Just wondering if anyone has any experience with the Bada windlasses from Whittworths Marine. Not much info on these out there, besides being a Chinese product.

I bought one from another supplier that was supposed to be a Muir but turned up looking exactly like the Bada and had some badly photocopied Muir info sheets. It fully fried itself in about 7 months and could not get any warranty. Bought a Lewmar from Whitworths and it goes really well.

LooseChange said..
Being Chinese I hope you don't expect to be able to buy parts for it in 12 months unless you can identify the brand that was copied and hope that it is a faithful reproduction.
There is a reason that they are only half the price of a nearly identical looking Lewmar.

Bada www.whitworths.com.au/bada-highspeed-windlass-above-deck-6mm

Lewmar www.whitworths.com.au/lewmar-pro-series-700-windlass-6mm

Many times the reason for poor performance is in the choice of materials. The average punter has no way of telling the quality of metals and other materials until they fail. The cheap product can look exactly like the quality product.

Then there is poor design, where a weak component fails and you have to junk the whole thing.
Overall, buying cheap ends up bad for the environment, wasting resources, and probably costs more than if you had invested in quality in the first place.

Shop around, I got a lewmar from a NZ online site about 30% cheaper then from WW. I figured the hassle of warranty would be about the same if it was required