Thread: Pto winch

The army style gear driven type with built in clutch is better as it doesn't rely on shear pins for overload protection. However, they are soooo much harder to come across, and thus pricier. Would be easier buying one with vehicle attached at the auctions...
I take it your County has a 4 speed gearbox? The army type won't fit the transfer on a 5 speed.

At the moment I have a chassis with a motor in it and haven't yet decided on which gearbox to run.i went to the army auction and the cheapest 110 with a winch, that had been rolled went for over 2600.i like the sound of the inbuilt clutch in the army pto but do they still have the brass bolt where the driveshaft bolts to the winch like the maxi drive unit?

How do the clutches work on the army style ones?who built the army pto?

Regards Brett

Hi Brett, I had a Thomas PTO on one of my previous Landies which was 4speed it was the one on the back of the gearbox, I broke the rope with it and the shear pin didn't. ( rope was old ) but it is 1000% better than an electric. I currently have a thomas electric on my county now, have got the pto fot the 5 speed just need some time to put it on. They take a bit more time to put on but well worth it. The 5 speed pto are alot harder to find though I just happened to be in the right place at the right time. With the gearbox if you are putting a V8 in it I would go the LT85 but Isuzu would go LT95 as the Isuzu was know to kill the LT85 but was fine behind the V8. I have a worked 4.4 EFI Leyland V8 in mine and Dad has a works 4.6 Rover V8 in his and they take the horsepower of those engine well. Tim

re: your comment about one being faster than the other.......they are both controlled by what gear you select and what RMP the motor is running at. i am unsure of the diferances in gear ratios but that aside they would both winch at the same speed

i don't recall seeing a shear pin on the military...........many atime the clutch kicked and stopped me wincing which was annoying.....fixed by putting the t-case into low so that the tyres spinning would reduce the load which would allow the winch to start operating

i have a PTO fitted to my five speed on a 95 defender.......some say they are useless if your motor is not running, i sometimes wonder how long an electric will run without the alternator.......the good part about my PTO is you can operate without the motor i.e. with a crank handle

i have only used mine twice.....a self recovery out of a creek bed and to assist two cars over a bump on a hill climb

what i like is the control over the winching speed

good luck in finding a unit

have you consider hydraulic PTO that M R Automotive ....this would be my choice if i didn't have the PTO, the only downside the the hydraulic oil tank

Thank you for the information, I now have no worries about the pto handling the torque. I have an Isuzu but plan to put the lt85 behind it as I have plans for a msa gearbox later down the line.

I'm trying to set up my county so that if there is electrical failure I can still get home without the need for electricity, so the pto winch is idea.i have thought about the hyd set up from mr auto but I'm trying to build my county on the kis principal (keep it simple) and the hyd set up with valves, compensator and hyd tank is a bit complicated/ expencive for the amount of times I'm going to use it.

I've put an ad in the wanted section but no luck yet?

Could you please tell me more about your crank handle for you pto?where did it attach? Which type of pto did you have?

Regards brett

mine is a thomas.......9000 i think

you can see the crank handle thing poking out under the cradle.........i must get around to making a crank handle

to be honest if you are trying to KIS
-put in the MSA from the outset and have the best gearing for the ZU
-and then plonk in a 12ooolb sparkie winch with two batts in parrallel.
Job done.

S

Do all Thomas winches have the hand crank or was it an opt?

I don't understand how the sparkie winch would be any simpler in operation or reliability then a pto winch'the pto is variable speed and only requires the engine to be running to operate or a hand crank lever.it only take one wire to break or not earth properly and the sparks stop.

How far could you winch out of a bog with two batteries and no alternator?

Regards brett