The main headsail winch, starboard side, has been damaged now for well over a year. My problem is that the Barlow winch company went out of business about 20-yrs ago (old boats are such a pain in the regard). New replacement winches are about $800 each, and, of course, I'd have to get two so they would look good; can't have mismatched winches, can I? So I put up with the problem of one winch not having a self-tailing capability.


Here's the problem. The top plate that carries the line stripper has to remain stationary as the winch drum rotates. If it doesn't, then you'll be adding turns to the drum as you crank in the line. What holds the top plate stationary is a splined area at the top of the internal main bearing pedestal.

Looks like this:
First I removed the main locking ring.

(Yeah, those are my greasy fingerprints all over it.)

Under that ring you can see the splines that the top plate mate with. This is what was stripped out.



You can see it better from the side at the arrow.



I found someone selling a set of Barlow #24 winches on ebay.


The seller said one was damaged, but the damage was to the gear teeth on the inside of the drum.



After a few e-mails I was convinced that I could use the internal pedestal as a replacement for my damaged one.
I did my usual ebay-sniping and won the set for only $102. For a set!

Once they arrived I saw why they had stripped out. The drums on his winches were made of aluminum. Mine are made of heavy bronze and weigh about twice what his do. But his did have some really nice chrome plated top plates, which I'll use on Galena. She'll feel so special.

So I took them apart, removed the pedestal and some other parts I might need for replacements (pawls, springs, etc) and put them in deep storage in the garage.

Once I have all the parts cleaned and lubed, they'll go back together and back on Galena.



I'm way too cheap to buy the special winch grease sold by Harken, et. al. They want $4 per 3-oz tube for that stuff. I've found that the grease sold for boat trailer bearings has the same 'special marine formula' to resist 'water washout' and salt. And it only costs $4 per 16-oz tub.

Another project done.

My old