My Bodgy Winch Install - testing on Page 2

[bigcam]

been reading this with interest.. other than weight (which wouldn't be that significant i wouldn't think.. ) why not just make a steel cradle or even buy one and modify it?

the safey implications of your design have been layed out before you.. swallow your pride and do it safely before someone gets hurt and there is another bloody tabloid newspaper article about how dangerous 4wd's are.

on a side note.. the inside radius of the fair lead shouldn't be doing much work as the winch line should lineup in the middle wrap so there is only about 20 degrees of change from full drum to empty drum.

the pop riveted fair lead is bloody dangerous , picture this, fully loaded winching up a 30+ degree incline on a vertical offset angle (i.e. pulling up or down on the fairlead) the rivets snap the rope hits the relatively sharp edge of the alloy bar, cuts the rope and down you go. there is a reason fairleads have big bolts instead of 7g tech screws.

by all means booty fab parts on your car, but not the ones you intend on hanging the thing off!

[me3@neuralfibre.com]

No wonder it broke then!! According to whats set out in the Australian standards for fibre ropes used in arduous conditions the SWL for your rope is only 690kg!!

And the SWL for 3/8 steel winch rope supplied with the winch is?
And the SWL for the 5/16 steel winch rope used on many Warn's is?

http://www.tiedown.com/fconstruct.html
will help with the answers (divide by 2.1 - they are US lb's)

Since when was anything except shackles rated with SWL in 4wd use?
No argument vs should it be. I'm saying you are confusing the issue and not comparing apples with apples.

If SWL was applied to snatch straps, what do you think they would rate at?

Paul

[shakes]

the cycle of temp differences and expansion and contraction will also cause alot of fatigue...

You seem to do some research but dont look into every variable?
You seem to be reasonably switched on, but then when something like this that's potentially fatal in the wrong situation rings alarm bell's you don't look into thing's further before wasting your time?

At least your semi-handling the critism this time

[me3@neuralfibre.com]

the cycle of temp differences and expansion and contraction will also cause alot of fatigue...

You seem to do some research but dont look into every variable?
You seem to be reasonably switched on, but then when something like this that's potentially fatal in the wrong situation rings alarm bell's you don't look into thing's further before wasting your time?

At least your semi-handling the critism this time ;)

I'll be honest.

The reseach was "Hi Mr Aluminium seller that sells cut lengths - what's the heaviest you've got? - yep - it fits - that's fine, I'll take it"

Option B is a whole new bar, I can't see any other way to do it, and I don't want to spend $1800.

The test I was thinkign of was a 90deg pull - full sideways. That would load hell out of the fairlead.
The issue is the lateral stregnth of the OEM bar is very limited. Pics of the oem bar mounting brackets below. Note the "heavy duty" lateral braces.

http://picasaweb.google.com.au/adrenali ... hDrumFault

Paul

[Ben]

It if breaks, it breaks

If you're winching you're already in a world of sh1t - what you you think is going to happen when it goes BANG!

This is the bit I'm really, really struggling with (even more so than the original concept). If it breaks, there's a bloody good chance you'll either kill yourself or someone else, or at the very least do some serious damage.

Personally, a couple of hundred bucks on steel is cheap when you look at it that way. And if you're worried about weight, do what everyone else does, wack a $50 spacer on top of your coils.

When it comes to live and death, I'd rather not save a few bucks.

EDIT - You say it hasn't broken yet, so what's the problem. Trust me, snatch straps don't always break on the first use, but they do. Things break after time, after wear and tear. FFS stop using this thing before it does the same thing.

[shakes]

the cycle of temp differences and expansion and contraction will also cause alot of fatigue...

You seem to do some research but dont look into every variable?
You seem to be reasonably switched on, but then when something like this that's potentially fatal in the wrong situation rings alarm bell's you don't look into thing's further before wasting your time?

At least your semi-handling the critism this time

I'll be honest.

The reseach was "Hi Mr Aluminium seller that sells cut lengths - what's the heaviest you've got? - yep - it fits - that's fine, I'll take it"

Option B is a whole new bar, I can't see any other way to do it, and I don't want to spend $1800.

Paul

I waited my time until something cheap came up... when I had my patrol I paid $550 for an immaculate ARB delux bar, WITH an old 8000p warn winch with steel cable. rebuilt the winch and brought some rope and we were away.

if weight is an issue, buy a turfor and take a shit before you go driving...
if cash is an issue, dont own a large fourby.

[bogged]

I'll be honest.

The reseach was "Hi Mr Aluminium seller that sells cut lengths - what's the heaviest you've got? - yep - it fits - that's fine, I'll take it"

very indepth...

[GRIMACE]

[hulsty]

No wonder it broke then!! According to whats set out in the Australian standards for fibre ropes used in arduous conditions the SWL for your rope is only 690kg!!

And the SWL for 3/8 steel winch rope supplied with the winch is?
And the SWL for the 5/16 steel winch rope used on many Warn's is?

http://www.tiedown.com/fconstruct.html
will help with the answers (divide by 2.1 - they are US lb's)

Since when was anything except shackles rated with SWL in 4wd use?
No argument vs should it be. I'm saying you are confusing the issue and not comparing apples with apples.

If SWL was applied to snatch straps, what do you think they would rate at?

Paul

I'm intruiged now! might have to check some of that stuff out!! I just noticed it cause I was reading AS1418 today the fibre rope section and it was talking about these kinds of things.

I did convert it to kgs before posting, just for interests sake one of the fibre ropes we can get for our cranes is rated to a SWL of 9000lbs, its 1'' in diameter!!

I'll keep an eye out for stuff relating to wire rope and snatch straps, might have to give arb a buzz.

[bru21]

Option B is a whole new bar, I can't see any other way to do it, and I don't want to spend $1800.

Paul

I don't want to come across the wrong way but, sometimes its easier then it seems to get things like bullbars cheap or even free.

I have had at least 3 mates that I can think of that have swaped alloy bars for steel winch bars.

Most people are happy with a std alloy bar and will never fit a winch and will gladly swap their steel bar. its a win win situation. Also steel bars are pretty cheap new - say $900 and yours would be worth $500 odd. So worst case you pay $400 and get a new bar.

That said, you might prove everyone wrong and get good service out of your current setup.

I am over cautious with these things as a broken lifting cable in an engineering workshop killed my granfather. (over 50 years ago)

cheers bru

[1MadEngineer]

I got given a bar just like this one



and realized why when i found out that the 5mm steel plate was bending and snapping the fairleads and the winch housings. The genius's welded a bit of 6mm round bar along the top edge as a strengthening rib. hahahahaha.

i fixed it up by cutting the whole front out and welding in a piece of 6mm bis360 plate with a 40mm return bent along the top edge!! now it doesn't bend at least! but i wouldn't like to hit anything substantial with it?

I was told this my first week of engineering at UNI:

Often if it looks right then it generally is!

Mate, in regards to your winch mount, All i can say is that i don't think it looks right

[ferrit]

im pretty sure theres a legit reason why the highly skilled engineers at TJM decided to manufacture a steel cradle for the winch when fitted behind their alloy bullbars, rather than just use an alloy one- its additional machining costs and equipment costs to change materials for part of the manufacture, so why would they do it?

Oh- probably because a multinational company, with real engineers who have done tests on their products worked out it would be a death trap.

As for your test- you didnt exert crap on that. When i did this to a work truck

We used 2 x 10,000lb warn winches with double line pulls, both on the steel ARB winch bar, and it stalled out BOTH winches before an aditional winch was brought in to get it out.

that was the worst i've ever been bogged- thats a 2" lifted cruiser, and it took 52,000lb of winches to get it out (you couldnt dig in that dirt, it would not give your shovel back!)

You may say your not going to ever use the winch much, but what about the "Oh crap" moment like i had? $90,000 fire unit, drove into a spring i couldnt see, in an unburnt area, with an active bushfire burning in the vicinity and varying winds

[80's_delirious]

Item Weight (KG)
Winch 21
Controller 3
Rope & Thimble 2
Fairlead 2
Mount 2.5
Total 29.2

Item Weight Saved (KG)
9500 vs 12000 10
Fairlead 4
Rope & Hook 8.5
Mount / Steel Bar 50
Total 72.5KG

so all else being equal, your alloy mount saved 47.5kgs of weight on the front of a 100series(probably less, you dont seem to consider the weight saved through removal of alloy bar). what's that as a proportion of the weight of a std 100series?

I agree with others, ally has completely different properties to steel (compare the tensile strengths for a start). Design and Fabrication with ally has to be different than with steel.

A real recovery situation has the potential for far greater loads/ stresses than testing done


Just think with all that weight saved, you might get 320,000kms out of the MTZ's


How about a variation of this (and keep the alloy bar)

Im guessing it ways a little less than 50 kgs

[me3@neuralfibre.com]

im pretty sure theres a legit reason why the highly skilled engineers at TJM decided to manufacture a steel cradle for the winch when fitted behind their alloy bullbars, rather than just use an alloy one- its additional machining costs and equipment costs to change materials for part of the manufacture, so why would they do it?

Oh- probably because a multinational company, with real engineers who have done tests on their products worked out it would be a death trap.

As for your test- you didnt exert crap on that. When i did this to a work truck

We used 2 x 10,000lb warn winches with double line pulls, both on the steel ARB winch bar, and it stalled out BOTH winches before an aditional winch was brought in to get it out.

that was the worst i've ever been bogged- thats a 2" lifted cruiser, and it took 52,000lb of winches to get it out (you couldnt dig in that dirt, it would not give your shovel back!)

You may say your not going to ever use the winch much, but what about the "Oh crap" moment like i had? $90,000 fire unit, drove into a spring i couldnt see, in an unburnt area, with an active bushfire burning in the vicinity and varying winds

That's an impressive recovery. Hope I don't end up that far in myself.

3 x 10,000lb at double line pull! 60,000lb possible pull - Far out. I'm not sure of the loss through the blocks, or if the winches were all pulling at full power, but it would have to be around 20ton on the front of the car. Speaking with dbongard who haunts here occasionally from ARB, he indicated that even Warn's didn't tend to get more than 3/4 rated power on vehicle batteries. Said they use a 3 phase inverter supply to test theirs.

Still, would only be 10,000lb (4.5ton) max on the cradle in your case, assuming the line were attached to chassid mounted recovery points.

I love the pic, that's brilliant.

Paul

[sierrajim]

Option B is a whole new bar, I can't see any other way to do it, and I don't want to spend $1800.

You own a live axle 100 series, ARB bars sell every second day on ebay for $2-600. I looked for months for an IFS bar last year, all i could find were live axle bars.

[Ben]

it took 52,000lb of winches to get it out

snip

with an active bushfire burning in the vicinity and varying winds

How many changes of underwear did it take?

[bogged]

it took 52,000lb of winches to get it out

snip

with an active bushfire burning in the vicinity and varying winds

How many changes of underwear did it take?

judging by the photos of the area, what on earth are you worried bout! so much clear land you could sit there on deck chairs!

[macca81]

it took 52,000lb of winches to get it out

snip

with an active bushfire burning in the vicinity and varying winds

How many changes of underwear did it take?

judging by the photos of the area, what on earth are you worried bout! so much clear land you could sit there on deck chairs!

that grassy shite all around burns hot and fast tho... it may have burnt past in a matter of 2 mins, but it would do it with enuf heat to leave the cruiser burning behind...

[daveo]

I have an XD9000 mounted in a TJM alloy bar in a steel cradle that would be about 8mm thick (at a guess) plate. It has the 2 long edges folded up at the front (through which the fairlead bolts pass) and the back edge down, and the 2 short edges folded up through which bolts mount it to the chassis and bullbar mounts. the winch sits with its feet down. being a TJM product one would assume that they have done all necessiary engineering and testing etc to withstand the loads. it also seems to meet your requirements of having the winch low between the chassis rails, strong and not excessively heavy (relative to the weight of the winch its self, the plate would not be a huge increase for which you have probably compensated for by running plasma anyway). maybe drop round to your local tjm shop and see how they have designed the winch cradle for their alloy bars? Is a few extra kg really worth the risk of having something fail and ending up with expensive panel damage, to what looks to be vehicle in good nick, at the very best?

[teemothy]

http://neuralfibre.com/paul/4wd/winch-m ... aking-rope

Let the games continue.

Anyone in BNE care to suggest any other reasonable test - I'll see what I can do.

Paul

dude, you have too much time on your hands, you need to get laid.
(even if you have to pay for it) good god man its a winch, mount to your car and go 4wdriving

[zagan]

if you wanted exotic.

you should have used something better than alloy, tungsten or titanium would have been good bets.

Tungsten is heavier than mild steel but it's far stronger than steel so the trade off is that in stead of using a thick bit of steel you might get away with a thinner bit of tungsten that will still handle the stresses placed on it from winching.

Titanium is lighter than mild steel but stronger than alloy, what sort of stresses it can handle I don't know (you'd need to look it up), but would be far better than alloy at least.

I couldn't really see a 25kg? winch cradle lasting too long with at least 4 tons depending on it to hold together, the 3.2ton bow shackles are half an inch thick, 4 ton and larger just get thicker.

[bogged]

that grassy shite all around burns hot and fast tho... it may have burnt past in a matter of 2 mins, but it would do it with enuf heat to leave the cruiser burning behind...

and when it does, although it can burn at a fast rate across a field, its a very low flame with the grass that low, eg low flames, you can easily deal with it, even clear an area of the fuel and stand in it...
I used to know the formulas for working out burn rates on grass fires, but aint done that shit for over 10 yrs now :(

[thehanko]

that grassy shite all around burns hot and fast tho... it may have burnt past in a matter of 2 mins, but it would do it with enuf heat to leave the cruiser burning behind...

and when it does, although it can burn at a fast rate across a field, its a very low flame with the grass that low, eg low flames, you can easily deal with it, even clear an area of the fuel and stand in it...
I used to know the formulas for working out burn rates on grass fires, but aint done that shit for over 10 yrs now :(

Im sure with a 90k firefighting unit on the back of the truck he could protect himself from the flames roaring across the paddock of 3 inch grass.

however were the spring up amougst the trees or dry blady brass etc then... its always alot of ifs and buts with but it could have been worse stories.

Impressive bog though. My rents once managed a simliar kind of thing in suburban sydney, managed to drop 2 wheels into a trench beside the road, council had just dug a new pipe in and when it was refilled it was slop. car sitting on diffs, and the tow truck on the bitumen couldnt drag it out. lots of swearing later and out came a muddy truck. all good fun in hind sight... as long as nothing goes bang while you do it.

But I guess it goes to show just how stuck you can get even when not wheeling hard.

How much would the steel cost needed to make the same mount as you have now in steel?

Rivets wear loose so they really will have to go. they only work through compression, so when they experisnce movement of any kind they wear, losen and fall off.

Awsome idea to fab it all. But i think as with many DIY's. If at first you fail but learn alot... give it another go with what you now know.

Its so rare I make any idea perfect first time - usually it looks like crap and has a fault, then second time round

[mike_nofx]

I couldn't really see a 25kg? winch cradle lasting too long with at least 4 tons depending on it to hold together, the 3.2ton bow shackles are half an inch thick, 4 ton and larger just get thicker.

Not 25kg mate... 2.5kg!!!

[ferrit]

it was the OTHER side of the grassy section that was the problem- the part where i was standing when i took the shot.

Which was the only bit of shade in the area because that was unburnt scrub- 10m from the truck?

And i was on my way back to the tanker for water, so i had about 50L of water in the back of the truck, which got turfed out to make the load lighter!

[lshobie]

Do you have picturews of that hole after you were pulled out? Any piocs of the recovery? That is the worst stuck I have seen - looks like it was being eaten up!

[GRPABT1]

Do you have picturews of that hole after you were pulled out? Any piocs of the recovery? That is the worst stuck I have seen - looks like it was being eaten up!

I agree worst stuck I've ever seen too. Looks like you spun all four wheels on the spot for ages and just dug your way to china lol. But there's minimal dirt thrown up so I guess you just found the perfect soft spot lol.

[ferrit]

I drove into a spring There was NO indication it was there, same dry brown grass everywhere, but as liquid as anything afterwards.

No photos of the hole, we were too busy buggering off to get out of there!

[bru21]

when you are stuck its crazy what it takes to get out. at veiwmont at obc i had 3 trucks doing double line pulls and a tractor on the back of mine. took 1 hr 30mins to get free with the crew digging like mad! drivers seat was the place to be!

[Dirty]

Good on you Paul for trying something different and posting it up for scrutiny. Also good on you for at lest attempting some testing, that is a lot more that some of the keyboard experts out there.

All this talk about people dying is great to try and get your point across. But at long as standard safety procedures and common sense are used while winching, this setup failing is no different to a any rope failure using ARB/TJM/etc equipment.

Granted that it is more likely for this to fail and I wouldn't be doing it on my rig.

I would have also thought for the price that alloy would have cost you, there would have been considerable change from building the same in steel, so the saving $$$ I am a little lost on. Normally if you want to do it on the cheap you build it in steel, everything is always very much more expensive in alloy.

- David.