Did you know that an Adventure Kings Domin8r X 12,000LB Winch is one of the best value recovery tools on the market and has to be one of the cheapest types of off-road driving insurance that you can buy. With literally tons of pulling power, and easily installing on the front of just about any 4WD in your driveway, you can quickly unlock sections of track that otherwise seem to be unreachable or not even worth trying.

The confidence inspired by having a winch fitted to the front of your 4WD will change the way you drive, but with the money spent, and the Domin8r X winch fitted are you getting the absolute best possible performance out of your brand new 4WD Winch?

Here are 4 expert tips to making sure your winch works first time – EVERYTIME, these tips are sure to earn you a beer or two on the tracks!

1.Thirty Second Rule

This one is an oldy but a goody, the thirty second rule means that no matter what type of recovery you are undertaking you ensure that the winch uses a 30 second duty cycle – that is 30 seconds on and 30 seconds off, the 30 seconds of pulling is generally long enough to recover your vehicle from the toughest circumstances offroad. If no the 30 seconds of down time will allow the winches motor, clutch and wiring too cool down whilst the battery generates a bit more charge.

This rule will stop you from burning out your winch on the tracks, with constant running potentially overloading your winch and preventing you from getting out at all!

2.Respool your winch cable

When smashing a tough recovery with your Domin8r X winch, it is important to make sure that you respool your winch rope, particularly when there is a mild lateral load on the winch.

When the winch was spooling in, it will generally wind up the winch rope tight against one side of the spool drum this can be okay, but what can happen is the winch cable gets bound up and prevents the winch from spooling in or out.

There is a simple trick here, is to unspool your winch cable more than it was during the recovery, and respooling it all the way back in, making sure it is being fed center on to the fairlead. This will ensure that the next time you need to recover your mates, you’ll have no trouble.

3. Don’t drag over rocks!

The synthetic winch rope included on the Domin8r X Winch is in a lot of ways, tougher than steel, stretch resistant, floats on water, doesn’t splinter, wont rust, and also stores next to no energy, meaning in a catastrophic failure is much less likely to crack like a whip.

Not only is the Synthetic winch rope found on the Domin8r X Winch a lot stronger than an equivalent size of steel cable, the synthetic winch rope offers over 12kg of weight savings when compared to the old fashioned steel cables, which when counter balanced out the very front of your vehicle can actually make a difference to your vehicles handling, and tyre wear.

It’s not all roses and rainbows though, the new synthetic winch cables do not stand up too well to sharp rocks and being dragged over sharp edges, for this reason where necessary you should re-divert your winch rope using a shovel handle or your rated Snatch Block out of your recovery Kit, to ensure that your rope doesn’t contact the ground when under tension!

4.Up the RPM’s!

If your 4WD is fitted with a locking hand throttle, it’s a good idea to up your RPM a few thousand RPM to ensure that your alternator is working at its most efficient. When operating your winch, at its highest capacity it can draw a whopping 430 amps of power, that is enough to kill even larger capacity starting batteries in just a couple of minutes, so by keeping your RPM’s up, you allow your alternator to provide the energy your winch needs to get you out of trouble.

Although your winch will still drain your battery, employing the thirty second rule, and keeping your RPM’s higher, you’ll be able to drive out of nearly anything!