Gogarty wrote:

My Lumar Concept 1 can let the anchor go in free fall so even if the windlass
fails one can anchor the boat. But you can't use a winch handle to bring it
back up. With a Delta 35 and all chain rode, we pray a lot that the windlass
does not fail. One could run the rode back to the primary winches but I don't
think they would handle chain very well.


The old square riggers used an endless line on the capstan that attached
to the anchor cable via "nippers".

Could be done that way with lines on the winch hooked to the chain?