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I am going to be mounting a winch on my truck. I know that warn makes a semi hidden winch kit. To be honest it just looks like a steel plate like all the universal mounting kits. I want to be able to retain the stock bumper. I have searched the internet and can not find the answer. Does anyone know if any of the universal kits will fit with the factory bumper?
I know the warn kit will fit and drop the winch down. The universal plates sit differently though. I was wondering if I get a universal plate and mount the winch on it will the factory bumper still fit on the truck. I dont mind cutting the bumper for the fairleads. I just need for the bumper to bolt back on.
No. I dont have a picture. That is what I am looking for. I want to know if I use a universal winch mounting plate, if the factory bumper will fit back on the truck over the winch.
Once I find out I will post. Either because someone answered or I tried it.
either way though it would still be mounted to the frame of the truck. I wouldnt trust the bumper to hold on with 9500+ lbs of force pulling against it.
Once I find out I will post. Either because someone answered or I tried it.
either way though it would still be mounted to the frame of the truck. I wouldnt trust the bumper to hold on with 9500+ lbs of force pulling against it.
Alright, sorry... made that previous post before I read this.
OK so I know this is an old thread but I mounted the winch today.
It is a smittybilt 9500 xrc and I used a badlands (harbor freight) 12000 lb mounting plate.
To start the badlands mount box says all over it that it is a universal mount. I knew that I would need to do some modification even being universal, but once you open the box the spec sheet inside says will fit all FJs. So it isnt really universal or isnt meant to be.
this is as far as you need to take the truck down do mount the winch, but best I can tell this is also the minimal amount. So its probably best to just go ahead and disassemble to this point.
The winch has to come up from the bottom and the mount be attatched to the bottom of the frame. There is not enough clearance to put the mount on top of the frame. We started by flipping the mount upside down and seeing where the factory holes lined up. They are very close to where the factory FJ holes are. We just used a Unibit and a dremmel to elongate the holes and that gave us enough to be able to mount the plate. In this picture you can see the elongated holes. You can also see where we trimmed the metal from the front and rear of the mount. I will get to that next.
Next we flipped the plate upside down and bolted it all the way down on the frame so that it was tight and centered. We used a pencil to mark where we needed to cut the part that stuck up. In the above pic you can see where it was trimmed down. We used a grinder with a cut off wheel and then the grinder wheel to clean it up, and then hit it with some paint.
then we took the winch and rollers and mounted it just like you would any winch or mount. I did have to change the orientation of the control box. It would not fit like this.
in the manual it has instructions on how to mount the control box upright at the back of the winch. This will not clear the transmission cooler and the ac condensor at the front. We mounted it vertically but turned the brackets so that the box was pushed to the front of the winch. I dont have a great pic of that but this is what I have.
after that we set the winch on the jack and lifted it up to the frame. We had to use one of the pieces of metal we trimmed off on each side with a hole drilled for the bolt to put in between the frame and the mount to help not push the clutch lever into anything and break it. ran the bolt through the tow hook, through the plate, through the spacer, and into the factory nut.
trimmed the plastic so it fit and to a look we liked. and done.
entire job took about 4 hours with two people and plenty of bull****ting.
Mounting a winch
