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It was raining pretty good last night here in the
Pacific Northwet, and I decided to pay a visit to the Winch doctor's hut in the
woods. He was busy in his secret underground machine shop working on some secret
project, and told me, "Sorry, eyes only. Need-to-know basis only, you know what
I mean..." then he winked, and said "You'll find out soon enough, it will
revolutionize everything! Too bad they stole my motorized scooter idea.." He was
starting to rant, and I wanted to distract him So I asked , "Hey doc, what sort
of battery should I get to run my winch? He held up his thumb, squinted at it,
and read from some really tiny print,
Rule O' Thumb regarding winch
batteries:
1 Size matters. Get the biggest, heaviest battery
that you are willing to carry from the car to the launch zone. At least it
should weigh the same as your winch, so when you carry them both, your arms will
have a balanced load, and you won't walk in a wide circle...
2 If you can get someone else to carry it,
disregard the above.
3 The F3B folks have
specific limits, namely, "275 Amperes, DIN, or 310 Amperes IEC, or 460 Amperes
SAE, OR 455 Amperes EN, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera..."
4 If you are going to fly all day with no charger
on backup feed, I suggest deep-cycle marine type. These are rated in "minutes of
reserve"
5 Regular 'car batteries' (usually rated in CCA)
work great if they are freshly charged, or kept on backup feed. They really
suffer if you suck 'em down low, but they can dump the current faster for
snappier launches.
Oops, I think I wasn't supposed to tell
you that..."
I asked him about what brand I should get, and he
tells me "If your LongShaft has "Real Balls", you need a big
Trojan."
"Yeah, I know," I said, "I get that all the
time..."
"I mean your winch motor, Mr. gutter-mind!" He
scowled at me, "Trojan batteries, in the maroon case."
"I wish they'd pay me to say that, but NOOoooo! To
think how many sales I've sent their way, they would toss me a free battery or
something..."
The Winch doctor was beginning to rant again,
so I bid him farewell and went home through the rain. I suppose I will have to
wait till next visit to ask him about the urban legend about putting your winch
battery on bare concrete being bad for it.
Doug
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