Manual winch - is it worth it to save on efficiency?
The reason for the fact that many owners purchase expensive automatic winches for countryside areas and garages is not in the desire to get maximum efficiency, but in elementary reluctance to bother. Actually, all the technical progress is based on the facilitation of labor, but, on the other hand, even the winch hand-worm cable force does not take much, not to mention the lever option, and money will save a lot.
The torque in the worm mechanism is created by using the Archimedean screw, and the handle has to be twisted as if you needed to pull water from the well, winding a chain or rope on the gate. In other words, it is primitive, but cheap, and if you use blocks, it is extremely effective. And what, in fact, is still needed? And we need, among other things, also a decent load-carrying capacity. And here the price / quality ratio shows itself to the full.
The cheapest hand winches are of an origin, of course, Chinese-Taiwanese. When buying such mechanisms, be careful, you can be assured that the device picks up up to 2 tons, and even in the corresponding figures are poked on the case, but take a closer look, and make sure that the units are newtons. And this means that the traction force is 10 times exaggerated. In domestic units such dirty tricks practically are not present, and already 500 kgs any of the hoists will fully pull.
How to choose a manual winch for all occasions?
Grapple winches rarely have the proper lifting capacity, they are more often used in the household for small household needs, for example, raise a bag of dried mushrooms or a bale of hay in the attic, or move a heavy loaded cart. To ensure more efficient mechanization in the economy and productive assistance in repair work, devices with a payload capacity not less than one ton are needed. According to many demonstration videos, manual chain with a worm gear is the most suitable for high loads.
However, the chain or cable is not so important, the main thing is that the mechanism itself is reliable, it should be carefully inspected and checked before the winch is finally selected. Independent experts have purchased low-cost devices many times in order to reveal the limit of their carrying capacity, and it turned out that most of the Chinese mechanisms break down already when loaded per ton, although their declared limit is 4000 kilograms.
Depending on the plane in which you need to carry out the movement of the load, horizontal or vertical, choose the winch or hoist, respectively.
Domestic hoists cope with the task better, but are often equipped with poor-quality flexible traction elements. For example, the cable may not be resistant to corrosion, then it will not save even a copious lubricant. When selecting a winch with a chain, carefully inspect it, make sure that the rings are welded securely. Also, you should carefully consider the details of the mechanism - the integrity of the gear teeth of the lever, the ease of movement of the ratchet.
Hand electric winches in comparison with lever
Sometimes it is possible to lift such loads, with which the mechanism can and will cope, but the lever itself will bend from the fact that you will hang on it with all your weight. In order not to spoil useful machinery, it is possible to use electric winches. True, they are much more expensive, but some cars have them according to the factory equipment, and even motorists buy automatic winch with great pleasure.
These devices do not require any effort on the part of the operator, it is enough just to turn the lever to the desired position and the load will move from the dead center. Another advantage is the reverse function, that is, you can both pull up the load, and make slack on the cable, and with a vertical move just drop the object below the .Something similar is possible with the use of some lever mechanisms, for example, such a function has a railway stretch hoist.
However, it will take a lot of effort and time to figure out how to use a manual winch of this type in reverse mode. But if the construction is in full swing and you need to raise the bags with cement to the second floor, there is hardly any time to develop the device, so if the deadlines are tight, take either automation or simpler talisman.