Have a 2005 290 Coastal. Have had issues with the windlass (Maxwell Freedom 500) ever since I bought the boat a couple years ago. I figured it was just an old windlass..... When pulling anchor up, it sounds like it is struggling, I see the Voltage on my gauges drop, and if I pull too long without giving it a break, it pops the breaker. In shallow water, its not too bad, but if anchoring in 60 + ft of water for fishing its a real chore to get the anchor back up.

Finally getting around to replacing it, was going to go with the RC6-8. But as I started looking into it, I think my problem might be undersized cables to the windlass. It all looks original OEM, but cable is undersized per windlass manual. I only have AWG 4 cables. And when you add up the distance from the batter to switch, switch to windlass, windlass to neg terminal, neg terminal back to battery, its around 60'. the freedom 500 and the RC6-8 would need a min AWG 2 cable for that distance.

Anyone else had this issue? Or what size cable do you have on the 290 coastal to the windlass?