I tested out my Superwinch LP8500 yesterday finally, unspooled it completely and reeled it in. It's quite slow, but it did not really get that hot, I honestly think a synthetic rope would be fine on mine even though the manual says against it. The wire cable though seems like it would be much stronger.

I believe the drum only heats up significantly under load or when unspooling it via the control box while under load. IE: lowering someone down a steep hill or something or winching someone out of a mud pit.

Just unspooling and respooling shouldn't create a significant amount of heat.

I'd rather be safe than sorry.

True, I only had it under the load of the Jeep itself!

When you do long pulls, or pull someone up something the drum does heat up quite a bit, That is what I do pulls in intervals 10 seconds of winching 10 seconds of resting then repeat. My winch got a little hot pulling my buddy up this waterfall with 3foot tall ledges on it .