SAME BUT DIFFERENT

LOOKING at the specs of each winch, there are only a few technical differences that can make a difference to a winch’s ability to perform: motor horsepower, final gear ratios, drum diameter and amperage draw.

Let’s get one thing straight, a fast winch is not necessarily the best winch! It may be fast in trying to extract your bogged 4x4 from danger in the beginning, but if it can’t maintain that speed due to high current draw (flattening your vehicle battery), cooks your winch thanks to high motor temps, or stalls the overloaded vehicle via high gearing, then what’s the point being fast for a short period? You want a winch that gets the job done, even if it takes a bit more time. So for the purpose of this test, we’ve ignored that quoted-butuseless specification.

When it comes to the horsepower of the motor, generally, the higher the better. It’s like a larger cubic capacity vehicle engine develops more torque than a small capacity version – all else being equal. But, more torque doesn’t necessarily mean faster.

In gearing ratios, the lower the final gear ratio number (eg. 150:1 compared to 268:1) the faster the winch drum will spin resulting in a higher line speed. The motor (or gears) turn 150 times to turn the drum one full revolution, compared to the lower-geared version which has the motor turning 268 times to turn the drum once. So, the higher the number, the slower it works; and the lower the number, the faster it works.

However, the faster the ratio (the smaller the number), the harder the winch has to work and the more likely it is for the whole shebang to stall. Just like labouring your 10-speed pushie up a hill, if you leave it in the highest gear, your legs won’t be able to supply the power needed to keep the pedals moving, so you stop and flop. A lower winch gear ratio (higher number) is slower, but will get the job done easier… eventually. It’s the old story of the Tortoise and the Hare – we all know how that ended.

As far as amperage draw goes, the more electronic power that little 12-volt motor can consume, the faster it will perform, but the hotter it will get and the sooner it will melt or burn something beyond further use. Keeping motor and gearbox temperatures down can only be done via short winching times and long rest times – the correct duty cycle – or perhaps, to a lessor extent, fluting or heat soaks built into the winch casing to help dissipate heat. But once the whole casing gets overly hot, there’s little you can do to cool it all down, other than rest.

An often forgotten specification that directly leads to winch ability, or lack thereof, is the drum diameter. The larger the drum diameter, the faster the gearing (but more load will be placed on the winch). Conversely, the smaller the diameter, the slower the gearing, making winching easier.

It really is impossible for average humans (like me) to calculate the exact final pulling power of any winch when all variables are taken into account.