which winch
 

Our overland through Africa trip that we are planning will be fairly budget restrained and fitting a powered winch, and all that goes with it, looks like a lot of money. Instead we are looking at a manual winch.
Could anybody tell us if we will be using the winch regally or not? If regally used the money will be better spent on a powered winch for ease of use.

Trans africa - I would be surprised if you use it at all. I have a warn 10000 winch fitted to my Defender and I used it twice in going trans africa, both recovering other vehicles and both when I could of used a snatch strap or alternative approach. Even solo travelling as we were you probably won't need it. Yes you might need it if you are making a solo crossing of the central congo in the wet season but if you are following the normal routes then you will be fine. If you can afford it then the manual winch is worth having as a last resort - its pretty cheap and I saved my Nissan patrol and a Toyota Landcruiser 75 series on an Australian beach when we were about to lose them to the sea - we would of been stuffed otherwise.

If the budget is really tight you can achieve the same thing by utilising a highlift jack as a winch. Its a very slow process but it will get you out.

My advice would be to get yourself a Tirfor or something similar and a snatch block, if your budget is a consideration, and not overlooking the weight factor either.

Yes they are slow and can be bloody hard work, but coupled with a snatch block it will almost certainly get you out of most situations, they also have the added bonus of being able to pull you out backwards, which a conventional front mounted whinch can`t.

For a bit of self assurance, have a look through most of the previous overland trip reports, and see how many of them actually used a winch on a regular basis, most of them are used on the odd occurance.

http://www.ihana.com/big_trip/stuck.htm

Check out this site, these two went looking for trouble, and still managed most of the time with a hand winch.

Personally I think if weight or space was`nt an issue one of each would be perfect, but its not really realistic.

Col Campbell

Don't spend to much effort/time/money on a winch. I carry sand plates, shovel, high-lift, shovel, compressor and recovery rope.

I used
1. Compressor (lots)
2. Shovel (quite a few times)
3. recovery rope (only once to get unstuck myselves)
4. sand plates (mainly as a sunchade, not for recovery)
5. Hi-lift (a few times back home, when playing in the mud and looking for it)

Not that I would leave without any of these.
If I would take a winch, I'd take one of those DIY store cheapies.

regs,

Rob

I have a Tirfor with 30 metres of steel cable and a Pull Pal ground anchor.

I have used it in anger on one occasion and it worked well, I now use it to pull out tree stumps! They work very well and of course you can use them without power and from any angle of recovery as previously mentioned.

The negative is that there is a big weight penalty, its slow and its hard work. The Aussies love tirfors and if you are driving a Toyota then the weight issue is less of a problem.

I dont carry the kit for desert trips now as you are better served by using a jack, sand ladders and an air compressor.

However if I were doing the length of Africa then the chances are that you would use it and I would therefore take it. I would perhaps question whether you want to spend limited expedition funds on a winch though.

Remember that you can also use a high lift jack for a short recovery of say 1 metre (or whatever the height of your jack is).

[This message has been edited by ctc (edited 22 June 2004).]

Yeah, save your money, get a good tirfor winch and some strops 1 quite long, and spend the cash on a good quality air compressor - engine driven are best, electric are cheaper -which has a high CFM rating (5+) you will need it, and in my opinion is far more impo rtant than a winch. Cheers Gipper.

Infact, it is (or should be) possible to use your 'hi(gh)-lift-jack-all' for more than it's lenght. All you need extra are some pieces of chain and two 'chain-hooks(?)', with some training it should be possible to hook up the second chain (removing the tension of the jack) so you can relocate it and hook it on again.

Did not tried it (yet) tho.

Here's a link with some pictures of how it supposed to work, it's in dutch (belgium) but I think the pictures tell a lot. Note he removed the base-plate for this purpose.

http://users.pandora.be/wwolf/hi-lift.htm

__________
bart

Hi all,

Read this document - a great source of info about off-road recovery for the entusiast and novices alike:
http://4xforum.co.za/downloads/50007.pdf
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Roman (UK)
www.overlandcruiser.info

[This message has been edited by Roman (edited 23 June 2004).]

Interesting, thats a lot better way to do it, I`ve have to recover backwards with a high lift and it took bloody ages (not to mention a lot of sweat) as the first two foot was used in taking up the slack and you only actually moved 2 foot per go, this way you would only loose a couple of inches in slack each time you reset your jack position with the second chain.

Col Campbell

Nice solution with those chains for extending the capability of your hi-lift!

Definately worth practising that little maneovre before hand though!

From a safety perspective I did think that the shackles looked a little light and it is not good practise to have two D shackles in line. I'd also want to know the break strength of the chain. The stresses involved when winching a fully loaded vehicle are truly frightening!




[This message has been edited by ctc (edited 23 June 2004).]