Attach hook to cable end

[gard]

Be very careful using your connector. It's not as strong as you think. When it fails, it will be your welds that have failed. Keep looking for a forged version of your connector.

Thanks, I am always careful when using the winch, I always assume something may break at any time. Other hazards include tipping the tractor over or getting wacked by branches. The logs don't move that fast when winching them in but if they hit something else it can move very fast. Picture a sapling that gets run over by the log, the top of that sapling can move like a bullwhip.

The side plate of my connector is 3/8 steel, there is total of about 4 linear inches of weld connecting it to the center round piece (like a lap joint). I suspect the connector is 2x or 3X stronger than the other components (cable, end hook, sliders and 5/16 chain).

 

[woodchucker]

the danger is not with anything attached, it's if the cable breaks or breaks loose. Then it's dangerous.

 

[Jake M]

Jake, can you tell me approximately what the drum size is on the winches that uses the 3/8 and 1/2 cables?
My winch specifies 11,200 lb on the first wrap and 4,200 on full drum which I will never have (speced as 262 ft of 3/8). The drum is 3.6" diameter.
Thanks for sharing the experience that the swage wire will soften up some with use.

What's recommended, or what do I see in practice? Half inch rope on a 4 inch drum, pulling through 4 inch sheaves (snatch blocks) IS smaller than what's generically recommended, but it's how we bought a wrecker. Those wire ropes "probably" suffered for that, but it wasn't enough to show through all the other things that happen to a typical wrecker cable. The "beginnings" will undoubtedly take on a heavier "set" when they get trained to the drum, but it's not going to take it away from you or anything when you pull it out.
The common callout for a minimum radius (which includes cranes, and general overhead lifting) is roughly 12 diameters, or six inches in your case. With the overhead component out of the way (I hope), industry does tend to take liberties with that.

At that drum diameter though, and you might have said but I don't remember, have you verified that the new rope will fit in whichever style anchoring feature you have? That might be a deal breaker right there.

EDIT- I almost forgot, in my world that would be rated as a 12000 pound winch, and while there's an exception to every rule, it'd probably come with a mounting feature for 7/16 rope. It's be supplied with 7/16 rope. Very common to install 7/16 swaged rope when the time comes, and many in the business would throw half inch rope on there, simply because it (almost) universally will fit through a 7/16 mounting feature if you trim it carefully enough that you don't have to stuff tape through as well. Backing down to 3/8 swaged rope wouldn't be done. A few "drag winches" in that "medium" class would actually spec a half inch rope, but the boom winches, while there may be some, I haven't seen it..

 

[gard]

The common callout for a minimum radius (which includes cranes, and general overhead lifting) is roughly 12 diameters, or six inches in your case. With the overhead component out of the way (I hope), industry does tend to take liberties with that

Just so I am sure I understand correctly, the drum diameter should be 12 times the cable diameter?

I removed 1/2 inch standard cable from the winch, which is what it had when I bought it used many years ago. I have removed and replaced it in the anchoring mechanism several times (when I switched the wire end for end and when I had it apart for servicing). I do not think I would be able to the 1/2" swage wire into the anchoring mechanism, I am not going to uncoil it and try, hopefully I can get some of my money out of it, if it is unused.

 

[Jake M]

Just so I am sure I understand correctly, the drum diameter should be 12 times the cable diameter?

I removed 1/2 inch standard cable from the winch, which is what it had when I bought it used many years ago. I have removed and replaced it in the anchoring mechanism several times (when I switched the wire end for end and when I had it apart for servicing). I do not think I would be able to the 1/2" swage wire into the anchoring mechanism, I am not going to uncoil it and try, hopefully I can get some of my money out of it, if it is unused.

Drum diameter and sheave diameter both go to the minimum bend radius. The minimum bend radius are not written in stone. IF YOU WERE RUNNING A CRANE, the drum diameter and any sheave wheels would be called out at six inches minimum, which corresponds to my GENERALIZATION of 12 diameters. Most actual rated lifting equipment would actually (probably) use a much larger diameter drum and sheave, as that type of overall use causes very, very little "abuse" of the cable, so the bending fatigue of the cable ( even on "recommended" drums or sheaves) becomes far more tangible during a predicted lifespan. Within reasonable amounts, it's not written in stone. But less bending is better for long life.

Honestly, having used a lot of wire ropes on various types of equipment... That anchoring feature bothers me an awful lot more than having a lower than ideal drum diameter. Makeshift anchoring is prone to sending one of those seven strands out of place over a long distance of the rope, then it won't wind up right, won't hold it shape, doesn't distribute loads evenly over the remaining 6 strands, etc.

 

[gard]

Jake, that is an excellent observation, I have gone down a bit of a rabbit hole on the internet and found US Navy Wire Rope Handbook vol 2 1987, there is a chart that shows rope fatigue life vs sheave/rope diameters (D/d). For example when a rope is loaded at 50% of its strength, the bending life goes from about only 300 cycles at D/d=10 to about 20,000 cycles at D/d=20 and 40,000 cycles at D/d=40 (corresponding to sheave or drum diameters of 5, 10 and 20" with 1/2 cable). (corresponding to 3/8 EIPS cable with strength of 15,100 lb and load of 7500lb with sheave diameters of 3.75, 7.5 and 15"). It seem like it might be possible that with small enough sheave diameters at a given load that a smaller cable will have similar or even improved life. However looking at my retired 1/2" cable I can see some broken strands that look like fatigue failure, others tensile and many many more that look like abrasion and other abuse so here a larger and/or swaged wire will probably help.
If I use the snatch block on the winch, the D/d is only about 8 using 1/2" cable and 11 if I drop down to the 3/8 cable.

Good point on the anchoring, its probably a good idea to always leave several turns on the drum so friction between the rope and drum will result in less force on the anchor of the cable to the drum.

 

[Windy city]

Look up Crosby Terminator Wedge Socket. I wouldnt rely on the holding power of the swaged sleeve on the end of the cable.

 

[Jake M]

Jake, that is an excellent observation, I have gone down a bit of a rabbit hole on the internet and found US Navy Wire Rope Handbook vol 2 1987, there is a chart that shows rope fatigue life vs sheave/rope diameters (D/d). For example when a rope is loaded at 50% of its strength, the bending life goes from about only 300 cycles at D/d=10 to about 20,000 cycles at D/d=20 and 40,000 cycles at D/d=40 (corresponding to sheave or drum diameters of 5, 10 and 20" with 1/2 cable).

Be careful with that. I doubt it's inaccurate, but that is based on two things that might make it misleadingn- A, it's logarithmic, obviously. B, it's based (or biased) towards unrealistic percentages of break strength. Hold on to that thought for a minute...

You've got a cable that without knowing specifics has a break strength way over 30,000 pounds. Probably closer to 35,000 pounds. Rough numbers, 50 percent of that puts you at 15,000 pounds with a 2:1 safety factor. The cable it's self is probably rated at 3 or 4 to one. More likely three, somewhere in the ballpark of 10,000 pounds, if they chose to rate it. If it's meant for logging, they may not have assigned a working load.

You've got a winch that's good for mid eleven's you said, on the bottom wrap? That's 30 percent of break strength with a good margin in your favor.

You've got a winch that is rated with a suitable pulling effort with the cable wrapped onto it, where it's maximum force is far,far less.

In practice, unless you have the wrong winch, even as you pull a hitch all the way in, maximum cable layers on the drum, it's gonna do what you need, right? The load will be WAY less than what the winch is capable of...

Now, back to that logarithmic scale on the number of cycles on their cable,

At 50 percent of break strength, you were in the 300 cycle range. At 40 percent of break strength you've cleared eleven hundred. At 30 percent (kind of where your winch maxes, on the lowest wrap), you at seven or eight thousand cycles. At 25 percent you've cleared ten thousand cycles.

In practice (based on the winch ratings, I've got no idea what your sense of adventure is), aside from some short lived hangups, you're going to spend the bulk of your winching time well under twenty percent of the break strength. So again, that logarithmic graph... If you look at the bottom of the graph lines, they don't connect the dots, they scatter, and in general, they start to head east just under 20 percent... That's where you'll be working most. And your hangups will be on one spot or another in the rope for load cycling purposes, not on a continuous pull (probably a loop) as the graph indicates. So the higher load cycling will be more reflective of the number of times you pull hard on the SAME SPOT in the cable, versus the whole cable wearing.

Bottom line- while that chart appears to be accurate based on my experience, I don't think fatigue is going to be your issue. That's why loggers tend to use oversized, often overrated stuff. Because it gets broken, mistreated, and abused. That cable could be 50 percent destroyed, and still be stronger than your winch.

If I use the snatch block on the winch, the D/d is only about 8 using 1/2" cable and 11 if I drop down to the 3/8 cable.

The break strength on that I think is 18,000 and maybe some change. (You are talking about swaged cable there too, right?). So take the difference in break strength, between 18K and ket's say 32K for argument's sake, run those numbers back up and down a couple of snatch blocks and wind them up on a drum... I'll bet the higher cable wear from a small sheave and drum doesn't look nearly as bad as running a cable at that much higher of a percent of it's break strength.

Good point on the anchoring, its probably a good idea to always leave several turns on the drum so friction between the rope and drum will result in less force on the anchor of the cable to the drum.

Four turns at an absolute minimum, five is a much more common callout in this size range.

I'm not worried about you pulling a rope out of the anchor. That's annoying, depending who sees you do it it could be embarrassing, but it's ALL going AWAY from you, and if somebody's standing over the rope downstream from you (then shame on both of you, but that's another story), it will let go with a force that doesn't do the things that horror stories are made of. It's not strong enough to impart any tangible stretch in the system, so it doesn't store that much energy in the cable. My concern with the anchors is that it collects ALL of the strands in the cable and retains them by some reasonable means. When one of the strands (the small "ropes" that you can see from the outside) becomes unsupported, it will have a propensity to displace from the bundle (the rope), and ruin the geometry that lets these things do their magic. Through a pile of cascading events, it makes a dangerous, weak cable with a lowered breaking point, that IS capable of getting high stretch out of lesser pulling forces... That's the part about the anchor that bothers me. Even though it's low force at that point, it's got to hold the cable together and in shape.

 

[gard]

Thanks for the additional information and experience I have edited my previous post to make it a little more clear.

The shops near me carry a 3/8 standard winch cable, (15,000 lb if its EIPS), and 1/2 inch standard cable (26,600 lb breaking strength). . Between these 2 choices I think I will stick with the 1/2". This seems consistent with what you have seen on the wreckers (1/2 inch standard cable on 12,000 lb winch). The 1/2" is probably a little overkill.

I did break a 3/8 cable once in the woods with this winch but not sure what kind of cable it was (IPS at 13,100 lb vs vs EIPS at 15,100lb). I know I had the winch line all the way out and was pulling as hard as I could. The 3/8 cable was an extension going from the end of the 1/2 inch cable to the tree that was just a little to far from where I could get to with the tractor.

Bishops (lifting.com) has a 3/8 super swage they list with a breaking strength of 20,400 lb available with a choker knob on the end. I think this would be a good choice for me but its pretty spendy by the time shipping is included. Perhaps next time. I have seen some 3/8 swage winch line listed for sale but it has a big hook on the end for a wrecker, I want a snatch hook for the 5/16 chain chokers.

The navy document summarized data from multiple different carefully controlled lab experiments and is intended to show general trends, not to predict actual life where the use will not be exactly the same as the experiment. As you pointed out, this is especially true when the end use wire fails by a different mechanisms not related directly to sheave diameter (logging abuse).

 

[gard]

I finally got the winch back together with new 1/2" standard cable and clutch plates, it is working great. I should of replaced the clutch and cable last year. The Farmi JL501 winch is 23 years old so I guess that's pretty good life. I have pulled out several hitches with 1/2 dozen logs ranging from 8" to 14" plus this one that is 25" diameter and 20' long. I could probably do 2 logs this size at a time but would first fill up the bucket with wood to keep the front tires on the ground. I will modify the Igland hook a little to make it easier to grab onto the 5/16 chain.