The Vehicle - Up To OverLand Spec

Suspension     To Winch Or Not To Winch     Roof Rack And Roof Tent

This was sort of decided for me as when I found the Land Rover I eventually bought, it already had a winch fitted and they offered it to me at a reasonable price. In my situation knowing that I might be travelling large parts of the overall trip on my own I left it was a good choice. But this is also another hot debated topic between overlanders. From personal experience so far I have had no real reason to use my winch, but it does make things easier when you do something silly. Like try and drive across a river with out wading in first. In that case we used the winch on the vehicle with me to pull me out. But the same recovery could have been none with a long towrope. So in my opinion if you are expecting to be travelling alone, as one vehicle, then a winch is a useful accessory to get you out of trouble when you are really are stuck. But if you are setting off in a group of two or more vehicles I have come across nothing you could not get out of with a long tow rope, shackles, snatch block and high lift jack. But do remember I might review this opinion by the end of my trip!

If you do decide to take a winch then you are left with the choice of mechanically driven or electric driven winches. The mechanically driven options can be used continuously with out overheating, but do rely on the engine running. Eg if you have drowned your Land Rover in a river and the engine had stopped, you can’t use the winch to get you out. I my self have had a few teething problems with the drive shaft to the winch, as I have an engine driven model. The electric ones on the other had are perfectly capable of doing hard recovery work for short periods, but will overheat if used continuously and do drain the battery fast. So a second battery is essential, if not already fitted for other reasons. The added bonus of an electric winch is that I have seen winch mounts that allow you to use the same winch on the back or the front. Thus giving you more options when recovering the vehicle.

But I will say this, when choosing a winch make sure it is capable of pulling the total weight of the vehicle when full kitted up and then sum. As when you add all the equipment, fuel and water up, an overland vehicle becomes very heavy quickly. I think for a Land Rover you are looking for a winch capable of around pulling 3 metric ton.

Other Recovery Equipment

I also decided to carry quit an armoury of other recovery equipment. I have taken various shackles and strops, a long towrope, snatch bloke, high lift jack, tree saw, shovel and sand tracks.

At the moment the sand tracks have seen proper use once and the most useful thing has been the high lift jack. Which I have used to get the Landy unstuck a couple of times, and for general other uses.