I have not discussed it at all but I have also joined 775 offroad and recovery. I will discuss them more later but working with that group has made it very clear that I need to start gathering more recovery gear. I decided to start with a winch. I found this Smittybuilt for a very reasonable price of $402 from Amazon. So I wanted to give it a try as an affordable but very powerful winch. Down the road I will update as the winch gets used how it performs and holds up to abuse.
Installing a winch is easy as long as you have a basic 12-volt dc understanding. Smittybuilt did a great job of labeling all the cables and what they belong to. Instructions are clear and easy to understand. I highly recommend reading your instructions first.
I started by laying everything out to understand what I had and work out what belonged where. Once I sorted out the bolts for mounting the winch and bolts for the roller fairlead, I started there, but I threaded the bolts and did not tighten anything yet
Next are all the wires. First, I attached the loose cable to the ground on the winch. I routed the cable under the grill and behind the passenger headlight. Then I did the same with the already attached to the positive winch cable. Then the three large cables and two smaller wires in the solenoid block one goes to the winch motor. Again we will start with the ground. It goes to the same post as the main ground. Then the three large wires are nicely marked on the wire end and the motor side. Just match them up and bolt them down. Before covering the terminals up with the provided boots, I sprayed some protectant on the metal bits. Connection to the battery is straightforward. Just positive to positive and negative to negative. After the roller fairlead in installed and all the wires are secured, tighten all of the mounting bolts.
After that, we are basically done. I took the big rubber band off the wire and drum, then pulled the cable eyelet through the roller fairlead and attached the hook. Then spooled the cable back in.
The handheld remote is interesting. It has some features that I’m not sure how I feel about until I use it a few times. It has a selectable light. Magnets in the handle to set it somewhere and have it stay. The trigger system is first selectable. So you would press the FWD or REV button on the sides to select the direction. Then use the trigger to activate the motor. It also has a load indicator. It will start green and will turn yellow and red as you approx danger limits. I suspect it uses induction to do this, as the motor works harder and will pull more current. It’s pretty clever, really. I have concerns about how accurate it is, though.
Future: I plan on a few mods. I want to add a wireless remote. I also want to take the solenoid pack apart, and wire in a switch inside the jeep so the driver can run the winch from the driver’s seat. The wire cable will also be replaced at some point for a synthetic rope. One thing I didn’t set up was a thin blue and white wire that came out from the solenoid pack. That wire will light up the “SB” on the front of the pack. I wasn’t sure what, if anything, I wanted to do with it. Right now, what I’m thinking is I will wire it so that when the winch is running, the lamp will turn on.
No sooner than I finished the installation was a call for recovery for three vehicles stuck in the snow up in Brunswick Canyon. So I packed up and got ready for a recovery. I don’t have a final install pic because of the call.
I suppose these will have to do.
