I think this is likely the case for self recovery in technical, but not not sticky / tacky terrain. And for most of us this may well be the most common situation.
But my study also caters to a greater audience - there are folks who use winch for extended self recovery, AND others, in deep "boggy" terrains, such as mud bog and deep snow. Compound it with a disabled vehicle, and you're often in for a long and hard pull.
This is a prime target for power and efficiency. Without looking at the graphs, few people would think a snatch block on a stock 8274 would let them pull faster, AND use less power. A 100' pull in a mud bog that would other wise destroy a battery (or burn out a motor), can be done with relative ease.
I do agree that when the winch is near the rated capacity, a double line pull can be more efficient.
I still question if it is worth it, and ultimately more efficient in the end....
#1, you have to know what the pull load is going to be. We don't have a way to do this yet. And we don't have a way to do this without rigging the winch in the 1st place.....other than guessing.
If you're stuck hood deep in a mud bog, you can guess the load is going to be pretty high, but you could also guess that there might be a stump or hidden rock up against the front axle. It won't matter how hard you pull, or how fast, if you haven't properly evaluated and prepared the recovery. This could also include having to pivot the vehicle or trying to winch backwards.
As I mentioned before, double lining the winch also has drawbacks that need to be figured in.
-The distance you can reach is halved. If your making a long pull, you may have to re-rig which costs time, complexity, requires more than one anchor, and exposure to mechanical physical injury.
-The no-load winch speed is halved. So if the vehicle can help, the chance of over-running the winch goes up drastically. If you lose tension on the line you can also jump the pulley on the snatch block which is never fun.
-The chance of damaging the line goes up. Both lines are now moving relative to the vehicle. This exposes more of the winch line to more damage.
Personally, I am going to default to a single line pull unless I have trouble. In my experience, this is going to work the majority of the time. Rigging the vehicle up and trying to pull (perhaps recording line speed?) is about the only way to know what the load is actually going to be. There is going to be a 'feel' component to it also. I've had a snatch block, and enough rigging, to effect a double line pull in my recovery bag for a long long time. I honestly just don't find myself using it for double line pulling. I do commonly use it to redirect a single line pull for a more advantageous angle when recovering other people. I wouldn't leave it out of my bag.
In the end, this is a good thread. I appreciate pushing people to expand how they think about vehicle recovery.
I just have a different opinion.
