jericho Posted May 13, 2007 Share Posted May 13, 2007 Had a great time at the Challenge Southwest 2 day event a fortnight ago. However,Darren Tucker,driving an nice looking Ibex was not so fortunate - after recovering from two broken front half shafts,his Mile Marker decided not to play. It appears the flange on the drum gave way due to some appauling welding at the manufacturing stage,and then shattered the motor end casting. The machine weld on the drum looks not to have penetrated the flange at all. The winch was 4 or 5 years old - supprising it lasted that long - so he might have problems with a warrantee claim. Chris the marshal said he had heard it was a known problem with Mile Markers when using plasma rope,due to the plasma putting more side load on the drum as it pulls down through the layers. I've never heard of it before - has anyone else? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bull Bar Cowboy Posted May 14, 2007 Share Posted May 14, 2007 Yes it is a known problem (but not a common problem) and was first noticed during the Supercat testing. Your are right in that it is caused by the plasma pulling through the layers, apparently some analysis was done on this and the side pressures involved are very high. This is one of the reasons why plasma should be criss-crossed as it is loaded onto the drum. The welding in this area has been noted before as being non too special !, although this is only the second failure in a challenge truck that I have heard about. I have also seen a similar broken end panel due to bunching under the S/Steel ties rods…………. Ian Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andy-T Posted May 14, 2007 Share Posted May 14, 2007 Hi all, This is not a unique fault. Milemarker winches went through a bad patch about 5 years ago when there was a known welding issue with a particular batch of drums. It was highlighted when a number of drums failed in exactly the same way as this one. The additional side stresses exerted by using synthetic line highlighted poor quality control within the manufacturing process, subsequently corrected! Absolutely nothing to do with using any type of synthetic winch line - simply a poor welding issue during manufacture. All new Milemarker winch drums are correctly welded - just the same as any other manufacturer. I have never heard of any other winch manufacturer having any sort of concerns about using synthetic line - in fact more & more are recommending its use. I continue to supply Milemarker users with Plasma and have heard of no recent problems. Regards, Andy Thomlinson. Ruftraks UK Limited, Glasgow, Scotland. www.ruftraks.co.uk Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andy-T Posted May 14, 2007 Share Posted May 14, 2007 Hi all,This is not a unique fault. Milemarker winches went through a bad patch about 5 years ago when there was a known welding issue with a particular batch of drums. It was highlighted when a number of drums failed in exactly the same way as this one. The additional side stresses exerted by using synthetic line highlighted poor quality control within the manufacturing process, subsequently corrected! Absolutely nothing to do with using any type of synthetic winch line - simply a poor welding issue during manufacture. All new Milemarker winch drums are correctly welded - just the same as any other manufacturer. I have never heard of any other winch manufacturer having any sort of concerns about using synthetic line - in fact more & more are recommending its use. I continue to supply Milemarker users with Plasma and have heard of no recent problems. Regards, Andy Thomlinson. Ruftraks UK Limited, Glasgow, Scotland. www.ruftraks.co.uk p.s - That ain't Plasma on his drum!!! Andy Thomlinson. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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