Cabover campers- Questions

[liftedlimo]

The winch was stalling out and eventually overheated. My passenger tire was dug down in the muddy/snowy ditch 3 feet or more, so the winch didn't have enough guts to pull the slowly sinking tire out through all that resistance. We would winch the truck one direction then dig out mud, then winch the opposite direction and keep digging until we had a nice "v", then put our aluminum loading ramp in the ditch and the winch finally could pull the tire up the ramp, 6 hours later.

The winch needs to be a minimum of 1.5 times the weight of your vehicle. 2 times is better. But with the weight of a fullsize vehicle, camper, gear, plus add mud up to the frame rails the weight is way to much for any winch short of a HUGE industrial unit. I would be worried the 16.5k, or even a poorly mounted 12.5k Warn might pull apart your frame rails/bumper mount!

 

[Kilroy]

The winch was stalling out and eventually overheated. My passenger tire was dug down in the muddy/snowy ditch 3 feet or more, so the winch didn't have enough guts to pull the slowly sinking tire out through all that resistance. We would winch the truck one direction then dig out mud, then winch the opposite direction and keep digging until we had a nice "v", then put our aluminum loading ramp in the ditch and the winch finally could pull the tire up the ramp, 6 hours later.

The winch needs to be a minimum of 1.5 times the weight of your vehicle. 2 times is better. But with the weight of a fullsize vehicle, camper, gear, plus add mud up to the frame rails the weight is way to much for any winch short of a HUGE industrial unit. I would be worried the 16.5k, or even a poorly mounted 12.5k Warn might pull apart your frame rails/bumper mount!

A snatch block with the line back to the truck would have doubled your pulling power.

 

[Code Monkey]

I would be worried the 16.5k, or even a poorly mounted 12.5k Warn might pull apart your frame rails/bumper mount!

I intend to try to design around this issue. I also intend to reinforce the frame a number of places.

 

[liftedlimo]

A snatch block with the line back to the truck would have doubled your pulling power.

Yes it would of. Our only snatch block we own currently isn't rated for this amount of weight, so we don't use it on large vehicles that are really stuck. I plan on ordering some correctly rated blocks after I finish buying a house in the next few months. The correct blocks are about 200 bucks each. I work with winches and cranes everyday at work. Our main winch line is 8" thick and has a mile of wire on it!:Wow1:

We also were pulling leaf springs apart as it was, so I decided instead of rigging up brute force to overcome the obstacle, to engineer an easier way out. Being stuck isn't black magic folks, its just a little but of geometry and physics mixed I always say. Winch smarter not harder, your truck will thank you in the end.

 

[Kilroy]

I was driving on a forest trail one time that turned to grass with no support.
Winch was on front, and we had to go backwards. After trying to use hi-lift to winch backwards, digging, etc. we finally used winch to pull us sideways. Keeping tires spinning while doing this reduced the hold of the mud and allowed winch to pull us sideways. Still time consuming. Had to pull out cable and rewind often because it was just loading up on one side. Also had to move attachment point several times. It wouldn't have worked if we hadn't kept tires spinning while pulling.