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Marine Drum Winch Resurfacing / Plating

January 10, 2022

Q. Speaking of winches. I have a bunch of old winches on my boat that need refinishing. The chrome has worn off the drums in spots, and corrosion is starting to show through. I have been reading your posts about plating with nickel instead and that sounds great.

     

The question I have is how do you plate just the outside of the drum. And also, the drum has a rough (nonslip) surface where the lines wrap around. Is this a challenging job for a plating company.

Joe Feese
Sailor - Los Angeles, California

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Q. I have a problem with the chrome-plated winches aboard my 21 year old, 38 foot sailboat. The gripping surface of the winch drum has gotten smoother over time, to the point that the rope slips on the drum as the crew tries to tighten it.

A sales person from the manufacturer told me that I might try blasting the gripping surface with a course grit (I think he said #6), then re-plating. My local plating shop told me that any type of blasting would probably make the surface smoother, not rougher.

Also, topic 30341 on this forum (Chrome Plating SS Marine Winches) states that chrome plating should not be used on a surface meant to have friction, due to the slickness of chrome finishes. How can I increase friction (grip) of this winch?

Jim Williams
- Norfolk, Virginia
2003

A. I'd like to hear someone else chime in because I was the sole responder to the other letter you mentioned and I don't want to portray myself as an expert on this subject. I absolutely am not; I don't think I've ever even been on a sailboat longer than 16 feet :-)

Chrome delivers great hardness and wear resistance and is therefore often used on friction surfaces. I was trying to say in the other letter that if the surface of a SS winch was previously unplated, slippage could become a factor if it was plated because of the reduced coefficient of friction of the chrome.

Unfortunately, I'm not sure if the original supplier or the chrome shops is right about the blasting. I've seen brush finished and chrome plated components where the brush finishing obviously improved the grip; but I've seen knurled and chrome plated components where the knurling was small enough and just the right size that they were so slippery that it was impossible to pick up these small items between your fingers.So my uneducated opinion is that--assuming the problem is the winches rather than the rope--these winches should be stripped of their chrome, brush finished, and replated. I think I'd stop at the nickel plating though, since chrome plating has a substantially lower coefficient of friction, and is microcracked (like a dry lake bed in miniature) to the extent that it can accumulate oil.

Ted Mooney, P.E.
Striving to live Aloha
finishing.com - Pine Beach, New Jersey
2003