Their existing test equipment was antiquated and not capable of developing the loads required for their new products. The new test equipment would aid the development of the new products and test production test winches for, at least the next 30 years, the required support life of their products.

Solution: TPD designed an instrumented load winch test platform capable of monitoring and controlling the loading and speed of the customer’s winches, per their design specification. The test platform is easily changed over between the two winches and has the capability to accommodate future new designs with only tooling and programming changes.

Design Challenges: The Test Platform needed to be capable of reeling in 250 feet of cable from the customer’s winch and reeling it out again, without damaging the cable, and control the cable tension, throughout the test. To meet this requirement TPD designed a 42-inch diameter drum with helical groove cut into the outside diameter to control the position of the cable. The diameter of the drum design meant that the Test Platform needed to provide up to 21,000 Ft-lbs. of torque to produce the maximum of 12,000 lbs. of cable tension. The Test Platform can provide up to 24,000 Ft-lbs. of torque by utilizing 2 radial, 7-cylinder, hydraulic position motors directly coupled to the drum. Safety requirements were met by totally enclosing the Test Platform in 80/20 framing with clean Lexan Panels and several emergency stop buttons located around the Test Platform. The Test Platform is controlled by a dedicated PC running a LabView GUI. The LabView GUI provides the means for the operator to select programs, run and monitor tests in progress and store and retrieve test data.