I have an Alioth with a Revolution winch. It’s been great for 12 months but yesterday I switched the boat on and the winch was s..l..o..w !!! I had a bit of a fiddle as the sheeting had moved out of its normal range so the sails weren’t fully in . No joy with altering the end point on the TX and now the winch doesn’t move at all! I’m hoping it’s fixable and I know a man who can, maybe, but if it has gone to join the winches in the sky, what do I replace it with ? RMG 280? Red Ant Stinger? Chinese winches don’t seem to be an option as my iPhone refuses to accept SMS from Ali Express so an S100 isn’t an option!!

I know Bill G is the agent for RMG but is there a U.K. agent for Red Ant? Or can you something better??

Many thanks

Simon

K7 Yachts can supply Red Ant see the advert on the suppliers page

Simon, the choice of winch will be dictated by performance requirements versus cost.

If price is not a consideration then my personal choice for a drum winch is the RMG or for an arm winch a Hitec Monster Power. (I am using both, arm winch in a Britpop and RMG in a Psycho. The arm winch is certainly the quickest and is good downwind to jybe, but sometimes unless you are controlled on the stick can be too fast.

If cost is a consideration the KingMax winches are a good choice as Component Shop in Wales can supply these. The most suitable range in price from £30 to £70. I also sail a Tonic IOM and have used a variety of these chinese winches in this, the Eurgle Winch (no longer available had satisfactory performance but proved unreliable. The KingMax winches have adequate torque and speed and have proved to be suprisingly good with reliability. There are plenty of IOM's using these winches. The lower cost versions are too slow and they are even slower as you approach the endpoints, I cannot reccomend these.

I did start a thread regarding the KingMax winches, I personally have only used the £30 versions (metal case) with either the metal optional drum on the faster but lower torque version or the higher torque version with an even larger 3D printed drum to improve speed. Happy with either in the Tonic.

One of our members purchased the next version up approx £50 and has been sailing her IOM with that without issue, even at the top end of the top suit of sails.

The decision on what suits your reqirements is yours!

Simon, forgot to include PJ Sails also offer winches suitable for an IOM or Marblehead.

I have not used one of these but word of mouth is that these are also of satisfactory performance. I believe that these are a little over £100.