Replacing the Quick Genius Windlass on Bavaria 37

[SV_Calisto]

Hi,  Does anyone have experience replacing the supplied Quick Genius Windlass?

The Quick Genius on my Bav 37 hasn't worked since I purchased the boat and it's time to fit a replacement.  I'm fairly set on a Lewmar Pro-series 1000.  Does anyone have experience / tips on fitting?

Many thanks

[nornie lees]

Whats wrong with it?

[Lazy Pelican]

Top tip- whatever you do don't fit a Lewmar Pro 1000 if you intend to use it regularly. They're very 'lightweight' & we've burnt out 2 motors. I'm replacing ours with a Lofrans Cayman, which although not cheap is a robust piece of kit.

[Nigel]

Whats wrong with it?

Indeed. Such devices are expensive to replace, so we'll worth doing some fault-finding.

[SV_Calisto]

Thanks for the responses so far.

The Quick's casing has corroded and in two places the Allen key holes are either missing or corroded through. Either the motor or the solenoid has burnt out. It's difficult to tell which given the level of corrosion on the case. It had 8 years of hard work with one of its previous owners so I'm not surprised that it's had its day.

I didn't fancy replacing it with another Quick because of the casing. I also wanted something that would fit under the hatch and so I think my options are limited. If not the Lewmar then what?

[Symphony]

As already suggested look at a Lofrans. Much more rugged than the Lewmar.

[Salty]

Nigel's advice is good, do some fault finding, it could save you a heap of money. My windlass is a Lofrans Cayman which had also worked hard during the boats early life as a charter vessel. Not long after I bought the boat the windlass stopped working. The fault turned out to be the original control cables (the ones used to tell the windlass which way you want it to run) were so badly corroded on account of them being ordinary cooper wire rather than tinned copper wire, that the signal was not reaching the solenoid. Firstly I ran a set of cables, just some ordinary household wire, temporarily across the deck and through one of the hatches to the solenoid control terminals after disconnecting the original control cables, and the initial problem was solved. The solenoid was still in working order, as also was the windlass, and now that it was receiving proper direction signals the windlass would run happily. All that was left was to remove the old control cables and lay in new tinned copper cables out of sight behind the interior furniture. Not an easy job, and particularly difficult negotiating past the chain locker bulkhead on a B36(2002), but once done I had a working windlass but only for the cost of some new signal cables and the time I spent laying them in. The cables had a cross section area of something like 2 square mm., and were quite cheap to buy through eBay. The original ordinary copper signal wires had corroded and had turned black throughout their entire length.