Anchor winch

[dnej]

I am looking at anchor winches. Question, how important is it to have a free drop winch ?
Also I imagine they are heavy on power ( maybe 800 or 1000watts). Is a dedicated battery necessary, or just use the house battery, with the motor running?
Any pit falls?
David

[fishwpa]

You can't go wrong giving Nick Savva a call @ www.savwinch.com.au (http://www.savwinch.com.au/) (03) 8361 8841 or 0402234839

[dnej]

some helpful information. A reverse send down, is at 39m per minute, that is 0.7m per second . So in 6 m, that would be, less than 6 seconds..
I can live with that due to the price difference.
Also, rode length sheltered waters, 5:1,open waters 7:1. Diameter of rope,3.18mm per 2.75 m of boat length. So 6m boat needs 6.9mm diameter rope.
So buying a drum winch is not as easy as it looks, depending on your boat size.
David

[scottar]

All depends where you are anchoring. If you are a regular offshore anchor dropper, a power down winch will give you the shites in double quick time (I know mine does to the point I just don't use it). If you only anchor in sub 20 metres though it should be fine. No separate battery required typically but it is a good idea to start engines first and motor up slowly to the anchor as you winch in to take load off the winch.

[Crunchy]

Want to put one in also, it will be a pain for me to run a heavy duty cable from the batteries at the stern to the bow so was contemplating having a seperate battery up front which I would only charge at home, would it last a decent trip pulling up the anchor a few times?

[dnej]

scottar,
that was my opinion also. Most of my fishing is in less than 20 m
The other thing is , if the rode needed is 7:1, and you are in 20 metres say, then you need 140m of Nylon and chain.
That would need a substantial size drum winch.
For example Viper "pro series 2 " 1000watt model, only holds 100m, plus, 8 m of short link, The wind down rate is 45m per minute. NB some come with rope and chain, some don't, so watch the pricing . Crunchy, they do looms for around $220, ready to go David

[Marchy001]

I was a bit worried about drum capacity when I had my winch built. I had the winch built as big as would fit in the well and it holds 125m of 8mm nylon with 25m of 10mm on top and 6-8m of 8mm chain. Still being not 100% comfortable I measured the 2 anchor rodes that I had in the boat for the last 4 years just to see how short I was..... 48m on the reef pick, 76m on the delta, plus 6-8m of chain on each. Anchored in up to 50m of water a few times in varied conditions while in Townsville and a few deep drops down here too and no issues so far. I feel much more comfortable after measuring what I had previously.
For the safety side of the discussion I always had around 100m of silver rope stored in the boat just in case I got caught short one day and needed to lengthen a rode.

[ranmar850]

Standard for anchor warp out vs depth is 3-1, has been since Jonah went whaling. You can go more in bad conditions, or get by with less if conditions are mild and holding is good. I quite commonly anchor in 20 fathoms, which is about 35 metres for you non-nautical amateur types, and I do it with 65 fathoms (100 metres, give or take) of 12mm silver line.

[chocolatemoose]

for years i just drifted. anchoring was a PITA. even here in melbournes relitivly shallow water. however when building my last boat i opted to have a winch fitted "because.. hey.. why the hell not" so i had a sav550 winch installed. and its been fine ever since
anchoring in 50plus meters of water seems insane to me "but people do all kinds of weird stuff :P"
free fall is a funny one. so far they are all using a clutch mecahnism . some betters than other. i was returning them around once every 2-3 months. give or take. but there has been some that have yet to fault.
however all this said its nice if you can get it down fast or as fast as you can "if you cant work out the speed of your drift and direction to counter for the speed?"
brushless variable speed motors are starting to come on the scene were you can increase the speed for a faster power out to compensate

here in victoria the drum winch thing is VERY VERY hot. lol. brand going at other brands throats. lol.