When people talk about tie downs, they probably are talking about totally different things depends on the context, for instance, ratchet straps for truck are definitely 2” and 10000lbs tie down while ratchets for pick up will be 1” and 500lbs tie down, we’re only going to discuss about truck tie downs here, more specifically, we are going to talk about flat bed truck this time, because we can see those tie downs on the highway,
When the jobs come your way, chances are you are not going to decide what kind of cargo will be put on your truck, the only thing you can do is to prepare for all the opportunities , most of the time you don’t get to choose what you like or want to do. Talking about flat bed trucks, a lot of the flatbeds come with winches installed, or you can install by yourself at a later time, then you can use winch strap to do the job without the hassle of having to tie down both ends of the ratchet straps.
Traditionally slide in winch and winch straps are most popular tie down devices for flat beds . When you work with truck winches and winch straps, there is one thing you can’t live without: winch bar, these steel bars are necessary for your job, so get one if you don’t already have one.
If your flatbeds come with winches installed, you only need to get some winch straps for most of your work, of course you still need to keep some chains, binders and ratchet straps handy. When the flat bed have the winches installed, we can use winch tie down straps to tie down articles on the flat bed , usually we tie down steel coils, concrete pipes, skids, anything that not too heavy for the 5400lbs working load limit. Both flat hooks and wire hooks may be used on 2”, 3” and 4” winch straps, but flat hooks are more popular than wire hooks, you may see flat hooks on all size winch straps while wire hooks mostly on 2” straps. Truck winches come in with two different width, 2” and 4”, but winch straps have width of 2”, 3” and 4”, it’s obvious you can put 3” winch straps in 4” winches, even the width availability of winch straps is limited, the length is not, though there are usually no winch straps shorter than 20′, these straps can be more than 60 feet long! And the best selling length is 27′ and 30′, 4” wide.
Of course there are most used tie downs: ratchet strap. What we call ratchet straps are actually assemblies, the ratchet buckles with short straps, one foot or longer, and the long straps, 6 feet or longer.
The ratchet tie down earned it’s popularity by being the most flexible, adaptable and capable tie down devices , from passenger cars to eighteen wheelers , you can see ratchet straps anywhere cargo needs to be secured. The ending comes with quite some varieties, flat hooks, wire hooks , chain extensions, snap hooks, endless and more. Width of the ratchets measured from 1” to 4” and the length can be anything from inches to more than 50 feet, the ratcheting mechanism really has it’s advantage. Even for flatbeds which use winch straps primarily the ratchets may be essential, just think about this scenario, while you’re on the way to deliver your load one of the winches comes off, and it’s midnight it’s impossible to find a new or used winch, you will have to use ratchet strap to fix the problem.
Before you go out or visit the web to get these tie down straps , you will have to know how to get most out of them with less money , most important thing is the quality , maybe you know the local store stuff quality, when talking about online stores you should evaluate them by reading other people’s the reviews, trucking blogs, such as trucker blogs , online feed backs, or use alternate methods to find out if the products and service are good or not.
