Winch Question

I have had the same question in mind. I am going around Oz and other smaller trips from next year and was considering buying a 2nd hand electric winch. Do you consider that a hand winch (tirfor or similar) would be better for my 100 series?

Hi Drew, weigh up the pros and cons, the weight of a winch in front of your front axle the cost of buying, fitting bull bar mounts, wiring, maintenance, wether you use it or not. Pros, its handy if its been maintained to pull you forwards for about 5 mins in hard conditions before it overheats or flattens your battery.
Cons of a hand winch, its hard work and has to be stored somewhere. Pros, its cheap, $350 for a brand new Tuff Pull, needs only a couple of shackles and a snatch block to pull front back or sideways, another advantage of a hand winch is after a hard winching session it will make you far more cautious about where you take your vehicle. Electric or power winches tend to make ppl feel they are invincible and take stupid risks. Excuse my bias but I have often had to go and get them out.
Cheers Rob

Thanks Rob, I will carefully consider the options before splashing out on and electric winch. I suppose you need a $1000 set of _Affordable_Storage_Drawers.aspx though to get it out of the way now?

Donald
I tried this arrangement a few years ago to see if it would work. It's a waste of time and sweat and probably dangerous. Try it for yourself by winching your vehicle up your driveway with the handbrake slightly on and you will see what a waste of time it would be in the bush if you really needed to rely on it. You only get about a metre of winch travel and if you need to use an extension strap, most of that travel is taken up by stretch in the strap. Even just using a chain ie no stretch, you still lose a lot of travel when you take up the slack in the chain. You would also need a second chain to secure the vehicle if you were winching it up a slope as you reconnected the hi-lift and first chain. Again, you lose most of what you have gained in taking up the slack in the system. The whole system is quite unstable and you wouldn't know when you are approaching the limits of the jack's capacity, unlike a Tirfor where the shear pins would break. If you factor in the risk, minimal winching travel, and the extra effort involved in connecting the line, securing the vehicle with a second line, disconnecting then reconnecting the first line each time to move about half a metre, it ain't worth it. I recommend you try it at home without loading up the jack to prove it to yourself.