopete]

Some type of centering device at the first roller to hold the boat in place will make life easier while you get up to the winch position. A synthetic winch rope is much nicer too rather than wire or strap.

Thanks for the advice. What sort of centering device are you refering to? WHy is a synthetic winch rope better? Are you refering to something like this?

http://www.bcf.com.au/online-store/products/Waterline-Winch-Rope-S-Hook-6m-x-7mm.aspx?pid=156391#Description

[deckie]

Try experimenting at the ramp before spending dollars. I imagine you;ve already tried simply backing in further to take the weight off the winch, but you;d be amazed how many tinnies you still see being winched with the back roller six inches out of the water. Might simnply mean a bit more periodic maintenance on the trailer bearings but thats easy on small trailers.

Just cant imagine any need for a leccie winch, BUT those cheapo's off ebay do work alright on light loads, but two things...
1. you;ll need to go to the trouble of taking solid cabling thru to the boot from engine bay plus an anderson plug...probably pricier than u imagine especially if someone else does it.
2. Make up a little cover for the winch coz as u imagine they arent made of the most corrosion and sun resistant stuff. Still great value tho. You can also use them to help manoevre around the yard if you are by yourself or have a bad back by cementing the odd convenient post in the ground.

Guessing its a 3:1 ratio you have..just hard to imagine you could need more than maybe a 5:1 manual jarrett type winch though...and perhaps just backing in a bit further cant hurt. They make a 3,5,10 winch too which might be worth the $20 more and save the hassle of a leccie winch. Obviously check rollers/skids are working properly...a good trailerguy can advise a few cheap ways of getting it to roll much better too. As others say that dyneema cable really is great stuff too...just seems to make the whole thing just a fraction easier.

[rooboy98]

I recently put a 3 speed Jarrett winch on my trailer. Picked it up on special for $70. My boat is only 4.1m but with 90 litres of fuel, triple batteries and a 40 HP 4 stroke motor it is still quite heavy, especially when retrieving up steep river banks. The 3 speed makes it a breeze now, even on really steep banks. I've also been running that synthetic winch rope for nearly 10 years now and won't use anything else. Unless your age or medical reasons are pushing you towards an electric winch, I wouldn't bother with one for a 4.3m boat.

Cheers,
Roo.

[johncar]

I just suggested a centering device which you can buy as a bolt on arrangement so that when you bring the boat about to the rear of the trailer you need some way of keeping it there while you walk up to the winch when retrieving on your own, which you can do while keeping a little tension on the winch rope as you walk up the ramp. I think Steadfast Marine and others sell such gadgets

My brother in law just has a purpose shaped winching plate welded to the front of his boat that he just lifts the bow of his boat slightly and it hooks over the first roller which is alloy and stays put while he walks up the the winch post after hooking up. One would think boat builders would incorporate such a simple solution..

The advantages with the Dyneema rope are many but the two main ones for me are that there is no rusty splintery bits to rip your hands open when you grab it and it doesn't act like a big coil spring to unwind your whole winch spool when you let the lock off.

The BCF one that you linked to looks like a version of the Dyneema (Spectra or Superwinch rope). I would though prefer a model with the snap on style hook so that it can't fall off at an inconvenient time, although the S hook shouldn't fall out just the same..

Backing your trailer to a depth where the axle is just above the waterline should be enough to load or unload your tinnie easily enough. With good wheelbearing seals and regular checks and good wash down after, there is no reason why you can't submerge your trailer totally if you wish and you can just about pull the boat up by hand, or you can pull it up to a predetermined distance and place the locked winch hook in and the boat goes nowhere untill you are ready to winch up the last bit, which is what I do when on my own with a 6.25M GRP boat. And I am old.