To help find things that I want to check out at SEMA, I always head out to the new product display showcase. And, while I was there, I came across something called a Rescue Winch made by a company called, Smart Winch. Now, I have to say that I was intrigued by the fact that it was essentially a sophisticated pully system and without a motor. Looking on one end, I could see that it even had a 3/4" drive on it but couldn't figure out how it worked. So, I went down to the special Overland Experience at the back of the West Hall to talk to these guys. And, what I found was interesting - essentially, their winch worked by processing rope. This as opposed to wrapping it around a drum and so, your 10,000 lbs of pulling capacity is always constant. You don't loose pulling power the way a normal winch would as the rope builds up. However, and it's a BIG however, their winch is manually operated only and with a BIG ass breaker bar. There is no gear reduction in their unit so you cannot use something like an impact wrench to drive it.
After talking to them for a while, they asked me if I was an overlander and I said, well, I do go camping in my Jeep but my rigs don't look like what most of the ones on display look like. After a chuckle, they said commented on how I was probably more of a rock crawler and that they get how our rule is to "never wheel alone". They then said that I needed to understand that the rule for "overlanders" is to "always wheel alone" and that something like their winch is a perfect tool for self recovery. You know, why use a regular powered winch when you can get a workout using this thing.
Without googling it, any guesses as to what this thing costs?
After talking to them for a while, they asked me if I was an overlander and I said, well, I do go camping in my Jeep but my rigs don't look like what most of the ones on display look like. After a chuckle, they said commented on how I was probably more of a rock crawler and that they get how our rule is to "never wheel alone". They then said that I needed to understand that the rule for "overlanders" is to "always wheel alone" and that something like their winch is a perfect tool for self recovery. You know, why use a regular powered winch when you can get a workout using this thing.
Without googling it, any guesses as to what this thing costs?
