12V Electric Winch With 50' of Cable

1. Is it possible to mount an automotive electric winch 50 feet away from the battery? YES

Since you did not include the amperage required by the motor, your question can not be answered.

You wrote: Since you did not include the amperage required by the motor, your question can not be answered.

Really? You have the voltage, and you have the HP. What else do you need?

wareagle's right. But, I'll add that you can't oversize the cable too much. 50 feet is a long way so I'd use welding cable. I hope the vehicle has a good alternator. Watch the duty cycle. WELDING CABLE AMPACITIES SINGLE CONDUCTOR Carolprene® Welding Cabl

The manufacturers only want you to use their cable to keep someone from splicing in other cables and possibly causing problems or hurting someone (liability issues)

You might describe the rig a little better.

How are you mounting the winch?

What are the amp draws on the winch?

Conductors are rated in ohms per foot (or more usually per thousand feet). The supplied 12 feet of cable (6 feet each way) will have some ohms. Select your 100 feet of cable (50 feet each way) so that it has equal or less resistance. Then it will work just fine.

Smiling............

I just want to thank you and all the other guys for your input.

I can know move forward with comfort.

Sincerely,

Roy

Lynlynch, mjb

Why would you want to use welding cable rather than RHW, THHW, THW, THWN, XHHW, or USE?

The op did not say where he was mounting it.

Because that's what popped into my mind. As MJB said, it's flexible.

Nothing more.

I'd not try it. A 1.1 HP motor takes about 90 amps at 12 volts, so it's like running a hundred amp service. If you really must do this, then use #3 copper or #2 aluminum to avoid a serius voltage drop and concomitant loss of function.

Russ Bixby, geek of the plains

Don't be silly,, the voltage drop with 3/0 welding cable is going to be less than 1 volt, the winch motor will run quite happily.

If the winch is mounted on a metallic framed vehicle, is the frame sufficient to be used a one conductor? Similar to how most front mounted batteries are wired to the starters/altenators on metal framed automobiles. Use the grounded side of the battery and ground the unswitched side of the winch as one conductor. You may have to use short jumpers to go from one member to another in certain places of the ground system but it is certainly cheaper than twice the length of #0 or larger welding cable.

THHN, THHW or other similar electrical wire will also work if it is sized the same as the welding cable. The advantage to welding cable is that it is composed of many more smaller strands of copper and therefore much more flexible and easier to bend or fish through structures. The advantage to the electrical wire with its larger and fewer strands is that is substantually cheaper if it doesn't require much "muscling" to get it into place.

Good Luck

Until now, I also thought that THHN would be cheaper than welding cable. A couple sites I just checked had a slightly lower price for 3/0 welding cable ($4.35/ft), with 3/0 THHN at (4.95/ft).

If that is consistent across all wire vendors, welding cable would be the cheaper option !?

I think you are correct, welding cable is generally not so heavily insulated.

Martin

The OP does not say wether the winch will be mounted permanently @ 50 ft away. Why not just take the vehicle and/or the battery to the job? Much simpler.

Why not mount the battery close to the winch and use the shorter, supplied cable? The wire used to charge the battery can then be much smaller as it will not be carrying the high motor current.

Since we've moved on from answering the question originally asked, why not use a manual block&tackle or come-along and discard the battery, wire, and winch, altogether? Lowest cost, no pollution, and no (well maybe some) toxic waste

Thanks to all of you for your time and information.

I have purchased the welding cable and beginging the installation. I'm alot smarter now!

Roy

Yes of course you can.

I work in meters but 50 Feet does not sound much.

The cable provided is only rated for a 2 meter cable run.

The cable is basically just a resistor and if you use this size cable on a 30 meter run it will be under great stress as it will drop a lot of voltage and possibly the insulation will melt.

I think 1.1 HP (American units.) is about 0.7- 0.8 KW Hours so rate your cable for this.

If you tell me the current draw and voltage it will be an easy calculation for gauge of conductor.

See post 6, also forget KW hours it is an irelavent quantity.