Battery light while winching

robx251

robx251

Caught the Bug
Yesterday while I was out wheeling with the group I go out with doing a long uphill pull in deep snow and I had to reset the line twice. Halfway through the last winch pull my battery light came on and stayed in until I shut it off and started it back up again.

I did check output while light was on it was at 14.3 volts. Has anyone else had this issue or is just because I overworked it for too long or is it something more serious coming in the near future as far as an alternator goes?

I do have a hundred thousand miles on it now. Also my free school doesn't work so well so I did have to winch the line out and back in.
 
Prolonged winching can drain a battery, and if you aren't careful, can strand you. As far as I understand there are multiple solutions, including dual battery setups, or some kind of high idle mode. I know that the AEV Procal had a high idle feature.

Also, winching both in and out uses the brake on most winches. Winching out puts unnecessary wear on the winch brake.
 
That sounds right to me. What size and brand battery do you have? How long were you winching at a time? You can step up the throttle but depending on that load coming uphill on the ground in the snow, you may have to let it rest a bit in between.

Spooling out draws current too, just not as much. If it takes you 5 minutes to spool out that still a draw.

I have a dual battery rig with a 500A solenoid switch on a spod. That way I always have a fresh starting battery in case the primary goes low, and can dual batt winch for sustained runs.
 
OK so I did just want to make sure that it was because of the long draw on the winch. I just have a standard lead acid battery on it. 34 series with 850ca 690cca not sure on the rc

We had plenty of other people around with jump cables and boost packs. But I will take more brakes next time.

Also as far as the winch out, I can't free spool it. Too much drag. If I were to use my jeep to pull a dead one out I can pull out out by backing out to on free spool just can't by hand.

Thanks a lot for the info and ideas.
 
MattMc said:
Prolonged winching can drain a battery, and if you aren't careful, can strand you. As far as I understand there are multiple solutions, including dual battery setups, or some kind of high idle mode. I know that the AEV Procal had a high idle feature.

Also, winching both in and out uses the brake on most winches. Winching out puts unnecessary wear on the winch brake.
Click to expand...

^^^^ This, The harder the Pull, the More the draw, even as deep as 800+ amps. They also generate a lot of heat, so breaks between winch pulls is also recommended...
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top Bottom