of course..






I am going to zip tie the other one

 

Call me lazy,old or smart, but this silly thing is HEAVY. Granted, it is a lil lighter with the cable off it

 

look heavy did the old one go tits up

 

Well, I started by jigging up the winch plate, and then seeing if the winch would even come close to fitting. Ha, too damn tight/big. So I ended up needing to cut a section out of the back bar of the bumper. I am going to reinforce the tubing ends with a verticle gusset that will tie into the winch plate and the front of the frame to help give it more needed support.



And here it is all jigged in place, and let me tell ya, if you ever need to remove this thing gibby, your going to have some choice words for me It's plain tight.





And even with the rear tube removed I had to still notch a little of the edge of the winch due to the fact the front/top tubes hang over the winch.



So next I need to eyeball all the bracket locations and hopefully tach this thing into place and start building more parts for it..

 

It still works, but you need a large tool, to pull a large rig out

 

yep you need a large tool alright

 

For those of you curious, there are a few reasons for the bumper/winch change.
1. The bumper was not designed for a body lift, so I had to move it up 2" to look right. That required that I try to weld 1/4" steel to a very thin radiator support. To get the heat up enough for the 1/4" plate, I kept melting away the other bracket. I did finally get it glued together, but it didn't hold and when a strong pull was needed, it would break the 1/4" bracket off the thin metal support.
2. The bumper mounts pretty high and when I pulled, it mostly just pulled down on the suspension and dug the front tires into whatever I was trying to get over or through - not very effective - rather than pulling straight forward or even up. Yes, I tried to attach the strap as high up on a tree as I could, but it still wasn't enough. The original plan was to just lower the winch and get a more solid frame mount that would pull at more optimal angles.
3. When a a 350 equipped, dual locked rig that ramps 1200 and rides on 40s get stuck, it's freakin' STUCK! the 8000# winch wasn't going to pull me out of those situations. The last time that Markus buried my rig, the winch simply would not pull me out of that situation. The only option for a double pull with a snatch block was also a sharp sideways pull. The only tree that was in the right direction was too far for a double pull. None of the other rigs that were with us could have gotten around to get in front or behind to help. They had just spent 2-3 hours getting themselves out - in fact, I had to come rescue them and drag them along on a strap. Thankfully, we had an excavator at hand and Markus used the bucket to lift the entire front end out and then we drug it to a better position. A stronger winch with a better mount would probably have been enough to get me out. This winch also holds an extra 50' of cable which would have been enough for a snatch block pull.
4. The last part of the modification was to accomodate my offroad and driving lights. The Hella 6x9s needed to mount right on top of the bumper inside the headlights, but the winch solenoid was in the way and I had to remove the lights. The PIAA driving/fog lights kept getting knocked off so Mike's going to find a way to build in some protection for the lights.
5. I had always wanted a rear mounted winch for a couple of reasons. First, it sometimes makes sense to pull yourself OUT of a situations, rather than farther in... second, in our club we have several capable vehicles, that simply haven't got a winch yet. We try to intersperse those rigs with vehicles that have rear winch capabilities in case it's needed. Many trails do not offer a snatch pull option with a strap due to very tight corners or poor traction for the other vehicle, and turning around to use the front winch of another vehicle is not an option either. The only options for for a vehicle from behind to go past the stuck rig and then back to the stuck rig, or for the rig in front to go forward to a tree, then back to the stuck rig. We did this a few times at it actually worked pretty good. Third, when crossing difficult side hills where roll over meant roll DOWN, having a winch pulling and winch letting out would provide for a lot more safety. Lastly, this would give me the option of using a winch for braking going down very steep hills.

 

my eyes my eyes

 

no kidding

 

Here is how I fixed needing to cut the tube on the bumper. The brackets tie into the tube, winch plate and the frame. nasty little buggers to make to





Here is where most of the support for the winch mount is gained. I have used this setup on a # of rigs now(even mine) and its held up great.

 

And here it is, all purdy with a new/fresh coat of paint..





I ended up need to make risers for the big lights biggy wanted put on due to how the soloniod box sits.



SO as soon as the paint is dry I will fully assemble the winch/lights

 

Going lysdexic? You've been working to hard...or there is something else going on there that I don't want to knkow about!



Forget the winch, just tie a front loader onto the bumper!

 

I you look closed behind the riser, you can see where the previous mount was literally torn off.

I also just realized that this lowered my bumper height - maybe even to a legal height?

 

Nah i dont think that means he's lysdexic, just a fruedian slip referring to the overall sheer giganticness of that truck and yes that thing might just need a peice of heavy equimpment tied to the front something like this

 

actually, the law states, your bumper, along with 2/3 of wheelers rigs are illegal. Plus, I suspect your frame height is above legal and the lower edge of the winch plate is roughly 3" above the frame..

 

Can you say "tight" fit, I can, even with a few choice words said
This thing is a total shoe horn




Here is why I needed to build risers for those KC lamps. There is about 1/8" of room there, just enough to point the lamps down pretty good.



And here is what it looks like. As soon as I find the other lamp (buried in the back part of the shop) I'll get it mounted and then just need to wire the lower 2 lamps(almost thought about mounting the turn signals with large wire ties )..

 

How much of a hit do you think the approach angle took? That roller fairlead really sticks out. Whaddy think about the roller vs hawse fairleads?

I think ya got the PIAA on the wrong side. Shouldn't the yellow light be on the outside?

 

I have been reading this the whole way, but I didn't have a reason to post til now.

I have to say that this is one hell of a project, Crash you do nice work and Biggy, I mean Gibby, awesome rig!

If you decide to go to a hawse, and you don't have one already, I have a steel Warn Hawse that I bought on e-bay and never used. I got synthetic rope and replaced the steel hawse with aluminum.

$20 + shipping and it's yours. If you're interested, i'll take a pic.

 

Thanks Jim, I do have a hawse - it was on the original M800. I appreciate the offer though.

 

I thought about the light location, and I think there will be a little light deflection from where it sits, but I can swap them side to side, no biggy at all..

You lost some apraoch, maybe a couple inch's at best. But ya, that roller does sit out a bit and you can always run the hawse(I ran one for years).