Electric winches on expo trucks.

[whatcharterboat]

Hi . Was keen to get a few views on winches in a thread here. I know there is a dedicated thread section for recovery gear but I thought it might be good to hear from those with trucks of a 6 ton GVM and over what they think rather than just what Jeep/Cruiser/F Truck guy might use. Certainly no offense intended there. Just that big trucks require very different consideration.

What brought this about is that a guy with a RTW camper we're working on at the moment wants me to fit a 16,500lb Warn winch. He also wants it to be removable so that he can mount it on the rear or even rig it to pull from the side in the event of a roll over. It's an FG84 and will possibly run close to max GVM of 6 ton.

OK now what frightens me is the rated current draw of 500 plus amps at 12 volts and the fact that the cables will have to run from one end of the truck to the other. Say 6 metres or there abouts. Add in some thermal runaway and you are talking serious current and lots of copper to cope with it and the voltage drop over that distance. Also the biggest Anderson plugs I can find so that it will be removable are 350amp so they'll have to be doubled up.

Not to mention the weight of the thing with the bracket. Imagine the weight of a removable bracket rated at 16,500lbs alone. It will be a heavy thing to cart around. Probably close to 90 kgs combined.

The biggest electric winches I've ever fitted were 12000lb on the NPS's which are 24volt so the current is half for the same pulling capacity. With the 12volt trucks and double the current, hydraulic or electric hydraulic is surely a better option. You don't get the same thermal runaway caused by excessive current with an electric hydraulic setup as the stall effectively happens from oil by pass. Also you only need one hydraulic power pack which can be used for an extra winch, stabilizing legs, lifting rams for wheels or bikes, or anything you can think of. Imagine a hydraulic hi lift. I want one.

PTO power is even more usable but with the need for the motor to run. Not much good to you if the truck's lying on it's side. Some say "Not much good if you swamp your engine in a creek either!!" Well don't forget that most electric winches aren't sealed anywhere near as well as they should be and will need to be pulled down anyway if they're submerged. A high mounted electric power pack will run a submerged hydraulic winch for as long as you like. I used to work with ROV's. Hydraulics form the basis of propulsion for these things at the bottom of the ocean so I don't think you would ever need to worry about one in a creek. It's the electric solenoids on the valve banks that would need to be protected. Still no problem. Most are well sealed anyway.

Cost I suppose is the bottom line. Hydraulics are not cheap to set up but then replacing batteries and alternators would be painful too. Actually on that point >>> does anyone disconnect the alternators when winching. Something we've done as a failsafe before so that the current or rather load isn't transferred to the alternator once the batteries are sucked dry? Also I suppose the size of the alternator would need to be considered. If you have excessive current and hence heat then I imagine you only be able to run the thing for a minute or so and then let it cool and recharge a little. Wow the mind boggles. Bigger alternator??? Amp meter?? Running on the house batteries. How many cranking amps will they give anyway??

Really keen to hear from everyones experience on this. You can tell I'm not a fan of big electric winches. Doing another one soon too with a 12v electric 12000lb 'er but he will have a 200amp 12v DC diesel power unit along with the Fuso alternator so I think the load on the batteries will be minor by comparison to the next RTW truck.

Please, any advice, thoughts, experiences, horror stories, etc will be appreciated. Or even general recovery stories would be appropriate here.

 

[oka boy]

Hi John,why not use a couple of pulleys to re direct the winch cable to a rear exit,I think of memory some Unimogs had a similar system.The weight of the winch with the frame will be extremely heavy and unless you have a bus load of passangers it will be very impractical leaving aside all the electrcal head aches.......just my two cents worth
joe

 

[Fireman78]

Gosh I hate to say this (no flames needed) but my 12000 pound Warn winch on my Power Wagon has been used, abused, and used some more. I have recovered a city dump truck from the sand, a fully loaded ambulance , again, from the sand. Pulled an 8000 pound chipper (connected to the truck) up a steep, icy hill, recovered other Power Wagons in the snow, pulled a Toyota 4Runner up a cliff, saved a Ford Bronco that was on it's side, assisted in tree felling, log dragging, pulled a wound logging cable out of a fecon forestry drum head, ect, ect... without giving much thought to amprage, power, battery, ect. I grew up on a farm and it seems that one just needed to "Get the job done", regardless.

 

[whatcharterboat]

Hi John,why not use a couple of pulleys to re direct the winch cable to a rear exit,I think of memory some Unimogs had a similar system.The weight of the winch with the frame will be extremely heavy and unless you have a bus load of passangers it will be very impractical leaving aside all the electrcal head aches.......just my two cents worth
joe

Hi Joe, Yeah, used to have an old Landie with a PTO rear mount winch with a roller taking the cable to the front. Worked really well. We used it more out the back than at the front too. Really handy for pulling the tinnie out of creeks up in the Territory. And remember the old Army Inters with the big centre mount PTO's. I remember they had a massive pulling power with a turntable at the back and a cable guide up and through the front bar. Very capable and better for weight distribution. Not good to hang to much of the front of those FG's either.

Sorry but I don't think it will be possible on this one and the owner wants this type of dual position setup cause he saw it on an OKA recently. So funny an ol' OKABOY would reply. What's on yours?

Fireman78 Hey mate, thanks for the reply. What's the Dodge's GVM? And how big is the alternator? I have a feeling that the FG will have a smaller power supply and a heavier GVM which is why I'm worried. This truck will probably be every bit of 6 ton.Your comments are certainly reassuring though. A 16500lb electric winch would not have been my choice but that's what has to go on regardless. Hope you can continue to reassure.
Cheers.

 

[Mickldo]

G'day John, I will repeat here my thoughts on this subject which we talked about down at the Brissy Show.

I am not a real fan of electric winches full stop. I do have a 9,500lb electric on my cruiser but in general I reckon the other options are better. Especially when the weight of the vehicle is starting to get up there like on the Canter.

The main reason I don't like the electrics is the huge current draws needed. When you need them the most that is when they are the most inefficient. They don't like the water too much either. I have a couple of mates that compete in winch challenges and I sometimes help them wrench on their rigs. It is standard practice to replace the electric motor after each round. It isn't uncommon to replace the motor after each stage too. Remember these are competition winches that are fully tricked out not standard-off-the-shelf winches that have been sitting unused for years on some bullbar being exposed to all sorts of weather.

Some of the winch comps don't like the PTO's or hydraulics because they offer an "unfair" advantage over the electrics and penalise them.

A lot of guys don't like the PTO's because you need the motor running but you don't get far with an electric without the motor running too.

The problem with PTO's is the shear pin but there have been a few advances in technology where small clutch packs are used so you don't have to replace the shear pin while buried in the mud.

The problem with hydraulics is the size, complexity and weight of the system needed to be able to survive in all conditions. Depending on the duty cycle needed you could get away with a small power pack but for any serious winching a PTO driven pump, large tank, filter, cooler, etc. If you are going to be using any other hydraulics on board then all this complexity can pay off. We fit PTO driven Hydraulic winches to the trucks we build at work. They use the winches a LOT and the hydraulics are the only thing that can keep up.

On the smaller vehicles we build we used to fit the PTO's to the Land Cruisers but now they have changed over to Patrols they don't have a choice and have to use electric. Even just spooling the cables on we have had a couple of the Patrols stall the motors when the winch sucks more current the alternator can supply and the battery voltage drops down too low for the ECU.

As far as a removable winch goes I am not a real fan either. I prefer either a pair of winches (redundancy) or a centre mount winch with the cable going back to a rear pulley then forward to a fairlead at the front. If rear winching is required you grab the cable off the pulley and then use the cable as a double line pull.

 

[BKCowGod]

Man... Not sure if the amperage draw would be my biggest concern, but as I understand the Power Wagon and most other HD alts have an alternator of 160-180amps. Assuming dual Optima Yellows or similar (the new 75 amp hour ones).

The 16.5k Warn is 3.4kW or 283amps @ 12v. Or, in English... it's a beast. Again making assumptions, it'll certainly work in a perfect system for an emergency pull but man-o-man is it gonna be generating some heat and your customer better be prepared to run the engine/solar panels/genset/etc after to recover those batteries, because the alternator alone ain't coming close and you're gonna be scraping bottom somewhat quick.

All that potentially faulty math behind me, I'm not sure I'd want to be too close to the receiver hitch pin that is feeling 12k lbs of strain. Nor would I want to be the poor sap moving 200lbs of winch into a (potentially off-camber) proper position for a recovery.

NOTE: Usual 4am crashed blood sugar shaky hands disclaimer applies to this post - check my logic and my math before making any important decisions, as I'm probably doing it wrong. But it makes sense to me.

 

[whatcharterboat]

BKCowGod. Standard FG alternator is only 100 amp. Sure you can get them rewound or fit an extra larger one but this hasn't been discussed yet. It's a long story. Oh, and I'm sure I read that at max pulling capacity the Warn 16500lb is drawing 507amps IIRC so surely it will have to be installed with a power supply and correctly sized cable to suit the rating of the winch or the manufacturer won't be to happy if there are any warranty isssues.

Also it will have to have a double hitch. Should have said that. Too much force sideways on only one. Can't get the rating otherwise. Already had this discussion with our engineer. But you are right. It could be scary. It certainly won't be a normal 4500kg receiver hitch anyway.

Hey Mick . I remember everything you said last time we spoke about this. Thanks for reflecting my concerns. Coming from someone thats fitted as many heavy truck winches as you have means that my worries are definitely not unfounded.

BTW Still going to try and drop in next Sunday arv on my way back from Bundy. Bumped into an old friend today up in Gympie. He moved to Maryborough awhile back. Runs the Blackwoods Industrial Supplies warehouse. Said he deals with you guys. Also he's got a really cool 80 and is very active in Widebay4x4. He said he'd drop in and see you. Also need your new address too. PM me please.

Talk soon. John.

 

[Bluewater Australia]

I'm very interested in how this pans out. I already have the double receivers each end for other reasons, and have long thought I would rather have a removable winch that can plug in either end, rather than a permanent fixture that I don't want most of the time. Coincidentally I spoke to the OKA owner who had done this a while ago, before I had a look at the amperage downside; and he didn't mention any problems. It's not an urgent job for me, more one of those wishlist things.

 

[ntsqd]

Disclaimer: No personal experience with a truck of this size.

That said, BK made my primary point before I got to it. No way would I want to be hefting a winch and mount that heavy, and very likely on unsure or uneven ground. That is a recipe for personal injury.

I would seriously look a fixed mount winch (preferably hydraulic) and set up guide rollers to direct the cable to where ever the customer desires to be able to pull towards. It will be far, far easier to thread even a 12mm-16mm cable through the guide rollers than it will be to manually heft a winch around to the various mounts. Joaquin Suave's "Libelula" is set up with such a system for fore/aft winching. A well thought out & designed one at that.

FWIW I'm not convinced that Warn et. al. pay much attention to the Anderson current ratings. At least one such system (from an un-recalled vendor) used the 175 amp series for a winch that clearly would use more than that. Since those connectors were originally designed for recharging forklift batteries (at 100% duty cycle over long time spans), they may be justified in using the smaller connectors.
Though it is not what I did in setting up the 2k lbs Superwinch on the glass buggy. I ended up using the size that most seem to use with far larger winches for my puny little winch, just to be within Anderson's current ratings.
I'm guessing from various comments that such an install might be subject to Gov't scrutiny and as such you have no option but to go by Anderson's ratings?
If forced to continue down the electric path I'd suggest a call to Anderson's Engineering dept. for the full scoop on those ratings.

 

[IggyB]

I used welding cable quick connectors and 2/0 cable for the rear remote mount. The cable and connectors are rated well above the 400 or so amps that the Superwinch draws. The cable core is the size of pinkie finger and the welding connectors are pretty massive.

https://www.acklandsgrainger.com/images/catalog/0671.pdf

 

[762X39]

What brought this about is that a guy with a RTW camper we're working on at the moment wants me to fit a 16,500lb Warn winch. It's an FG84 and will possibly run close to max GVM of 6 ton.

OK now what frightens me is the rated current draw of 500 plus amps at 12 volts and the fact that the cables will have to run from one end of the truck to the other. Say 6 metres or there abouts. Add in some thermal runaway and you are talking serious current and lots of copper to cope with it and the voltage drop over that distance. Also the biggest Anderson plugs I can find so that it will be removable are 350amp so they'll have to be doubled up.


Really keen to hear from everyones experience on this. You can tell I'm not a fan of big electric winches. Doing another one soon too with a 12v electric 12000lb 'er but he will have a 200amp 12v DC diesel power unit along with the Fuso alternator so I think the load on the batteries will be minor by comparison to the next RTW truck.

Please, any advice, thoughts, experiences, horror stories, etc will be appreciated. Or even general recovery stories would be appropriate here.

I am not familiar with the truck in question and don't think much of 12 volt winches except maybe to lift a spare tyre with.

Is there any possibility of running dual alternators, a second battery bank and running a 24 volt winch? I think that would be the easiest thing to do but it may not be feasible (it is always possible!).

Running 24 volts would solve the wire size, Anderson connector capacity and complexity problems associated with the preferred option (hydraulic).

 

[whatcharterboat]

Running 24 volts would solve the wire size, Anderson connector capacity and complexity problems associated with the preferred option (hydraulic).

Well I don't think it would be practical. Too much but you are right. 24volt systems are far more suited to big electric winches as I said before about the Isuzu's. Also I'm running out of room on the engine with a belt driven compressor hanging off the motor as well.

BTW I should have mentioned that to make it worse, the winch is intended to be used for more than emergency recovery. It will be used to get himself into places he wouldn't get to without it so I imagine that means some sand big hills, etc.

 

[jefe4x4]

I've been 4bye-ing for 45 years. 11 Four wheel drives with about 6 or 7 of those having winches, with maybe 500 pulls on the spool, and hundreds of recoveries.
I've tried the repositionalble winch fore to aft, and it's not worth it. Too heavy. too much #2 cable for power. I used the welding cable that came with my on-board welder. That's heavy too. Usually if you need a winch you are burried in some kind of terra incognita, so much of the time your winch is down there somewhere too. A good shovel is more appropriate.

PTO winch: had a factory one of those on a '66 TLC, FJ-40. I bought the Toy @ 6 months old. Shear pins snapped right away. Very low rating. Drilled out the shear hole and used 1/4" drill rod as a substitute shear pin. Worked very well after that. As long as the engine was running, I could use it in very deep water and mud, and did. You could use the gear box also to adjust line speed and pulling power.
Wierd Winching Tales and true:
About 1968, we tried to follow the jeep trail across a meadow on the way to Monache Meadows in the Sierra Nevada. It was about 100 M across the muck. Tried to Bonzai across, and of course sank like a rock to the frame. Reeled out the wire rope to near the end of spool. Rolled the spare tire out to end of rope. Enter the 'Dead Man'. Dug 4' deep hole slightly bigger than tire laying down. Burried spare with hook attached through the hole to the tire X-iron under the wheel. Reeled in winch. dug up spare tire, moving on to do the same operation again, over and over until we got the 300 feet across to dry ground. We should have turned around, but when you're 25 years old, nothing is going to get in your way. I've also been stuck in quicksand to the frame and sinking. Broke the winch trying to pull out. Had to use the hi-lift and a square of plywood (2" thick) as a foot or jack base. Finally found bottom and got out but the sand was everywhere in the brakes, etc. Had to completely disassemble the 4 wheel drum brakes and hose out the sand. We've run the wire rope under the rig and pulled backward, very carefully placing the cable so as not to cut any important brake or fuel lines.
Warn 6000, 8000, 8274: I used the 8K on my '70, FJ-55 over 300 times and actually wore out the spur gear that runs the bull gear. And pulled the homemade front bumper right off the rig. The 8274 is still my favorite of the medium winches and resides on my '82 Jeep CJ-8 rock crawler. Terrific line speed. If you are in a group situation, having the 8274 positioned to get rigs over some insurmountable-by-traction object, you can do it with dispatch. Works very well with snatch block, as it moves right along. 150' of wire rope. I've used it a couple times under water to no ill effect.
A couple other cheap 8K and 9K Chinese winches. They didn't last very long.
Now to the OP's querrie.
On my Truck Camper (see specs in sig below) I found a barely used Warn 15000 pound winch at about half the price of new. 90' of 7/16" wire rope, huge hook with keeper. I got a Warn install kit and beefed it up, as I was planning on some big winch pulls (We heat our home with firewood, so I do some logging of Oak and Fir to split to add to my GIGANTIC carbon footprint. Oh, and a cheap source of heat)
The common logic is for the winch to be 1.5X in pulling power to the weight of the rig it's mounted on. My truck and camper combination is about 9800 lbs., wet. So, a 15K winch is acceptable. I've used it for logging, and almost always must 'deadman' the truck to a tree or rock so it doesn't slide all wheels toward the object of the pull.
What about a 16.5K lb. winch? It would be nice, but I couldn't find a good deal on one. So I saved about $1K, US, for 1.5K lbs less in rating.
When I was shopping winches, I noticed a newer Chinese market of even heavier duty winches, some up to 18,000 pounds of direct line pull. For some of you with BIG expedition trucks, I would be worth looking into.
I'm a hard core rock crawler and on a particularly gnarly run in Arizona a few years ago, did the most exotic winch operation I've ever done. Here's the story:
I was out with a friend, Dave, with another extreme rock crawler and he had full width axles. Mine were medium wide. See pic:

[/IMG]
We were doing a lot of the named hard-core trails in June east of Phoenix, so daytime temps in 112 F range were to be avoided, so all of our journeys were at night.
A couple nights in, he approached an obstacle which was basically two 6-8 foot tall rocks up on end with about a 5' breach between. There was no other way out except over those rocks. He was wide enough to straddle them and ground and winched his way up and over, just barely not falling it. I gulped, as my narrower track was not going to straddle. We though for moment and surveyed all the recovery equipment we had available: His 9.5ti winch, my 8274 winch, 2-20' and one 30' tow straps. 6-"D" rings (clevises), a 20' piece of hardened chain with slip hooks, 2-snatch blocks, and a tree saver.
Here's how it worked out: He went ahead and turned around (with great effort in the narrow canyon) to get in a position to winch me forward. I dragged the chain, some d rings, a snatch block, the 30' strap and winch cable up the steep hill to my right, securing the chain and the 30'-er around a gigantic sandstone rock(up at a 45 degree angle from my jeep) with the snatch block attached. Ran the winch cable up to the block and back down to my rear of my roll bar, making for a sort of accute triangle. He attached to pull me toward him. I took up the slack on mine and worked my rig on the right rock obstacle at more than a 45 deg. angle, essentially hanging on the triangle of wire rope. The huge rock was slightly forward of my position, so I worked the winch in bit by bit as he pulled forward, literally hanging in the breach and swinging forward on the rock with absolutely no traction from the tires. I was on the CB with him the whole time as we had to co-ordinate the move. With Fuel Injection, the jeep kept creeping forward with 0 lbs. oil pressure, (I was in lo/lo at idle (130:1 final drive) so as not to produce any drag but still have a little control.
It worked great. We were through and had lunch. This is at 2:45AM, BTW.
I've got a lot more tales and true, one involving three winches to pull my buddie George straight up out a rock box he rolled into. Upside down and in a rock shoebox just bigger than hi TJ.
regards, as always, jefe

 

[762X39]

I am not sure if you have gotten the information you need yet.I think you were specifically interested in peoples experiences with recovering 6 ton vehicles under all conditions in order to make an appropriate decision or recommendation for a RTW truck build.
Is a hydraulic winch still off the table? I understand that it is possible in some cases to upgrade the power steering pump, add a small tank and run a relocatable or permanently connected winch that runs from the engine?
I know this means that the engine must be running for this to work.
Perhaps the owner of this vehicle needs to be gently persuaded to reconsider his wish list or throw more cubic dollars at a realistic solution.
Most of the responses so far (and I am not critical of any of them) don't quite apply to self recovery of a 12,000 lb vehicle that will also be someones home for an extended period of time.
When you are caring for your home, redlining any system is totally unacceptable and must be avoided at all costs.There must be redundancy and safety built in that will allow you to occupy and depend on your portable home for extended periods without support.
Good luck in coming up with a reasonable, safe and reliable solution for your client

 

[Robthebrit]

I gave up on the winch idea, I could never come up with a bad scenario where I would use it and it would work. You are not going to pulling a camper over a rock crawling trail. All the winching scenarios with a heavy camper are fairly horrible and in 99% of cases you should be able to see the problem coming.

I saw recently a unimog 1300 stuck up to its frame in wet mud and no winch was ever going to move it, in fact no other truck or combination of trucks could budge it. Ultimately a tracked bulldozer yanked it out.

Rob