Abstract: A manual marine winch includes a winch line including a wire rope, a pair of spaced side plates, a rotating spool assembly supported between the side plates and including a drum, wherein the drum defines a wire rope stacking space on the drum for storing a single stack of wire rope, and a manually actuated control for spooling and un-spooling the wire rope in the wire rope stacking space on the drum.

Abstract: A manual marine barge winch includes a housing, a winch-line holding drum mounted for rotation on the housing, a winch-line coupled to the drum and adapted to be wound onto and off of the holding drum to tension and pay out the winch, a drum drive for rotating the drum to tension and to pay out the winch line, and at least one winch-line engaging roller adapted to engage the winch line at least during tensioning of the winch. Preferably at least one of the winch line engaging rollers is a powered or driven roller for driving the winch line.

Abstract: A manual winch includes a housing supporting a rotatable reel, a ratchet assembly coupled to the reel movable between an engaged and disengaged position, and a load releasing system for moving the ratchet assembly system to a disengaged position. The ratchet assembly includes a rotatable ratchet gear which is adapted to be engaged by a pivotable locking pawl. The locking pawl is pivotable into and out of engagement with the ratchet gear for moving the ratchet assembly between the engaged and disengaged position. The locking pawl is mounted on a movable base which secures the locking pawl to the housing. The load releasing system includes a linear actuator for moving the relative position of the base relative to the ratchet gear and the housing, and a separate brake for holding the reel and ratchet gear in position under a load.