Imagine my surprise after following the installation directions on my incredibly expensive and brand new Lewmar self tailers to find that the bedding compound they say to put on the base of the winch for attaching to the winch pads had pushed up into the gear assembly! Life Caulk adhesive caulking in the gears - great.

So, I disassembled the winches from the pads and took the winches apart completely and cleaned and re-lubed them and am ready to start over.

Does anyone have any suggestions about bedding? The jib winches that came on my boat show no signs of any bedding or bedding residue - looks like they just bolted them onto the pads as is.

The instructions also mention drain holes in the winch base. Well, if there's bedding compound all the way around the base, how will the water that drains down through the winch escape?

No bedding on the winch pads wouldn't seem to be a problem since any water that comes through the pad will simply drip onto the deck. However -
I'm installing a winch on the cabin - as per many of the photos on the site - and that involves through bolts to the cabin where leakage would be bad.

I suppose I could bed just the perimter of the winch base and work out a little drainage canal in one spot? Anyone ever done this before???