Hand Winches?

Hi all,

Noticed you can get hand winches on eBay, new, for £10-20.. They look okay and apparently can handle up to 2 tons, but are they any good for very occasional/emergency self recovery?

My level of offroading is very tame, usually only happening when I'm in locations with RAYNET and I end up down tracks/in fields etc. but I was thinking that something like this might just get me through that few feet of mud I could find myself stuck in.

My only concern with them is the apparent lack of gearing... would it be possible to effectively (and slowly!) winch a freelander forward by a few feet using one of these? Anyone got any experience of using them?

Would appreciate any advice.

Thanks
James

i have a hand winch that i use for all manner of things(getting lenny's wallet out of his pocket mainly) yes they are ok for what you want but they are feckin hard work

thanks for the advice, yella.. think i might get one for £20 then.. like I say, just for real dire use! my missus doesn't seem to encounter many problems extracting my wallet, but i could test the winch out at the weekend, by attempting to pull her out of debenhams.

cheers mate

James