ATV Winch Cable Keeps Breaking When Plowing Snow - Solution!!
Вставка
- Опубліковано 23 гру 2020
- The winch cable & synthetic rope kept breaking while I plowed snow with my ATV. This video shows how I solved the problem using a leaf spring, a piece of flat steel, a pulley and a few bolts.
Music by Joakim Karud - • Video - Навчання та стиль
Simple, cheap, and easy to do as it was mentioned in the comment. 2 1/2 tow or tie down strap with metal hook a the end.
Cut strap at about 8-9' remove old winches cable, take a 4-5" piece of duck tape stick half on your strap , run your tow strap through fairleed tape strap to winch roll then winch cable in then voila. That strap will never break again. Been running this for 2 years now not a single fail.
I like the way you try to make do with simple things to find. Nicely done.
If you're thinking the rig in this video is not the solution you were looking for, check out what other viewers have posted in the comments below. Some great suggestions and ideas have been provided! 1- year update: I have tried some suggested alterations to my rig, but I have returned things to exactly as shown in this video because it works without any problems, where other modifications came with some kind of issue or another. UPDATE 04-03-23: Another brutal NW WI winter, pounded with snow for 4 months straight. Rig-up (as seen in this video) is still performing well.
Genius idea. I love your creativity. It sure is an excellent solution.
looks like it works great! Good job.
I spray my blade with non stick cooking spray, to help with the slush sticking
Great job! I've been looking for a similar solution, and your way to address the issue with a leaf spring on the front rack is idea inspiring.
I think the ATV Snow Plow industry has a problem without a viable permanent solution. Yet.
Your video is much appreciated. Thank you for posting.
You're welcome Eric! Thank you as well for the kind words and for checking out my video.
Try silicone spray on the whole blade if you have issues with buildups. Once silicone is on it will stay extremely slippery for a long time.
Pretty cool
Job using what u had on hand to fix a problem. Very inventive 👍
Thanks!!
GREAT JOB !! I going to make 1 ASAP & THANKS for info
You're welcome Phillip 👍🏻👍🏻
I put a broken fishing pole sticking out front so you know when to stop raising it
Great choice!
I used a pulley like u did and a cable stopper.
Good solution. Another option is to put a switch on the plow that electrically cuts the winch raising too high.
That's a really good idea. One I hadn't though of.
I like the idea, and I am going to use it on my machine. The only change I plan to make, is that I will have the pulley lower, so the angle of the rope between the pulley and the fairlead won't be as extreme.
Thanks, that ought to work well. If my pully hanger bolt were longer, I'd have used it that way, but fortunately it hasn't given me any trouble with the rope at that angle.
Nice idea. Seems to work for you just fine. Merry Christmas and God bless.
Good idea
I think Richard Miller and "M B" are on the right track. Unless my knowledge of simple machines is worse than I think, you're not getting any actual mechanical advantage by having the pulley fixed onto the spring -- you're just changing direction of the applied force. And, perhaps, you don't mind because it wasn't a design goal. All that said, your use of the spring as a shock buffer and an "all the way up" indicator is brilliant!
If you feel like trying out a pulley relocation, I think you'll find that although each life & drop will take more time, it'll work even more smoothly, and put less stress on the winch and the whole setup. Please let us know if you do, I'd love to see how it works out!
Thanks and will do! It's worked as good as I had hoped so far with 3 separate snowfall events the way it is now, but I am going to try attaching the pulley to the plow and attaching the winch line hook to the leaf spring- the next time it snows. If that doesn't happen until next winter, I won't complain!
@@UncleBucks "Won't complain" ... boy howdy, did I hear that. I'm in WI and where I am, we're getting creamed with snow this winter. I've had enough!!
That's the idea, to pull the plow straight up in stead of pulling it up at an angle. Straight up is applying so much less stress on everything.
I kept breaking a rope too. But what I did was buy a cheap winch mount it to my plow and didnt use the rope I used a seat belt on the winch and have plowed all year no problem. Just unhooked the leads off my existing winch and run them to the plow winch so I didnt have to change my switches or run more wires into the cab. Drop the plow and hook the leads back to the old winch. The seatbelt works great and doesnt ball up and rob the wich of power.
They have quick disconnects for winches, amps, and forklifts. Buy the smaller version and some wire. Attach the plugs on the winches and put the harness one in. Now it's plug and play.
Very nice!
Great idea! I had the same problem where the cable kept breaking. I had a strap used on boat trailers which is about 2 1/2 inches wide and a little less than 1/8' thick that already had a hook on the end.. These straps have great tensile strength. I cut it down to about 5-6 feet and used duct tape to hold it onto the winch "drumr". I then rolled up the boat strap so it had many layers on top of each other. I have been problem free since.
I am thinking I may do something similar to what you did to change the angle of the strap going into the winch, thus lessening the load.
Thanks! The wide strap sounds like a very good solution as well. I do like being able to have a long line on my winch in winter too though for other occasional uses, but the wide strap is a much simpler approach to the issue. The leaf spring flexibility in my set-up has really been working well. I tried putting the pulley down on the plow but the rope kept binding in along side of pulley wheel, between it and and pulley wheel housing, so I went back to hanging the pulley from the spring. Works flawlessly this way... so I'll not mess with it anymore.
The 2000 lb. Winch on my UTV, just tore the end of the strap right off.
This position awareness comes with experience. I love the ingenuity, but the cable stop product is a good solution. I really think this not an issue as we get through the first couple storms.
I had a cable stop product initially. It worked ok but not perfectly. The cable would still rip on occasion. It came off while I was plowing at night one time. I found it two summers later in the ditch.
@@UncleBucks good point sir, I had the same happen to me as well. Plowing with an ATV is an adventure in repairs and modifications :)
Yes it certainly is!
the magnetic one?
I ended up using some 1/2 inch iron water pipe that I had laying around, to make the support for the pulley system. I made a "T", with the long 2 ft piece, (the equivalent location of your spring) attached to a 2 ft piece of crossing pipe , secure to the mounting rack. I wrapped the pipe with hot water insulation foam, and for the front support, I placed a piece of 1" X 3" board on the front of the rack, and secured both the board and pipe to the rack. I mounted a double pulley at the plow, and a single pulley on the front of the pipe.
I threaded the winch cable through one of the lower pulleys, then up to the upper, single pulley, back through the second lower pulley, and secured the end of the cable at the end of the 1/2 inch pipe. This slows down the rate at which the plow moves, making it much more controllable. It also reduces the load on the cable, to 1/4 of the load of the original setup.
To indicate the height of the plow, I am going to attach a foot long rod vertically at the top center of the plow, and I am going to mark the upper and lower limit of the plow on the rod wrapping electrical tape at the two points on the stick, so that the marks are easily visible from the driving position.
I am all ready for the snow, so that means that we won't have any snow this season. :-)
Using more than 1 pulley is something I hadn't thought of. Good idea! I've tried relocating my 1 pulley down on the plow but my line would bind up in it once in a while. Went back to how I did it in the first place (as shown) and it's performed flawlessly for two winters now. Good luck with yours & thanks for your comment.
@@UncleBucks I'll know how well it works after this season. The cable fits tightly in the pulleys, so there won't be a problem with binding. I forgot to mention, that I removed the hook, and just secured the loop by slipping it over the end of the pipe. I have the hook stored under the seat, so it will be readily available when I need is.
I stuck with the winch cable for now because I wanted to have the winch available if I need the winch for other purposes, such as dragging logs.
tie a rope around front rack, put pulley on plow. then loop from your winch, out to your pulley, then up to your front bumper rope. the angle of your rope has too much pressure and friction on haus, try a roller with a larger bottom roller to help reduce wear out. if need be and you have room, you can add a extender to the pulley to lift it higher away from the the bottom of the plow, less angle and less stress on winch, rope and fairlead. enjoy plowing.
Thank you. I did notice another video of a method similar to what you described. That'll be my "plan B" if this rig up doesn't hold up. So far, so good though!
cool. my utv magnetic cbl stop would be perfect here but the hook dangles so added a thimble.....so ur rope broke just by over winching a bit? hmmmm
in order to keep your Blade so it won't pack snow on it and make it HEAVY ??? Spray it Liberally with W/D40, wet or dry.
I sometime put diesel on my blade! Helps with snow sticking!
Good to know, thanks for the tip!
Hi Brett, good video, great idea, I wanted to ask you how your ATV battery holds out when you plowing ?? Do you have any issues draining your battery? Thanks
Hey Joe! This is my 3rd winter using this rig-up, including some very heavy and wet snow the last few days. It still works flawlessly. It hasn't created any issues with battery drainage, but I am always using the winch when the wheeler is running.
Simple Canadian solution,undo that rope and take one of those cloth fishing rod protection and cut it to about two feet long.
Take that short piece and slide it over the winch rope.the liner keeps the rope from fraying and wear...your welcome.
If you install your winch properly with a 30 amp power breaker the rope will not break!
Thank you for commenting. My synthetic line came with a sleeve like you described. It was awesome at binding up real good in the winch. I fought with it many times but eventually got fed up and eliminated it. Interesting tip on installing a power breaker. Never heard of that...
Put the pulley on the plow, not the leaf spring. solve angle issue?
I tried this but the rope jammed up along the wheel in the pulley that way because the pulley twell. The side when the rope is slack. The angle of the rope is not the problem. The problem is the winch overtightening and ripping the rope at the tie spot on the hook. The pulley is back to hanging on the spring once again and working well.
My cable snapped so I thought, why not ratchet strap. So i fed a 2 inch wide car grade strap into my winch and it works great.
Someone else mentioned that also. I think it's a great idea!
I have a 10,000 pound, 2" wide recovery strap (Black Friday price, $12) that's just waiting for the day that my synth rope is worn out. Even if that snaps, it's long enough for 2 or 3 uses! :-)
@@floobertuber i have a synthetic rope in my storage but i don't like fixing stuff that works.
@@Grandamse1 I don't blame ya!
Try the pulley where you have the hook and the hook where you have the pulley
I agree! Attach the pulley to your plow and run the hook to your brace. That will give you a mechanical advantage of 2. The winch will use about half the force to lift the blade, but the blade will also move at half the speed. I have wide tow strap wrapped around my rack. I attach a pulley to the snowplow & attach the winch cable hook to the strap ends. My plow lifts very smoothly & easily. This is a different ATV & plow for me this winter, but I haven't had any cable issues so far. My former set up had a manual lift. My plan B was cutting a long, wide tow strap in half & use half of it wrapped on the winch to lift my snowplow. Someone already mentioned that, too!
I tried this but went back to my leaf spring contraption here with the pulley hanging from the leaf. My problem wasn't the angle of the rope or the location of the pulley. The problem was when I winched up too far, it kept ripping the knot out right at the hook. The leaf spring being able to bend has proven to be the best way on my rig. I have not ripped a knot out with it yet after dozens of times plowing with it this way.
If your winch line went straight down to your plow there would be way less stress on your winch line and winch. Using the spring and pulley system works but your over thinking the problem. My winch line on my plow goes straight down to plow. So far no issue. I use 3/16” metal cable line. When it starts to fray I just shorten the cable before it breaks.
My winch cable (3/16") used to go straight down to the plow as you described. The stress on the line was when the plow would be lifted up as far as it would go, the winch would overtighten just a little each time it topped out, until eventually the cable ripped out. So, digging that backwound cable out of the winch when its dark and blowing and cold got old quick. Perhaps my winch is stronger than others. It would rip that cable right off before the winch would run out of power. Same thing with synthetic rope. Put up with that for a couple years too. At least it was easier to regularly re-tie synthetic line v.s. cable. Digging that frayed end out of the winch wasn't much more fun though. Perhaps I didn't explain my problem very well in the video. I needed something to reduce tension when the plow tops out. I've tried many other methods before this, not over thinking it, that did not work. I've not had to re-tie my line one time in the two winters after dozens and dozens of plow sessions with this set up, so it solved the problem, at least on my rig. Thanks for commenting.
@brettmoravitz hows it holding up Brett?
I've plowed a half dozen times this winter, each time taking 45 minutes going constantly. It's working very well and I haven't had to make any adjustments or tweaks to it.
Or just use a roller instead of the hawse fairlead for plowing. You dont use enough line to worry about snagging the corner of the roller. And the roller will spin and not wear the line like a hawse......
I had rollers on there when I had cable on the winch. The cable still frayed and broke often, but I never tried the roller with the synthetic rope...
@@UncleBucks warn makes a wide 66 inch plow strap but I’d only use it with a roller fairlead.
Seems like you’re making 4 additional fail points to fix one . Never had a issue snapping line with a roller fairlead , a rubber winch line stopper , and eyeballing the height
Glad to hear that way works for you. I had a rubber winch line stopper which helped some, until it came off and was lost in the snow. It's tough to eyeball the plow blade height when the entire plow is under the snow - often the case when it's fluffy snow.
Could have saved you all that Maria Monroe get your PVC pipe get you another one that's smaller that can slide into the bigger one run your PVC pipe the small one all the way to your plow when your other piece of PVC pipe to the front bumper of your ATV UTV whatever it is put a mark on it when the blade is down when you raise the blade then more comes up to certain point on the PVC pipe showing you the blades all the way up
A video demonstration of this would be fantastic!
Spray your blade with cooking oil and snow won’t stick to your plow as bad. Just a suggestion
Pam, or one of the other cooking sprays, works really well. I used it with my snowblower, and of all the solutions, it worked the best for me.
Fluid film?
USE A 10,000 LB WINCH STRAP. MY CABLES WERE FRAYING THEN BREAKING PUT A TOW WINCH STRAP GOING ON 3 RD YEAR NO WEAR AT ALL. DO NOT LUBRICATE THE STRAP!!! ROPES ARE JUNK!!
Spray the blade with silicon before use it will help the snow to not stick works on snowblower shoots
Great suggestion and something I hadn't heard of before. Thanks!
I plowed snow with a wire cable for 10 years with no problem. I fell for the marketing hype and put on a synthetic rope and it breaks EVERY TIME I use it. I am going back to a wire rope.
Synthetic rope is probably the biggest scam ever presented to the consumer.
I had plenty of trouble with both, but synthetic was definitely problematic. Thanks for watching and commenting.
The angle of your plow cable is too much. The winch is trying to pull the plow in towards the ATV, when it should actually just be lifting it straight up. The cable should attach to the plow directly below the winch. I used to break a lot of cables, until I changed the cable mounting point on the plow's push arms. You want that cable as vertical as possible. Notice how your new mount is now lifting it straight up rather than pulling it in toward the machine. That is how the winch should be, lifting not pulling.
I bolted a piece of metal across the push arms on my plow and then attached an eye bolt directly below the winch so it now lifts straight up.
My mount solved the problem. Haven't ripped the winch line once yet, and it is the third winter now in-use. There wasn't much of an angle directly from winch to plow before I built this. My problem was overtightening. It was tough to see/feel when the plow was all the way up when it's snowing and blowing and dark. For me, this mount creates some forgiveness from winch line overtightening. Thanks for watching and commenting.
fellas nvr use an argo 6x6 to plow they suk!!!!!!
This hurts to watch. The hole time I’m thinking hey, this guy gets it, he is going to reduce the angle out of the winch so it doesn’t fray the cable over the fairlead roller... genius !
But as I continues to watch, yelling at the laptop I’m like “ hey you idiot instead of softening the angle you actually created a sharper angle but in the opposite direction”
You need to flip that frown upside down Bruce Jenner. Flip that leaf spring so it hangs lower so the cable comes straight out and doesn’t strain and wear over the small fairlead roller. So close to a great idea... so close.
You mean the "whole" time? The line kept breaking because of winch overtightening, and not being able to see it. Good job with the name calling though if that makes you feel better about yourself.
when you inevitably roll that machine, that piece of spring steel will end up sticking through your body somewhere. don't do it
I certainly appreciate the word of caution and hadn't thought of that danger. My yard is flat however, so rolling my machine would be extremely unlikely, especially with a plow on it. I've had 15 winters of plowing with this ATV here without incident. If I lived in hilly country, I'd certainly reconsider. Thank you for commenting.
@@UncleBucks I’m in northcentral Pennsylvania. Never heard the word “flat” before. I’ll bet it’s related to the word “flatlander,” which we do know all too well 😄 Be safe and thank you for the interesting video
That’s a horrible job
Wasn't going for looks but it functions rather well.
@@UncleBucks I think Wazzer means plowing snow is horrible. Some of us love plowing. Others, not so much.
@@kthompso43 oh, that makes sense. I didn't mind plowing snow at first but after decades of doing it, the fun has worn off! Going south for winter is sounding more and more like the way to go for each passing year.
I'm going to try your way on my brothers Razer. He breaks winch lines on a regular basis. and I have a bone yard of junk car's with perfectly good spring's to salvage!
I have lived in Minnesota for 70 years and I used to plow for a living ( 16 years at a service station and 28 years for a major MN. city) I am looking for a place in South Texas where the locals have only seen snow at the mall in the form of Snocones!
I use a 89 Bronco with an 8 foot Western plow or my 1845C Case Uniloader if thing's get really rough. Nice plowing with a heater and radio playing!!
Good luck with your rig. Hope it lasts for many years!
Spray pam on the front of the blade snow should not stick.
Sounds like a good solution. I'm going to give it a try.