I like it, I would approach it in a similar fashion.

It's satisfying to spend a lot of time and money on a mod AND use it! First trip out with winch & bumper, and I used it.


My system worked great: popped the hood, turned on master switch for winch, connected control wand to interior port, ran out and attached winch cable, and ran the winch while idling in 4Lo and it pulled it right to solid ground. We didn't go much further as the entire trail was icy slushy snow and only getting worse.

But the winch and electrical additions worked great to pull me out. Nothing got hot or sputtered at all for about a 30-45 second continuous pull.

I bought this Bulldog Winch 500 Amp Shut-Off Switch for my cut off, I haven't seen many Toyotas using it but it will be part of my configuration.

Bulldog Winch 500 Amp Shut-Off Switch - Metal Housing Bulldog Winch Accessories and Parts BDW20248

I'm a firm believer of better safe that sorry. A simple addition such as this should give the end user electrical cutoff control should a problem arise. Great add on.

The increase goes to all of the mechanical components in the system, not just the anchor point. The anchor, the hardware at the end of the cable, the cable, the winch, the mounting components of the winch, and where the winch is mounted (you could have bullet proof mounting of the winch to the bumper and crappy welds between the bumper and the frame).

I've seen a winch destroyed on one of our brush trucks (it was due to negligence...luckily no one was harmed, maimed, or killed!) that broke the winch cable, broke the gears inside the winch, broke the winch mount and bent the bumper of the truck.

This phenomenon is a huge consideration in the rope rescue realm. Setting up Z-rigs or 4:1 and 5:1 mechanical advantages means you really have to watch what your multiplied load will be compared to the breaking weight of your rope, as it is incredibly easy to destroy your rope with 1 or 2 people pulling when you have enough mechanical advantage. Obviously the weight of a rescuer and victim plus the associated equipment on them will not overcome the rope rating, but you absolutely can do this when setting up complicated rigging for rescues.

Not to mention hos much more cable or rope they will take, and how little movement you get...a 4:1 mechanical advantage will move the load one inch for every 4 inches of rope/cable slack that is pulled.

I think we can all agree that vehicle recovery is just a dangerous business, no matter how you slice it. Whether it is using an electric winch, come-a-long, tow strap, chains, etc.

Maybe I'm missing something with the fuse sizing.
Every electrical circuit I've worked on has always been sized the same way for fuses or breakers.
You take the wire size and protect to the amperage rating of the wire.
That way you get the minimum amount of nuisance tripping or blowing fuses and it'll pop on a short circuit.
I would be annoyed if the only thing that stopped me from getting out of a hole was an undersized fuse because I hadn't tested the winch at an extreme recovery. Just because it holds in flat ground in snow doesn't mean it'll hold in a mud hole or on a steep slope after ten minutes of intermittent winching and everything getting hot.
Please correct me if I'm wrong and let's try to stay civil.

This is my understanding as well. However, different types of fuses blow differently. So that aspect needs to be considered. Here is a chart for an ANL style fuse for example:


Their actual amperage blow amount exceeds its written rating by quite a bit. Almost double for multiple seconds. My thought process was this: how many seconds are you going to be maxing out a winch? And then when you start thinking about how long 5 seconds actually is, you may realize it's unlikely you'll max it out very frequently for that length of time.

The other thing to consider: an electric motor will pull whatever amps it needs to do the work. Period. It will literally destroy itself or burn up wiring to accomplish the job. (Watts=amps X volts) so however many watts of power it needs to consume for the job will dictate the amount of amps it pulls. I've sized my fuse so that the fuse will pop if I'm nearing the amperage rating for the winch. Meaning: I have a telltale if the winch is at or near its upper limit. So it would be unlikely I would suffer catastrophic electrical opponent failure.

I'm also not a hardcore wheeler. I don't do crazy rock crawling stuff up insane hills. So I know that my winch won't be having to do an extreme amount of work repeatedly. Winches don't come with fuses for a reason. I understand not putting one in. I would still suggest a big fat kill switch however. The idea of having a winch or its solenoid short out and continuous run with no way of stopping it is terrifying to me.

After looking at the chart I'm not sure what to say really.
It looks like a 35 amp fuse will allow over a thousand amps to flow before burning out so where do you draw the line?
I'll be sticking with the time tested and industry accepted way of determining fuse size, determined by wire size. There is just no way a double ought cable is going to fry before the fuse does.
I cannot guarantee what, where or how I may get stuck and need the winch to get out and don't want to limit my abilities with an undersized fuse. Maybe a little log bridge collapses and leaves me in a steep creek bed. You never know what's going to happen.
I tend to think of others as well, if I come up to a crash and someone needs to get recovered from a ravine or a deep mud hole then my system will be able to deliver maximum pull. How disappointing would it be for your 9 thousand pound winch to only pull 6 thousand before popping a fuse?
And please try this if you don't believe me, the more strain the winch sees the more amps it wants. Put a fifty amp fuse in it and see what it'll do, not much.
Real world, not charts and graphs since it'll be used in the real world. I would be very interested in seeing what pull your winch develops before blowing the fuse.

Edit: don't forget that start surge can be pretty high, that's why electrical motors have capacitors. High discharge rate to start turning the motor.

To each their own, do what makes you feel safe and comfortable. I just personally don't understand why anyone would limit their ability to self recover or recover someone else.