We’re getting to the colder months of the year, that means if your 4WD is a mud pig, its time to blow off the dust, and get ‘er warmed up and ready to hit the tracks!

Whilst it’s easy enough to whack a 2” suspension lift on, add some mud tyres onto your 4WD and call it good, but do you truly know what it takes to get your 4WD further offroad when the rain starts falling and the tracks turn to squelchy mush?!

As always when you hit just about any offroad surface, dropping your tyre pressures just the right amount can make the difference between getting there, getting stuck, or breaking things on your vehicle!

To drop your tyre pressures accurately you can simply attach your Kwiky Tyre Deflator directly to your tyres valve stem and release all excess air pressure in a controlled and accurate way, this allows you to gain additional tyre traction on the soft stuff and easily increase your vehicles surface area, allowing your 4WD to float over the soft stuff.

Usually dropping your tyre pressures would allow you to get through most offroad obstacles, however if it isn’t enough, you may need some serious offroad assistance.

If you have managed to get your 4WD bogged in the soft muddy tracks, generally attempting a snatch recovery comes with increased risks, not commonly found with sand recoveries. As the suction forces applied to a 4WD buried in mud are massive and unpredictable.

When the huge shock loads are applied to your vehicle you can require a force in excess of 300% of your vehicles gross weight to pull it free, which is often much higher than the components used in a snatch recovery, dramatically increasing the likelihood of breaking your recovery gear. Not to mention the unseen underwater obstacles like tree branches, and the end of the puddle, all potential things that can hang up on the underside of your 4WD and break suspension steering and brake components along with all of the electronics usually routed through the underside of your 4WD!

This is why a reliable winch like the Domin8rX 12,000lb come in, giving strong and stable controlled pull at your fingertips, with the added ability to use a snatch block to double the mechanical advantage giving a whole 24,000LB of potential pulling force to get you free!

Employing a winch recovery to free your vehicle can be a lifesaver when you are in the middle of nowhere and find yourself flicking mud up your sides and all over your windshield, but safety must always be considered, so pay close attention and we’ll walk you through what a typical winch recovery looks like!

1.Setup your recovery anchor

When needing to get your 4WD free from trouble, you need to identify a strong anchor point, this is usually at the base of a strong rooted tree that is preferably the largest tree around in a direction that is immediately in front of your vehicle, this will ensure the maximum pulling strength and prevent your winch from binding up by spooling on just one side of the drum!

By using a rated tree trunk protector you will be able to safely take the full pull of the winch, keeping in mind that the less amount of metal you use in your recovery setup the safer everything is as there is less mass to catapult in case of failure.

2.Unspool your winch cable
Your Adventure Kings Domin8r X is fitted with 26m of 9.5mm synthetic winch rope, which is buoyant, easy on the hands and in the case of it breaking doesn’t store kinetic energy like the steel cables found on traditional winches.

To unspool your winch, simply release the clutch handle by rotating it 90°, this allows the winch drum to free spool, pull out as much cable as you need (and maybe just a little more) to prevent excess respooling later and fasten your winch hook directly to your Tree trunk protector from your Recovery Kit if possible.

Always cover the metal component of your winch recovery setup with your recovery dampener, this will prevent any failures from ending in catastrophe by acting as an air brake and by keeping any flying components low and away from your melon!

3.Lock the clutch back in
Rotate the clutch handle to re-engage the winches clutch mechanism this means the powerful 7.2HP motor is now engaged with the gearbox and is able to drive the winch rope!

Plug in your winch controller, and you are ready to go, with maximum power at the touch of a button you will have absolute power during nearly any winch recovery with this setup.

When winching always keep in mind the 30 second rule, which is 30 seconds of winch operation followed by a 30 second break in winching, this will allow your winch motor and brake to cool off and prevents overheating!