Mounting new Primary winches near helm

[Patches]

As a charter boat, it is sometimes awkward to trim the genoa due to factory placement of the Lewmar 46ST primaries on my 1990 Mark 1.25.  Someone usually has to shift while I trim.

After looking it over, I decided to buy some new Anderson 40STs and mount them further aft on the coaming.  Both the base diameter (6") and the bolt circle diameter for mounting are smaller than the original Lewmars.  Access on the port side doesn't look too complicated, but starboard side mounting looks like it could involve extreme boat yoga.

Anyone tackled this before and have suggestions/observations to share?

Thanks,

Patches

[Ron Hill]

Patches : Why not move you just move your Lewmar 46ST winches aft a couple of feet?  Then just fill the holes with round headed short bolts?

If your 1990 has the standard transom installation on the starboard side should to be too difficult!!

A thought

[Patches]

Thanks Ron:

I'm not sure the Lewmar 46STs are going to fit, or be easily re-located.  When moving the winches back opposite the helm, the width of the coaming decreases from roughly 7" to 6" or less.  My plan is to use some 6" diameter Starboard as a backing plate underneath the new Andersons, which look like they will be a lot easier to fit.

The coaming is not cored anywhere (that I can tell), and the factory installation of the Lewmar 46ST was with simple fender washers and nuts.

[George Bean]

I mounted Lewmar ST40s as secondaries on Freya.  These are overkill, but I wanted them so I could alternatively re-route the genoa sheets aft and single hand and not disturb guests.  Mounting the port side is easy with the lazarette for access.  I wound up cutting in a new beckson port in aft cabin for easier access for the starboard mounting.  I had to split the G10 backing plate there so I could get it through the port.  I needed to butter a lot of thickened epoxy on those two as  the under surface on that side was quite uneven.

[Patches]

Thank you George, that is just the kind of advice I was hoping for!

I ended up buying some pre-cut 5" round X 1/4" thick Starboard ($17 at Buck Woodcraft online) which I plan to use as backing plates for the new Anderson winches.  After eyeballing it from several different angles, I think I am going to first remove the rear panel in the aft aft cabin and see if there is a way of working over the top of the aft starboard closet.  If I recall correctly, there isn't much securing the top of the molded closet interior and I may be able to fit the backing plates and hardware that way.

If not, I like your idea about a Beckson port.

Patches

[George Bean]

Freya is a MkII boat and there is no cabinetry under the secondary winch location, only headliner.  The key for me was lots of thickened epoxy liberally butter.  I did'nt care how much oozed out and dripped out has it is all hidden by the headliner.