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Advice on synthetic rope fairleads

On the comp trucks with the mid winch they often only have a circular fairlead. The winch cables spool to the outside of the drum on them.
 
I wouldn’t worry about it too much Rich. I appreciate the neat and tidy approach, but if you spool it like a garden hose or maybe a cable drum (in your instance) it can pull in under tension and it can be a bugger to dig / pull the line out again.
The dyneema tends to flatten as it spools IME so maybe less jamming than with a cable.
If you find you can’t rig it to pull straight, then keep a close eye on it as it bunches at one end, you know I’ve just busted mine by being careless, and I’m not on my own doing this.
In a way, the fairlead not going to the extreme would / should assist it feeding better if your winching at a n angle, at least there’s somewhere each side of the static feed point then.
Just my thoughts having done a bit of it. One thing, when you’re stuck and need the winch when alone, you’ve usually spent 1/2 hr or so trying other things, you may be on a 1:3 slope, heaving open the door a dozen times again gravity, your slipping and sliding on mud laden boots and getting knackered... that’s when you (me, I) tend to make mistakes, so the neat-and-tidy aspect tends to go to the bottom of the to-do list.
You’ll have to run it all off again to wash up properly when you get home, so that’s when OCD can be allowed to kick in :lol:
Don’t be lazy and leave it full of mud, but who am I to tell you that mate, I’ve never seen you in the slightest be untidy :lol:
 
Seen those, they are very smart looking. But I can say from experience that I've never had a winch with a less than full width slot that has ever spooled the end of the drum. Can't say how they achieve that Stu. There used to be a whatsit that you could fit to the winch that moved the cable back and forth. As we've said it's really only aesthetics because when you're winching under load the cable goes where it wants. You supposed to lay the unused winding on in a zig zag to prevent biting but I've always found that I run out of room on the drum when I do that.
 
The whatits are a spring loaded plate that fits to the back of the winch that stops the cable from going anywhere else then alongside the coil before it. N3ver had one on a 4x4 but had them on both 60ton winchs on the recovery truck I used to drive. Unsure how these would work with synthetic rope.
 
On the comp trucks with the mid winch they often only have a circular fairlead. The winch cables spool to the outside of the drum on them.
I think the winches are some way down around the bed of the truck with the ring a good 2 foot or so away. Gives the cable a very shallow angle to be able to swing back and forth. Mine will be pretty close.
 
Under stress the rope will find the least path of resistance , it will fall alongside the last turn , until it reaches the side of the drum , a fairlead the ropes thickness to narrow encourages an immediate return to the path of least resistance and so under stress it should promote a tidy left to right and right to left stack - surely .
 
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Under stress the rope will find the least path of resistance , it will fall alongside the last turn , until it reaches the side of the drum , a fairlead the ropes thickness to narrow encourages an immediate return to the path of least resistance and so under stress it should promote a tidy left to right and right to left stack - surely .
This was one of my thoughts Shayne. :thumbup:
 
Sorry guys it simply does NOT work like that. Ever. The only time that rope lies neatly on a drum like that is if you lay it on by hand. Steel cable tends to lie a little more orderly under tension if it's very straight but synthetic rope does not. It just climbs over itself.
When you are winching, remember that its very rarely a beautiful text book pull. Any amount of sideways angle and the rope will stack up. It most certainly does not wind itself along the drum following the last coil.

Getting to be a bit pointless this I admit but if I was to try and add up how many meters of winch rope I'd pulled over the years it would be quite a lot. Pulling something onto a flatbed recovery truck with steel might just go OK but then there's not really a fairlead issue there. But an off road recovery with plasma - not a chance. This is why so often on a pull you have to stop, freespool a load off, lay it on by hand and start again. I have seen winches burst their tie rods on a pull where the cable simply stacks up in a heap and exceeds the diameter of the spool.
 
Back when I used to use a winch more often I always thought a camera watching the winch drum, that the driver could see whilst sitting in the drivers seat, would have been very useful. That way the driver would be able to see when the rope was winding on unevenly and building up to a dangerous level, and then stop to freespool off and re lay, before resuming winching in.

The camera introduces an increased level of safety, as no one would be tempted to be in the danger zone trying to keep an eye on the winch.

Technology has moved on since then, and this may be more achievable these days.
 
Winch-cam. I like it Scott. Might even get it's own programme on Quest! Heaven knows it would be more interesting than some of the stuff on there.

Actually really easy to do with the availability of reversing cameras nowadays. Mine comes through the sat nav screen when I press the little camera icon.
 
Agree with your above post Chris
Unless the conditions are perfect the winch rope cable or synthetic very rarely spools on nicely. Even on a relatively straight pull.
 
Hopefully we can test all this stuff at Lincomb. We can have a prize for the most neatly spooled rope.
 
Mate I am not going to win that prize for sure
 
Under stress the rope will find the least path of resistance , it will fall alongside the last turn , until it reaches the side of the drum , a fairlead the ropes thickness to narrow encourages an immediate return to the path of least resistance and so under stress it should promote a tidy left to right and right to left stack - surely .
I wish someone would tell my winch this..:)

If I'm out of the vehicle it can sometimes be persuaded a little with my foot, but any sort of angle, ime, it does what it wants.
 
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