The importance of logging maint or "How not to work on your windlas"

[Cruisingscotts]

We have a older Lofrans horizontal windlass. I overhauled it about a year ago and cleaned painted etc. At the time the motor megged good and I just cleaned painted and installed. It has been used about 20 or 30 times since getting put into service. Last month I went up fwd to haul the anchor and I noticed the speed drop then nothing. Back and forth to work and several sailing trips just hauling it manually and I got a chance to investigate. The first thing I found was the throwupinyourmouth cost of a replacment motor at $1,200. I pulled the motor cover and was happy to see all was still clean and dry with a small amount a carbon dust. I unwired the motor and varified voltages from the directional relay all checked out. At this point I had that buzzing Dejavueish feelign that maybe I had been here before but things were a little foggy. I had a bag of rags and some oil pads and pulled the motor out and put a oil pad under the shaft seal. I brought the motor on the dock and took a look at the brushes. I was very happy to see that two were stuck. I pulled all the brushes and cleaned them and the motor with electric motor cleaner and some scotch bright. Re-lubricated the bearings etc. At this point looking at the motor I saw how easy it was to service the brushes without removing it from the gearbox. Thats handy, same buzzing feeling. I then attemped to re-instal the motor, the shaft has a woodruff (half moon) shaped key and if not aligned propelry will bind when putting the motor in. At this point the deja vu part was pretty stong and things were getting less foggy. As a side note we have a 24 x 24 hatch in our v berth directly under where I was working, my wife was in bed working on a jewelry piece. Try number two the keyway slid, pulled the motor out and tried again. the fog had almost cleared and I was sure I had been here before.. try number three and the key slid again. I pulled the motor out and along for the ride came the shaft seal and insert and most important all of the gear oil. At this point I clearly remembered telling myself to NEVER attempt to pull the motor off when there was oil in the winch as the seat was not very tight on the o-ring for the shaft seal assembly. Of course I had thouroghly prepped the area by not removing about 300' of 3 strand anchor rode and several mooring lines right under the oil down pour. After lots of swearing and many rags and cleaning and more cleaning, I put everything back together filled with oil and it ran great. I asked my wife if she saw what was going and she smiled and said "Yes, I wasn't going out there!"

So, good idea to log your work and maybe read the log.