First vid was no big deal. Flat area so the winch was not moving a major load To get it to shore. Either option would have worked. I probably would have gone with the winch too just to save getting my strap wet.
Second vid the Winch is not a bad Idea. In fact with the limited area it was probably the better choice. I don't think the Jeep would have had enough traction to pull the dead K5 up the hill with no real area to get a rolling start. Also the speed needed with the K5 going backwards it could have got out of hand REAL quick and possibly result in the K5 on its side.
Now he made a really bad choice in how little cable he had out. That winch, if it was the factory cable on it, had between 100-125ft of cable. He only had 30-40ft out when he was at max load. That K5 would be around 5-5.5k. So he was exceeding the winches rating.
Yeah yeah that just confused a few of you ...Some of you are going to say "but that was at least an 8K winch!" Here is the reason he exceeded the winch rating:
A Winch is rated max pull on the first wrap on the drum. He was on the 3rd wrap and the extra diameter reduces its max pull to around 4-5k depending on what the winch was rated. That is why he was having problems and then overheated and burned up his winch. He should have backed up more to allow the winch to be on the bottom wrap OR he should have double lined it. Either option would reduce load on the winch. He should have also allowed the winch to rest and cool. The duty cycle at full pull is only 30 seconds or so.
Here is the specs on the M8000...one of the more popular winches with the people on this site.
http://www.warn.com/truck/winches/src/M8000.shtml
The third wrap single line is rated 3900lb.
Now look at that vid one more time.....Just where the hell was he pulling that truck to in the first place?
The winch truck was sitting where the disabled truck needed to be. There was a clear spot 30feet back allowing for enough room to get that K5 to the top of the hill on one rig double lined.
It is best to rig and make sure the disabled vehicle will stop in a safe place. Stopping on that hill to re-rig is NOT safe. The K5 probably wasn't running so no power assist. NEVER trust a Parking paw or a parking brake on that steep of hill. That Winching operation is best served as a bad example of how to winch. It was just plain bad planning and not knowing the equipment.
If you ever get in the position where you have no choice but to make multiple rigs on a hill it’s a good Idea to use a recovery strap to a fixed object to make sure the vehicle is not going to slide when the cable tension is removed when you rig to the next winch point.
