Chip & Debbie Willis on s\v Elegant'sea: Machine shop for Lewmar H3 anchor windless 2015

August 2015 - At private slip in Nuevo Vallarta in Banderas Bay, Mexico

Last Summer I read in the Lewmar H3 Anchor Windless doc's that the gypsy had to be serviced annually.
It need to be removed and cleaned and greased. Ok no problem we can do that. Just and easy again, now really do you think so? I removed the RMS control arm, that is what Lewmar calls the arm that holds down the rode and chain as it passes over the gypsey to the chain locker.

Then I remove as many parts as I can from the gypsy, the manual recover system and option we purchased, and some other parts.

Now two screws need to come out under the front of the gypsy. Guess what, yep they are not coming out! they are small socket heads that stripped right out. Now why not put two SS screws right under the front of the gypsey where the chain goes right over the top of. They get sea life like barnacles and sea weed etc washed down on them every time the chain comes up. They also SS screws going into and aluminum housing. So they like to weld themselves in there with the aluminum. Must of looked good on paper but really? I suppose if maybe I had done this annual maintenance annually this may not of happened but it took me a couple three years to realize it need to be done. Any way now what?

So we put the parts back on but wait, the RMS control arm will not go back on? Come to find out unless you remove the gypsy you can not get the RMS control arm back on the pin!

We email Lewmar and they say just drill off the head of the screws and the RMS mount, what holds the gypsey onto the windless will come right off. The simply take some vice grips and remove the screws, replacing them with new ones. Now do you think that is really how it is going to go? Well thankfully I did not either. We were about to sail south along the Mexican Riviera for six months, which we did six months to the day with anchoring many many times in a lot of different locations and conditions. So any way we said not now! We are a few weeks from setting sail. So we used the windless without the RMS control arm for six months and had really no problems. It did make it more difficult some times but it was not a deal breaker.
This summer fixing the windless to be as we installed was a proprietary along with getting new anchor chain. We have the new chain etc and now it is the windless turn to get wrenched on.
Now to get the two screws from Lewmar we had to buy a hole kit of screws and gasket etc. Guess it is not bad to have but for two screws?

Now real life happens.

So it is drill time in Puerto Vallarta!

We drill out the screws. Now they are not that easy to get at or see of course so I take a little too much SS housing off along with the head of the screws, and break one drill bit.