By Bill Burke

Bill Burke is an internationally recognized professional 4WD trainer. In 1991, Bill and a team mate represented the USA in the Camel Trophy. The event traversed Africa in a 1200-mile grueling off-road adventure competition. Through his company, Bill Burke’s 4-Wheeling America, he teaches off-road and back country driving techniques, vehicle maintenance, recovery, and trail etiquette through group classes, private training, and guided experiential vacation trips. Bill conceived and developed the International 4-Wheel Drive Trainers’ Association©, an organization to evaluate and certify professional 4-wheel driving trainers and has created several instructional DVDs including 4×4 Safe Driving, Getting UNStuck and Getting PREpared. For more information about Bill visit www.bb4wa.com

Most companies that purvey recovery equipment, winches and hardware do their best to ensure safe operation by offering us quality, rated items. Selecting the correct equipment for the application can greatly reduce equipment-associated risks. Ratings such as those of the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) were created to provide quality information to help us navigate this task and make sound decisions. Unfortunately, there has been a lot of mis-information in the recreational 4WD industry regarding safety, work limits of equipment and capacities of recovery hardware, which serves to undermine the safety of the 4WD community. Below I will lay out some terms and try to dispel some myths about some of the recovery equipment we use when out there in the field.

Roller Fairlead versus Hawse Fairlead:
Roller fairleads are easier on all ropes, wire or synthetic. Besides better straight-on winching, they enable off-angle winching by rolling with the rope as opposed to dragging against the Hawse Fairlead. According to the American Rope Group catalogue: “High temperatures can be achieved when… running over stuck or non-rolling sheaves.” A Hawse fairlead is a “non-rolling” sheave. Off-angle winching with a Hawse Fairlead creates friction that damages all ropes, wire or synthetic. Friction creates heat, which further damages synthetic ropes. In my professional opinion there is no benefit to Hawse fairleads; I always choose Roller Fairleads and I suggest you do too.
Occasionally I hear the argument that a Hawse Fairlead is superior to the Roller Fairlead because ropes can get wedged in between the horizontal and vertical rollers. Yes, there are those that have let the rope (wire or synthetic) get caught between the rollers. It takes a very rare set of circumstances to initiate this event, usually involving a winch vehicle on its side. On the few occasions it has happened to me, I have just put a winch glove in that area between the rollers and run the line over it. You only need to winch with the glove wedged there until the vehicle settles and the rope runs properly over the rollers again, which usually occurs after only a few feet of winching. As these circumstances are so rare and the solution is so easy, this scenario should not dissuade anyone from choosing a Roller Fairlead.

When synthetic winch line first hit the 4WD industry, critics found it heat sensitive for the planetary winches on which it was installed. Planetary winches can generate great amounts of heat when winching out. So lowering your buddies down Surprise Canyon Trail, returning from Panamint CA, could damage the rope. Given what we know about how friction damages a rope it makes no sense to winch out any longer than to slacken the rope. Add a Hawse Fairlead and rope damage, especially over time, is a given!

As I see it, the problem here is incorrect winch selection. Planetary winches are a poor choice for winching out for long runs under load for two reasons: First, dragging the drum brake creates heat and second, the drum brake only holds 60% (at best!) of the winch’s rated capacity. It is quite possible that the drum brake in a planetary winch will not be able to hold the full rated load, especially on a steep grade. This may allow the winch to “unspool” and can be dangerous. This higher than desired winch out rate also affects the integrity of the motor and/or drive-train. So if you need to winch out under load, select the correct type of winch.

If you winch out for reasons other than to slacken the rigging or for short lengths, I suggest choosing a Worm drive winch or a spur drive winch, such as the Superwinch Husky or the External Brake style winches like the Superwinch EP models. If you do select a planetary winch, make sure to monitor the heat build up of the motor and drum whenever winching out since the internal brake of a common planetary winch is always dragging when powering out. This also generally causes the motor to work harder. Something easily noticed when winching in or out.

When to retire your rope:
The decision of when to retire a working rope is as much an art as it is a science. Of course the goal is to use the rope as long as you can, cutting down your rope expenses, yet retire it before it breaks! Yeah, but when is that going to happen? There are no definitive rules or industry guidelines to establish when a rope should be retired. There are too many variables involved to calculate that figure. Factors include: Load history, bending radius, abrasion, chemical exposure and time in service. As you can see it pays to take care of your rope by avoiding unnecessary wear so it will continue to safely take care of you for years to come.

When synthetic rope is put into service the outer filaments will quickly “fuzz” up. This is the normal result of these filaments breaking and it is actually a good thing. The roughened surface forms a protective cushion that shields the fibers underneath. One of the Amsteel Blue winch ropes that I have been using for over 10 years (call it a long term test) is very fuzzy indeed. With all the training and ‘wheeling I do, I typically use this rope 4 times a week and it still “tests” well within the limits I put it under. Like I said before, take care of your rope and it will take care of you for years to come. It is more important to replace a wire rope before failure than it is to replace a synthetic rope before it breaks. Any guess why? Wire rope generally is made of different grades of Plow Steel, which can have an elongation factor of about 20%.

Yes, your winch line can elongate almost 20% under load. When a wire winch line breaks it releases a great amount of energy. The force of a breaking wire winch line can easily kill someone. Amsteel Blue synthetic line has an elongation factor of less than 1%. Synthetic winch lines stretch less and thus release less energy when they break. They are much safer than wire, but should still be treated with respect. Remember to always follow proper winch safety procedures. Both types for rope should be inspected regularly.

Rope Tips:
It is important to maintain enough wraps on the drum when winching, as the resulting friction is what actually keeps the rope on the winch, not the attachment on the end. For synthetic rope we generally want a minimum of 8 wraps on the winch drum. With wire winch line we can go down to 5 wraps as the metal bites into the drum while the synthetic rope tends to slip more. Visit www.winchline.com site for some good ideas about attaching synthetic rope to the winch drum.

The mounting position of the fairlead relative to the winch drum is also important. Make sure the middle of the fairlead is even with the lay of the rope on the drum, so the rope pays out centrally. If the fairlead is too high or low, the rope coming out is forced to bend around the fairlead. This is to be avoided. Bending any rope over a short radius under working loads causes premature wear as the inner rope fibers are compressed and the outer fibers stretch. Wire is more affected than synthetic rope because of its inconsistent diameter. You can minimize this damage by increasing the diameter the rope has to bend. As you can see, it pays to use a large pulley block and a large diameter Roller Fairlead.

Most winches are “under-wound.” That is the rope pays out from the bottom side of the drum. Make sure when you install a rope that it goes on in the correct direction. Industry standard is 10% of the rated winch capacity is needed to “set” the rope. It is always best to use your vehicle as a “dead weight” for enough resistance to wind the rope and stretch it properly for initial installation. Drag the brakes lightly for the first two layers then ease off for the final layers. I suggest doing this at least once a month.

When initiating a pull for winching start by winding/stowing the rope on the drum with at least 40 or 50 pounds of resistance to “dress” the winch line properly before applying a load to it. This will help set the tone for the first two layers. Pay it in “hand over hand” do not let it slide through your gloves!
For more technical information on ropes and recovery equipment, I recommend the American Group’s Rope Catalogue, The Wire Rope Corporation of America’s Wire Rope Handbook and the Crosby Group Inc.’s catalogue. Also the US Army has a great handbook for recovery and rigging standards FM 20-22 if you can get your hands on one! [And of course if you are looking for a DVD on the subject we recommend Bill Burke’s movie Getting Unstuck. – ed.]

I’ll try to bust some other myths in the next column. Take care and see you on the trail.

Vocab:
Below are some terms for you to use during your rigging exercises with your buddies. Knowledge is power!

Static Load: The load resulting from a constantly applied force such as winching or using a Hi-Lift Jack for winching. When using a chain or metal device, the load should be static not dynamic. Dynamic Load: The load resulting from dynamic movement or inertial force.

Like a yank strap or rope, when pulling a buddy out of the mud or sand. This creates a shock load to attachment points and equipment. Fatigue Rated: tested to a minimum standard of 20,000 cycles at 1.5 times the Working Load Limit (WLL). This is an industry standard as set by the Euronorm for fatigue. One of the reasons we recommend that a winch and recovery equipment be minimal rated at 1.5 times the GVWR – gross vehicle weight rating – “minimal” for sure!

Test: a test applied to a product solely to determine injurious material or manufacturing defects. A very good reason to use products with rated nomenclature clearly marked on them or on sewn in tags. Check out the Crosby Product catalogue and trust Rovers North to Offer only the highest rated equipment.

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