[TowerTalk] Clickless Fulton 1550 KWinch.

[Alan NV8A]

On 08/27/13 09:42 pm, caraj at cox.net wrote:
> I refurbished my EZ way tower with a new beam, rotor, paint job and winch.
>
> Everything is electrically and mechanically fine except the winch.
> It has no click to resist the tower coming down. It appears the brake is not being engaged.
> Either that or the youngster I had helping me oiled the brake along with the other gears
> I asked him to oil.  Suspect it's the lack of brake engagement.  I removed the outer and first
> inner handle shaft nuts to reposition the handle. These have been returned to their original positions.
> Also tried to remove the inner most nut but no movement The questions I have are:
>
> 1.Why there is no clicking to preventing the raised tower from lowering  itself?
> The ratchet gear clicks when I manually turn it. How do I correct it?
>
> 2. How does one differ winding the tower up from lowering it? The old EZ 	way winch was pushed
>   in to wind it down avoiding the resistive teeth. The current Fulton 1550 brake winch is being wound
>   counter clock wise to lift the 	tower. The tower rises smoothly and lowers smoothly without a block of wood.
> This is my first brake winch.
>
> 3. How does one remove/get to the Fulton 1550 brake mechanism?  The inner most nut/hexagonal
> surface doesn't rotate with a wrench. Fulton has a brake kit.  Instruction on how to get to the brake assembly
> would be helpful.

A few years ago I replaced my HDX-555's K1550 by a K2550, and the tower 
has hardly ever been lowered and raised again anyway (this is the 
tilt-over winch), but let me see if I can recall how things work(ed).

The clicking is only when the cable is being wound in. When you are 
letting the cable out, the pawl is engaged and the brake is permanently 
engaged, so that you have to wind the handle against the friction of the 
brake. This has the advantage that if you were to let go of the handle 
for any reason the brake is still preventing the tower from crashing to 
the ground. From your description of the EZ way winch, I can imagine 
that if the tower were to start descending rapidly, the moving part 
might be rotating too rapidly for it to re-engage with the part with the 
brake.

I think there may be maintenance/overhaul instructions for the Fulton 
winches on the Web.

73

Alan NV8A