[abl1111]

It's vertical ( it sits flat and the chain/rope are pulled in in a vertical position ).

I have never had a problem w/ the rope getting into the locker correctly. It just does every time. There is plently of room. The only problem could be if you use too much rope/chain and it piles up too high in the rope locker and does not allow the incoming rope to come in - it could jam ( I experienced this while bareboating in the Caribbean on a 44' sailboat w/ all chain ). I have never had this happen on my SC - I have 200' of - I think it's 1/2" I'd have to check )

This system works great ! The anchor roller I used is a Windline ( I think a CAR 4 ) - it's the one that cantilevers. This model is not advertised a lot but Windline makes the best of that style. If you get it, let me know, I did a small, cheap retrofit that makes it work 100% perfectly.

If FF isn't really an issue I'm thinking of going vertical but I'm afraid it won't work well with the anchor locker. It sounds like a vertical windlass needs a deeper locker in order to have enough rope hanging before hitting the bottom to pull the incoming rode down (ie. you need the weight of the hanging rope to make the incoming rope come off the winch properly making the 90 deg turn down in to the locker.