Windlass rebuild.

[Colwyn D]

I've recently rebuilt an Ideal windlass, may be of interest.

This is what I had;




Removed;



Luckily the mixture of oil and water that was in the gearbox had protected the gears so all I needed was a new gearcase;

 

[Colwyn D]

The gearcase was around $800 and the rebuild itself was quite easy. Ideal were very helpful when I had questions. All bushings etc were already installed in the case and plugs were supplied for installation after fitting the shafts.



Mainshaft in, just idler to install and motor that was luckily in good condition;



Assembled and being lifted back into position;

 

[(Nobody You Know)]

That vertical capstan on those old units including Taylor Maid (I think they were named) let water intrude to not only severely damage the unit but also the composite deck wood.
11 years ago I was able to rebuild mine replacing the mounting brackets with 1/4" stainless steel, and router out the damaged deck wood to be replaced with fiberglass.
As I recall, our buddy Karl went through this before he sold the boat - he could not have unloaded it at a better time!

 

[Colwyn D]

Bill, exactly what had happened so I removed the balsa core and replaced it with a mix of filled epoxy then rebored all the holes through that solid laminate.

Drying out the deck void before filling;

 

[Genesis]

Yep. It didn't help that whoever originally installed mine (and it looked to be OEM) didn't bother doing anything more than painting the exposed core. Really. With paint. Gray paint at that.

My gearcase was not damaged, however, and the oil was dirty but had no separable water layer in it. The deck and surrounding area was in bad shape and it got rebuilt, but the windlass itself was fine.