So far truck winches and winch straps are only being used with flatbeds, I don’t know the exact percentage but a big portion of flatbeds sold with winches installed, this is a big plus for most drivers since they only need to get winch straps and winch bars(assume they don’t have them) to get started, and the plastic corner protectors maybe required or optional depends on what kind of loads on the truck. Truck winch comes in with a few different flavors and sizes, we have slide in winches, weld on winches and some other winches, usually the weld on winches are sold with the new flatbeds, 2” and 4” are most popular sizes of truck winches, and of course we can say that 2” & 4” winch straps are the most popular ones, 3” winch straps are not that popular but you still can see them from time to time.
The way the truck winch and strap system works is pretty simple, the mandrel, the part into which you can insert the tie down strap, can be used to tighten the winch straps easily, thus tie the loads down pretty much by just put winch bar into the winch side hole then turn as many rounds as needed until the loads are secured properly. The winch structure is pretty simple, there is a barrel goes through the winch body, one side has a though hole and the other side has a gear with a brake, in between lies the mandrel, the winch strap can be inserted into it, when the brake on the gear is closed, the gear can only go one direction so you can tighten the straps one notch at a time, when you untie the strap, open the brake, turn the barrel the opposite direction to pull the strap off the load. In order to secure your load with winch straps, you will need winch bar to turn the barrel, there is no way you can operate the winch by hand, it’s not only not safe, but also not legal.
For your information, usually you can choose from 4 different kind of winch bar, the standard winch bars painted black, the chromated standard winch bars, chromated combination winch bars and combination winch bars painted half yellow. To be honest, all these winch bars are serving the exact same purpose, and it’s all about personal preference and sometimes people choose combination winch bars for specific reasons, one of them being that you can use something else with the combination winch bar, thus the word “combination” in the name.
