Lofrans Cayman 88 Windlass Power down issue

[hwturner]

We have a 12v Lofrans Cayman 88 installed on our 42' sailing cat down in the chain locked below deck. Up until recently it has been bullet proof. I did a full maintenance a few months ago, added oil, replaced a bad remote and put in a new control box. Cleaned and greased as needed. Was working fine for 2 months of anchoring almost every day.
The other day as we dropped the hook it (my wife is up front and runs the anchoring program) it made an awful noise and would not go down. there was no load on the system. I went up and tightened both of the wingnuts (on either side of the shaft) weird one had loosened up (port side). The chain came up no problem and went down about 15 feet fine, then it stuttered again. I could see the shaft spinning and that awful noise again. The wingnut had again spun itself off. What I found worked for that time was to pull the chain back up a few meters, tighten the nuts, and then go back down. By doing this a few times I was able to get the hook down.

Now before folks say we should manually lower the anchor I agree we should, but with the windlass position where it is mounted it is almost impossible to loosen the drum quickly. The windlass is mounted low in the locker and the rod that fits over the wingnut cannot make enough of a turn to fully looses on tighten. Suffice to say that is how we do it now, but it is not safe. I also was having problems with the gypsy sticking even when loosened up. I pulled it apart and cleaned all the clutch cones and it spins fine now. Just difficult to loosen/tighten it quickly. Think of a socket/wrench only being able to do 1/8 of a turn at a time.
My questions are:
1. Why does this only happen when lowering the anchor, it even happens when I spin the windlass with no load, I removed the chain to work on it and trouble shoot. Same situation. No problem what so ever when pulling the anchor up, we try to reduce the load as much as possible by staying over the anchor, but no issue no grinding works like a charm. 2. How can I open the side panel to inspect the inner gears of the windlass? I have searched youtube, and the OEM install and owners manual and they have a parts diagram, but no instruction on disassembly. My suspicion was that there might be a worm gear grinding issue or something similar. But I cannot figure out how to open the side panel of the windlass to look inside. I removed the allen screws but cannot get the final clutch cone off. Maybe the key is stuck? I think if I could see inside the windlass I could determine what is going on. It has me baffled.

[model 10]

I think there is a spring loaded ratchet mechinism on the drive shaft. Mine makes that noise when the chain gets jambed comming out the hole.

[hwturner]

Originally Posted by Guy

I think there is a spring loaded ratchet mechinism on the drive shaft. Mine makes that noise when the chain gets jambed comming out the hole.

Thanks for the response. Unfortunately mine is happening under no load, in power down only. It works fine coming up every time. Even with no chain on the gypsy it still stops and clicks when going down.
Good call on the spring, I looked at the parts diagram and I see it. Having trouble removing the clutch cone, but I think perhaps I just need to bang on it with a rubber mallet.

[Pacey16]

Did you fix your windlass problem, my Tigres also slips with very little load on it when powering th eanchor down. I have finaly managed to disassemble, the inner cone was very hard to get off the shaft, I have inspected th edog clutch mechanism and it all seems fine, i am thinking of giving the spring a bit of a stretch snd sticking it back together.

[hwturner]

Originally Posted by Pacey16

Did you fix your windlass problem, my Tigres also slips with very little load on it when powering the anchor down. I have finally managed to disassemble, the inner cone was very hard to get off the shaft, I have inspected the dog clutch mechanism and it all seems fine, i am thinking of giving the spring a bit of a stretch and sticking it back together.

I put in a new seal and spacer, but it did not fix the issue. My work around is to completely loosen the shaft before release and then I can power down no problem. What happens is the locking hub somehow tightens in the power down mode and loads up and stops. By loosing it a lot it can just spin freely. Not a great solution, but it works...