Jim, before you spend a lot of time and money replacing batteries and buying a new charger , etc. , you really should check out your winch motor ( actually you are checking out the system , which includes the cables and the selenoid 's ) . The "cheap way" to do this is to borrow a Current Meter from your local service station , preferably one that is closed on Sunday. You return it on Monday Morning with a Dozen or so Donuts , or Bagels , etc. ,and you will make their day. Get as many of your club members to show up at your flying site on that Sunday, we want a variety of planes. As each Pilot hooks up , write down their name and what they are launching . As they are Launching , write down the current draw, maybe a couple of times if they do a zoom. What you are looking for is a "pattern" , Gentle Ladys should produce a low current reading , Pedal to the Metal 3M Contest Planes should produce much higher readings. After about 20 or so launches do a "Temperature Test " on the cables and the motor , and don't forget the short one between the selenoid and the motor. The cables should be warm but not Hot. If they are hot then you have a problem. Either the motor is drawing too much current or the cables are too small. I use 2/0 welding wire cable because it very low resistance even at 200 amps, and even after 20 hard launches it's barely warm. Because of the way it is made , thousands of small strands of copper wire , it is very flexible , so you will never have to worry about breaking individual stands. If the Motor is really hot , you should really check that too. In most cases a competent automotive shop should be able to tell you the "Health" of your starter motor with the drum attached , just remove the line. He will know if the motor is ok in about 10 seconds. Once again Donuts and/ or Bagels work wonders here. Two other things to keep in mind , if you are relying on the simple bronze bushings in the starter motor , you are going to delevop a great deal of drag soon after you start using the winch. Either add and outboard ball bearing to the drum , or bite the bullet and purchase a set of Doug Boyds Real Balls end bells. If you are using a 6 volt motor then naturally your current draw will be higher than for a 12 volt motor. That will effect your battery life. The biggest problem with using 6 volt Trojans is Logistics . At the end of the day you have two "tired" batteries and one slightly "tired" battery. You have to keep swapping batteries so that they get equal use as a retriever battery , and as 1/2 a winch battery. With only three batteries one is always working hard two times in a row. Obviously there is no excuse for buying a cheap charger and then blaming the batteries for poor performance. The big problem with many of todays batteries is that they have sealed them up so that trying to check them with a Specific Gravity Gage is difficult .( you have to pry the covers off to get access to the cells ) . The good thing about the Trojan Industrial cells is that they assume that you are going to have to add water to the cells due to the high charge currents they have to endure , so they have "old-fashioned " caps on the cells . Ok I'm done for now , somebody else finish this up . Jim Bonk RCSE-List facilities provided by Model Airplane News. Send "subscribe" and "unsubscribe" requests to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
