Tmax winch controller ground smoking, and what is time limit for pull? (1 Viewer)

[brider]

I applied load to my EW11000 (think that's the model) winch this weekend, pulling a telephone-pole type log across flat ground to a dry area where I could cut it up.

I used pulls that I was afraid were too long; 15 sec, maybe 20 sec, and the winch pulled fine, but the small black wire that comes from the controller box (mounted to the front bumper, and it was a wireless setup) and goes to the underside of the motor case (4 other heavy-guage wires; 3 to the power/in/out post on top of the motor, 1 to the battery +) started to smoke severely!

Q1: what is the purpose of this ground? To provide ground for the solenoids inside the box? Why should there be THAT much current that it should start to smoke the insulation?

Is there something else I'm missing? I was going to rely on this winch to pull a larger tree (in sections) out of a gully.

 

[greentruck]

The wire that smoked sounds like a control line to the wireless base of your wireless control system to the solenoid pack of the winch. Sounds like it was cut or otherwise grounded, shorting it out? Does that make sense?

Do you have an old wired controller you can use to test to see if everything else is good? It sounds like the remote system was shorted, so is most likely toast, but the winch and its solenoids may be OK.

As for a 15 second pull or whatever...
Monitor the heat of the winch motor for best results. There are lots of variables in different winching situations, so a hard number can't be recommended, other than to take frequent cooling stops. What counts is how hot the motor gets. Be careful or use gloves, it gets hot fast, but keep putting a hand on or near to track how hot it gets. Best to stop and take cooling breaks when it gets hot.

And for pulls that are more than easy jobs, use a snatch block to reduce the load on the winch. It takes longer but is generally safer for you and easier on the winch.

 

[brider]

Never thought of using the wired control instead of wireless, if that little ground wire is specific to the wireless function, that may solve the problem. But I'll still need to find out why it's happening.

During the smoking action, the wireless controller still worked fine. No smoking until the winch was activated.

I was assuming the smoking was coming from excessive amperage from winch load going thru the wire. I suppose I could disconnect the fat power lead from the motor, then actuate the solenoid pack alone and see if the wire gets hot then.

 

[greentruck]

Whatever it is is either shorted by grounding or was miswired from the get-go.

Is this the first time the winch was used since install of the remote, assuming the only wire fried was between it and the solenoid pack?

If so, then that's where I'd look for the problem. Never installed a winch remote, probably not too complicated, but the first thing I'm thinking is that something is backwards there, because that would be all too easy for me to do

 

[brider]

Discovered my problem (I think):

Yes, when in doubt, READ THE MANUAL!

The Installation instructions clearly state to ADD a BIG, FAT ground wire from the same motor ground that the little black smoking wire is attached to, and attach the other end to the battery - post.

Duh.

So there IS current from that post, and it needs to be grounded back to the battery (or theoretically, a good chassis ground). The single little black wire was carrying all that current.

I'll make repairs this weekend. Thanks for your .02!

 

[greentruck]

Ouch, yeah if the winch power was grounded only through the wireless remote sense(?) wire, that would account for the smoke. Your power ground needs to be at least the same size cable as the hot side.