When starting with a recovery offroad, many people jump straight to their 12,000lb winch, this is a good idea as a high torque high powered, quality winch has the ability to pull your 4WD free of just about anything.

Using the unbelievable pulling power of a winch is a good idea, however with the extreme loads put on the motor, gearbox and your vehicles electrical system when your vehicle is sitting on the chassis rails deep in mud the pulling force required is up to 300% of the weight of your 4WD.

Doing some quick calculations, a fully loaded GU patrol with a GVM of around 3000Kg you are looking at up to 9120Kg of pulling force required. This is well in excess of the 12,000lb (5443Kg) provided by some of the top tier winches including the Domin8r X 12,000lb Winch and the Grande MKIII 12,000lb Winch!

There is a simple method to instantly double your winches pulling power, by getting your hands on either the Hercules Recovery Kit you’ll be equipped with the tools that all the pros use!

By setting up your winch with a strong mechanical advantage, you can rig up an 8,000Kgs rated snatch block to double your pulling power to up to 24,000lb of pull this is over 10,800kg of force!

When doubling the pulling power you also half the pulling speed setting up a double line winch pull is as simple as any block and tackle system by running your winch line out to a snatch block pulley, and back to the stuck vehicle and directly to a rated recovery point.

With the decreased overall load on your winch you use much less amperage and drain your battery by much less, a double line pull recovery is one of the best ways to get a heavily stuck 4WD free from trouble!

The awesome thing about using a snatch block is the ability to combine multiple rated snatch blocks to create even more mechanical advantage. By adding a second snatch block and anchor you gain the ability to pull up to 36,000lb of pulling force which is equal to 16,300kg of pulling force this far exceeds the bogging forces of around 300% of the GVM of your vehicle! By pulling with over 16 Tons of force, you can easily free any stuck vehicle.

The advantages of a double or triple line pull are undeniable, but not without perils, there are a few extremely important things you must do to ensure that your 4WD won’t get broken by the forces you are imparting during recovery!

If your vehicle is stuck, it is important before doing anything to recovery your vehicle that you inspect exactly what is holding your 4WD back. If for example, you are stuck behind a rock or a deep mud puddle, you may bend suspension components or steering components and get your 4WD really stuck.

Before undertaking any 4WD recovery in any situation, you must try and make the recovery process easier and smoother, this involves a little bit of elbow grease, but by breaking out a shovel so you can clear the path in front of your tyres to allow your 4WD to roll out of trouble much more freely resulting in less likelihood of damaging your vehicle!

Along with getting the shovel out, when setting up your recovery, you need to consider factors of safety when rigging up your recovery anchors you must think about all the factors of safety that could put spectators or other 4WDers into danger.

SAFETY

For the safest setups when, rigging up your 4WD winching recovery anchor points. The first thing is to look for a stable, and solid anchor point to fasten your winch cable to, this is usually a sturdy tree trunk with deep roots, to make the anchor extremely stable! When mounted to a solid anchor point it is considered poor practice to simply wrap your winch cable around the tree, with the immense forces described above, you can easily ring bark the tree causing it to die.

When choosing a solid anchor you must use a rated tree trunk protector like the one from the Hercules recovery Kits, this not only preserves the tree for future winch recoveries but it gives you a sturdy and solid foundation for which to attach your winch cable that is free to pull from different angles and directions without damaging your winch cable either!

The next rule for winch safety is by only unspooling enough winch rope to complete the recovery, there is no reason to unwind more winch cable than you need. This is where the Hercules Winch Extension Strap comes in handy. By adding an additional 20m of reach for your winch without requiring your winch motor to wind up even more than it is required to!

The natural reaction is to, connect either end of your tree trunk protector together with a shackle, some may even use an additional shackle to attach your winch extension strap. The issue we have here is that we end up connecting metal to metal, this risks the metal components within the recovery system from breaking!

This is where the Bright orange weighted Recovery dampener comes in. By placing a weighted dampener over the top of the metal components of your anchor, you can rest assured that in the case of a catastrophic failure of any sort, the heavy metal components will have both an airbrake and a heavy anchor dropping them to the ground and making the failure, less likely to result in catapulting the metal components dangerously through the air.

Extra pro tips for safer winching;

1. Use the 30 second rule – that means that every 30 seconds of winching along with your Domin8r X 12,000lb winch, you need to let both your winch motor and control box cool down, you should be winching with your engine running, whilst winching as this will provide more amps to your battery and prevent damage. The 30 seconds off will allow your crank battery to recharge a bit and prevent losing too much voltage!
2. Keep your winch line off the ground – by dragging your rope through the mud, rocks and dirt – You will force sharp grains into the core, instantly weakening the fibers sawing through from the inside out – additionally any rocks and sharp sticks cause small nicks in the fibers causing issues when the lines are under tension.
3. Every anchor point needs at least 1 recovery dampener – this will keep safety at the forefront!