Fastest Electric Winch vs Fastest Modified PTO

A PTO (Power Take Off) is a mechanical gear box that is attached to a truck transmission ,  these PTO can be used to powered hydraulics or even a winch directly.  Shaft connect the PTO output to another gear reduction gearbox at the drum where Industrial or loggers PTO normally have a ratio from 45:1 up to 150:1 for slow speed and increase pulling power. For a normal 4x4 truck winch the ratio normally around 30-35 is to 1. From the sound of the ratio , we can tell that the winch is basically very slow even slower than some electric winch.

A modified version of the PTO was born out of 4x4 competition in Malaysia, The gearbox powering the reel drum was replaced with IFS differential modified to couple to the drum. The Toyota Prado 90 7.5 inch IFS differential are the most commonly used in this application. The stock ratio of this differential is normally 4.11:1 that will be at least 7 times faster than the normal PTO speed. If the engine is not powerful enough , re-gearing can be done easily with plenty of aftermarket gear. The construction differential make them very tolerant against stress. Due to the speed of this winch , it has a few nickname to it - "Winch Hantu" or ghost winch as hantu is a Malay word for ghost. It is also known as the "Winch of God" as no other winch till now can match its speed and strength.

Its use is accepted in major international competition in Malaysia, thus creating an unfair advantages for local team. But kudos to the officials whom had been trying hard to balance this out by introducing rules regulations and competition format but let us put this aside first as this is not what we want to discuss in this topic.

But until recently the speed gap between electric winch and this modified PTO winch has been narrowed. Electric twin motor winch has been popular recently and with over-volting (that is supplying 24V to a 12V motor) the speed can increase significantly. Red Winches from the UK even came out with a motor that can produce higher rpm thus improving the speed of the winch even further. Although there is still a difference in speed compared to the modified PTO currently but as technology improves the gap might actually be bridged.

There are pros and cons for both type of winch which we will discuss further in our next post.