Homemade winch: diagram and detailed description

2024 Author: Erin Ralphs | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-02-19 11:42

The winch is one of the most essential tools that every off-road conqueror should have. Indeed, without this mechanism, it will be almost impossible to pull your car out of a ditch or ford. Some motorists buy ready-made winches and put them on power bumpers, while others make them with their own hands.

And if you are in doubt about choosing the right tool, you can try to make it yourself. Our today's article will help you with this.

What could be a homemade winch?

It should be noted that devices of this kind are divided into several categories depending on the type of their design. So, a homemade car winch can be:

• manual;
• electric;
• hydraulic.

However, despitedifferent design, all three types of devices have the same principle of operation. It consists in the following: a steel cable is wound on a drum, which in turn rotates through the engine gearbox or due to the efforts of one's own hands. To understand this in more detail, consider each of these types separately.

Electric winches

Often, a car starter or a cargo generator is used in the operation of these tools. Even such a homemade winch can operate on a separately installed electric motor. In other cases, motorists remake the starter and generator to work in motor mode.

However, whatever the origin of this quinoa, it must have a high torque so that the mechanism can pull a 2-ton huge jeep out of a ditch. And since the main energy for work is absorbed from the battery, motorists install batteries with a higher capacity. However, an electric motor, no matter how powerful, should not drain the battery so much.

Hydraulic devices

The design of such winches is more complex than that of electrical counterparts. Typically, hydraulic tools are driven by an oil pump. Despite their large size, winches of this type have great advantages - they provide the highest possible tractive effort, taking a minimum of energy from the vehicle's on-board network. In addition to SUVs, such home-made winches are installed ontractor or walk-behind tractor.

Hand-held devices

These tools are made in the same way as all the others. However, here the role of the engine is not performed by the starter or the oil pump at all, all efforts are made manually, that is, by human efforts.

The power of such a device directly depends on the physical strength of the operator and the total length of the lever. Therefore, a homemade hand winch is equipped with a rather long lever. This creates maximum tractive effort.

How to make?

The cable drum is the key unit that makes up any homemade winch. The drawings of this device must be as accurate as possible so that the mechanism works correctly and reliably. It’s good if you have such a drum ready, because it’s much more difficult to make it yourself.

How to make your own drum? To do this, you need to take a piece of pipe with thick walls, and with the help of electrodes and a welding machine, attach cheeks 5 millimeters thick to it. It is necessary to attach the driven gear to one of the last parts. The pipe itself is supplied with seats for bearings.

You can make a winch drum in another way. To do this, you need to have several hubs from any Zhiguli or Volga. They should grind a place for welding and attach the halves on a mandrel of the desired diameter in order to achieve alignment of all parts.

Reducer is best taken with a largegear ratio (worm type). The main advantage of such a mechanism is the absence of the need to create a drum brake. Most often, motorists purchase a gearbox from trolleybus doors - it is easiest to mount it on the site.

If you decide to make a homemade winch driven by a starter, it is best to take a model with a planetary gear. This is how the early Zhiguli engines were once supplied.

To create a mechanism with a starter, the first step is to prepare a platform from a metal sheet. It is necessary to weld seats to it, on which the drum shaft will then be mounted. After that, the gearbox is installed here with the input shaft up.

A self-made adapter is mounted on top of the gearbox. We need it in order to install the starter. A gear with a certain tooth module is mounted on the input shaft. After the starter is finally attached to the structure. The final step is wiring. That's it, now such a winch can be put on a car.

How to install a homemade winch from a starter on an SUV?

First of all, you need to determine the exact location for placing this equipment. It is best to fix the winch in the center of the bumper, and on its lower part. If this is an imported SUV with a plastic bumper, then, of course, it will not withstand a load of 2-2.5 tons, and will simply come off the body. Therefore, instead of a plastic one, we put a strong, steel (power) impact element.

Next topower bumper, you need to make a platform of metal plates for the winch. The thickness of the steel sheet must be at least 0.5 cm. Holes are then marked here and drilled with an electric drill.

Now the metal pad is ready to be mounted on the bumper. It is worth noting that the winch is mounted here at the very last stage. First, the plate is attached to the bumper, and then a traction mechanism is installed to it. If this is an electrical device, the control panel is additionally connected to the vehicle's on-board network. The connection with it occurs according to the following scheme - the “plus” is connected to the positive terminal of the battery, and the “minus”, respectively, to the negative. Everything, at this stage, the installation of the winch on the SUV can be considered complete.

What else is this device useful for?

One of the main features of home-made mechanisms of this kind is the possibility of their use not for its intended purpose. This means that a homemade winch on the UAZ can move heavy loads on the plot at any time.

To do this, it is not even necessary to remove it from the bumper (but in this case, you need to fit the car close to the location of the load, which is not always possible to do). Also, a homemade device can help you uproot old trees, stumps or transport logs. Sometimes such a winch is used to move pallets of building materials.

Nuances

However, this tool has its ownrestrictions. Homemade winches are not entirely safe, and therefore not suitable for lifting loads, since they do not have a stopper. However, having made this tool once, you will not be afraid that your iron friend will get stuck off-road. At any moment, a homemade winch will be able to pull the SUV out of the ditch, no matter how deep it may be.