Recovery Gear
After the last couple of newsletter articles on recovery points you’ll now have a nice secure set of front and rear points. However, we now need to look at the proper kit so they can be used safely.
Recovery gear is an essential part of offroading and bad equipment or rigging can result in some very nasty accidents, as you can see elsewhere in this newsletter. I’m going to look at recovery gear in two parts; the first looking at ropes, strops and shackles, the second looking at winch gear.
Ropes and Strops fall into two categories; static and kinetic. Basically, static have very little stretch and can be viewed as having a constant length at all times (hence static). Kinetic, on the other hand, are designed to stretch (like a very big elastic band), store energy and use this to recover the stuck vehicle. Kinetic ropes are commonly called KERRs, standing for Kinetic Energy Recovery Rope.
KERRs were originally developed to recover stuck tanks, and the MOD actually forbids their use on non-armoured vehicles due to the damage they cause if they snap. This tells you something about the forces they can generate, and how badly things can go wrong.
STATIC ROPES AND STROPS
As with anything recovery related you have to ensure the rope, or strop, has a high enough load rating for recovering. When a rope snaps you’ve got a lot of energy in there and even though they don’t weigh very much they’ll do a lot of damage to anyone, or anything, in their path.
The forces generated in a static recovery are much lower than a snatch recovery, but they are still very significant. Because of this you should be looking for gear with a minimum breaking strain of around 4 – 6 times the vehicle’s weight. That means, in the case of most Land Rovers you want to look for items with a minimum breaking strain of 8 – 12 tonnes.
Personally I prefer using stops as they have a dual use in winch recoveries, they’re a lot easier to clean and it’s very easy to see if there’s any damage to them. This is very important as a rope that looks good on the outside can often be rotten or worn out on the inside (due to mud not being washed out) whereas any damage on a strop can clearly be assessed by a quick visual check.
However, ropes are generally available in longer lengths, which can be very useful if you are stuck some way away from firm ground (let’s face it – even Will doesn’t get stuck on firm ground that often –Ed).
There are lots of different types of ropes out there but you want to ensure they have sheathed eyelets, as in the picture to the left. Nylon is good material as it’s flexible, hardwearing and has good weather resistance. The rope in the picture is the sort of thing to look for.
Strops tend to use a different rating system to ropes as they normally come from the lifting industry. This will normally be quoted as Safe Working Load (SWL) for straight lifting. This equates to a minimum breaking strain of 6 times the SWL so, for example, a strop with a SWL of 2 tonnes will have a minimum breaking strain of 12 tonnes. Stops will also normally be ‘Duplex’ (i.e. double thickness) and be 2” – 3” wide. As with ropes you want to ensure the eyelets are sheathed as well. Pretty much all 4x4 specialists should be able to supply you with suitable ropes and strops and a lot will be able to sell you a ‘get you started’ kit in a bag for a good price.
KINETIC ROPES AND STROPS:
The first thing about Kinetic gear is that its expensive and, generally, has a shorter life expectancy than static gear. The important thing to remember with kinetic recoveries is that the energy involved is huge and ropes, stops, shackles and recovery points must all be top notch otherwise they’ll fail and the results will be disastrous, possibly lethal.
THE BASICS: RECOVERY GEAR
Also, with this type of gear it is essential it has a minimum breaking srtain of at leat 12 tonnes.
The most readily available kinetic devices are KERRs (Kinetic Energy Recovery Ropes). These tend to come in either 5 m or 8 m lengths. My personal opinion is not to bother with the 5 m ones as they’re less effective (they can’t store as much energy) and there’s a higher risk of the vehicle being recovered becoming very intimate with the back of the recovery truck!
The other thing you really have to think
about with these ropes is cleaning. At the end of every day of use they must be meticulously cleaned, otherwise the mud that’s worked its way inside the rope will cause it to fail very rapidly. Even if looked after properly, you should look to change a KERR every 2 to 3 years.
Kinetic straps, or strops, are rarer than KERRs but, in my opinion, are better for the same reason static stops are better than static ropes. I only know of two companies that manufacture them: Black Rat and ARB. Both of these are very well made and have the correct load ratings. Visually they look very similar to static stops except they are longer and are significantly more expensive.
If you’re looking to purchase some kinetic recovery gear make sure the seller knows exactly what they’re selling; the last thing you want is to end up with something that’s not up to the job.
SHACKLES
This is another very important area to look at, as without shackles you can’t attach your strops or ropes to your recovery points.
Again, you have to ensure your shackles are rated correctly and stamped. Ideally, they want to be bow shackles as opposed to D shackles as they’re usually stronger and cause less distortion to strop eyelets.
You should be looking for shackles with a minimum SWL of 3.25 tonnes (19mm diameter pin). Other common sizes are 4.75 tonne SWL (22mm diameter pin) and
6.5 tonne SWL (25mm diameter pin).
Its important to ensure that all your shackles are kept clean to stop them seizing and that any with bent pins are thrown away as they will fail, and that gets very messy! Again, most 4x4 specialists as well as chandlers can normally supply the correct shackles. However, the important thing is to ensure they’re rated especially if they’re not coming from a 4x4 specialist as many companies stock non rated shackles and they’re not up to the job.
CHAINS
We are not talking about any old chain
-chain designed for recovery is made differently to chain for other jobs, and as such using a piece of old chain you found lying around is a complete no-no.
Chains are not used very often -they used to be used to extend winch lines or when using a Hi-Lift jack or hand-winch for winching as they don’t stretch.
This means they should not be used for
anything other than a steady pull from a winch, as shock load from even a gentle tug will transfer directly to the vehicle and either break a recovery point, the vehicle, or the chain.
In general, very few people even carry a chain these days as a strop is almost always the better option, not to mention being cheaper and safer (and lighter to carry).
The club does not recommend you use a chain for any recovery, full stop.
The last thing to think about is how to use your recovery gear properly. Jon’s article on page 40 shows what can happen when a recovery goes wrong. So, if you don’t know what you’re doing just ask a Marshal (it’s what we’re there for) and if you see someone doing something you think isn’t safe, please speak up - you actually might save someone’s life.
Will Warne
FURTHER READING
A goldmine of information on recovery is at:
http://www.pirate4x4.com/tech/billavista/Recovery/index.html