the cheaper winches

[harry]

recently i had a problem with my repco winch, which is a cheapy, probably a chinese copy similar to the many different cheaper winches on the market - and many of us have purchased them.
i am in the process of repairing mine and have not tried to apply for warranty as i think that is over.
mine failed when trying to escape from crystal creek, as i was recovering myself using a toyota as a winch anchor point. [when mine failed he offered to hook his warn winch to me - it didn't work at all!
having dismantled the reduction gear box, [and i do have a photo trail of this] i found the problem to be a sad way of shimming the gear train clusters of the planetary gear system.
this caused the final drive gear to disengage from the cable drum.
i have nearly finished the manufacture of new shims and the positioning of them to retain full engagement of this most important part of the gear train.
having now nearly sorted the problem in my winch, i would like to inspect another winch of the same origin as mine to see if the problem is common to others - many chinese or other similar manufacturers make the same thing and 'badge' it for many different customers, so i suspect that mine is not the only one with this problem.
i do know of one winch which has not been fitted and is still new, josh, and want to pull that apart, but if someone wants to provide me with their winch, i would like to strip it down to check this and will reassemble it as found or note the problems for warranty or fix it at no cost - if it has the problem i am looking for.
club members only need apply and only one. i still have a day job to look after. assistance with overseeing is acceptable with the correct grade of lubricant.

[Grimace]

Hey mate, I have one of the 4x4point winches that we all purchased a while ago.

Its never been fitted and is sitting in my shed. I was actually looking at opening uo and repacking it with better quality grease (also sitting int he shed next to it) but I know have a high mount winch thats is goin in the front of my rangie (if i eva get one).

Your most welcome to pull the 4x4point winch apart.

Cheers
Grimace

[harry]

ok, lets do it, give me a ring.
we'll look at yours and josh's.

[dungarover]

Should be interesting, will wait and see with the outcome of yours Harry.

Trav

[Outlaw]

yep can take mine... will bring it to the next meeting or can collect earlier... mine was a T-Max though so hoping it is better quality but who knows ;)

[harry]

may try to look at josh's on sat if that's ok, as mine will still be dry, so we can show the problem and the cure with photos, and compare on the bench.
doesn't take long to open up and put back together.
grimace, bring yours to the meeting or i might try to call you sat.

[philco]

Harry, you are right about the same manufacturer different labels, I could possibly tell you who the chinese manufacturer is for most brands on the market and ebay just by looking at them. I also know who is the better manufacturer and who is not.
I would like to have a look at the insides of those winches also.
I might have an hour or so spare tomorrow, maybe you can call me. 0423759779
if not the photos will be ok.

[harry]

have looked at grimaces 4x4point winch this evening, nice setup, better than the repco jobbie, although maybe not comparing apples with apples,
my repco is 9500lb the 4x4point is 12500, so it may be different anyway to the repco or even its own smaller capacity job.
the 4x4 point is well made and has none of the shim or end play problems i found in my repco winch.
next is the t max of josh's.

[MickG]

Great job Harry, been wondering how my 4x4 point winch might stack up against others. Stikman helped me fit mine but before we did we stipped it and repacked it with decent grease. I have used it a couple of times but it has performed fine although a couple of niggles so far;

1. I cannot seem to firstly get the clutch disengaded to freel spool
2. When I eventually do it will not free spool easily
3. Went to use the hand controler at Beerwah the other day in the rain on about a 35 degree angle (if that makes a difference) and it did not work, the only thing that worked was the remote controller
4. Yesterday I unspooled the wire to re spool it back onto the drum neatly (hand controller worked again no problems:eek:) and noticed that when I backed the car down the very gentle slope using the "out" button on the winch, the car kept going for about a metre or two before stopping and would have gone further if the slope was steeper. This is not good news surely? I would expect the winch to stop when I released the button.

Anyway sorry for the highjack but keen to hear the outcome of your tests Harry and also if you can shed some light on my issues based on what you have observed from the internals of these machines.

Aye, Mick

[incisor]

so if the nose is high you have the controller problem mick ?

[MickG]

so if the nose is high you have the controller problem mick ?

I wouldn't have thought that was the case Inc as this would be no good at all for recoveries, but it may have been a contributing factor at Beerwah when it didn't want to work.....it was chucking it down with rain as well at the time, so perhaps I had a short somewhere. Although I was surprised when the wireless controller worked instead of the hard wired one.

Plan is to eventually move all the controls to incab leaving the hard wire conection somewhere easily accessable.

[Grimace]

Mick,

The winch should stop almost instantly when using the fixed controller, with minimal wind down.

The wireless winch controllers are known for their not so speeding response time, I personally won't be using mine, but will leave it for a backup.

I think after seeing Harrys winch he will have incresed the strength ten fold, and the packaging/instructions for his repco winch is the same as the packaging for our 4x4point winch.

Cheers
Grimace

[MickG]

Mick,

The winch should stop almost instantly when using the fixed controller, with minimal wind down.

The wireless winch controllers are known for their not so speeding response time, I personally won't be using mine, but will leave it for a backup.

I think after seeing Harrys winch he will have incresed the strength ten fold, and the packaging/instructions for his repco winch is the same as the packaging for our 4x4point winch.

Cheers
Grimace

That's what I thought Grimace but this was on the hard wired controller. Yes the remote one is a bit non responsive and I only have it there as a back up. Not too happy or confident that the car moves so far back on the main controller......must get it looked at.

[Psimpson7]

Mick,

I wouldnt worry about being able to pull the cable out easily on free spool. My Warn's are both a bloody nightmare to pull the cable from. The XP's were ok when they were new but they had hardly any grease in, and repacking them increased the friction massively.

In all honesty unless you are competing I dont think it is much of an issue.

Pete.

[stikman]

Mick,

I wouldnt worry about being able to pull the cable out easily on free spool. My Warn's are both a bloody nightmare to pull the cable from. The XP's were ok when they were new but they had hardly any grease in, and repacking them increased the friction massively.

In all honesty unless you are competing I dont think it is much of an issue.

Pete.

Mine is slowly getting better the more it is used. We did not exactly go light on the grease Mick :eek:

[harry]

Great job Harry, been wondering how my 4x4 point winch might stack up against others. Stikman helped me fit mine but before we did we stipped it and repacked it with decent grease. I have used it a couple of times but it has performed fine although a couple of niggles so far;

1. I cannot seem to firstly get the clutch disengaded to freel spool is the winch fully unloaded when you try to disengage
2. When I eventually do it will not free spool easily possibly the answer to the above, as the load is still on the gear train due to the stiffness, grimace and i noticed his was difficult to turn when disengaged on the bench
3. Went to use the hand controler at Beerwah the other day in the rain on about a 35 degree angle (if that makes a difference) and it did not work, the only thing that worked was the remote controller wiring, when on the angle the weight of the cable acting on the plug may have caused a dodgy connection
4. Yesterday I unspooled the wire to re spool it back onto the drum neatly (hand controller worked again no problems:eek:) and noticed that when I backed the car down the very gentle slope using the "out" button on the winch, the car kept going for about a metre or two before stopping and would have gone further if the slope was steeper. This is not good news surely? I would expect the winch to stop when I released the button.
if you're extending the cable i think that would be correct, the way the brake works is to stop windout when retracting the cable, so you don't bounce the car on stopping winding in

Anyway sorry for the highjack but keen to hear the outcome of your tests Harry and also if you can shed some light on my issues based on what you have observed from the internals of these machines.

Aye, Mick
not sure how we deal with the drum being tight, may have another look at grimace's, they do have good seals at each end of the drum and maybe we can loosen off the ends a bit to loosen it up, but as phillipe has shown they do get less tight with use, and i remember being on a dodgy slope in the rain dragging phillipe's lovely rope out to hook his winch to my truck one wet and cold sunday arvo/night and it was tight to pull out, it seemed to get easier as we all got more desparate!!

[Grimace]

Harry, just letting you know I have put a post on outerlimits trying to obtain some details/pics of the insides of a repco 12000lb winch.

Might even buy one of the deals direct specials which look to be exactly the same and open it up.

Cheers
Grimace

[harry]

just an update, took the t max winch apart and found the same story as my repco one, so will have to shim it up also, and just read in another thread that aldi are flogging winches from 22nd so will have to check them out also.

[Grimace]

just an update, took the t max winch apart and found the same story as my repco one, so will have to shim it up also, and just read in another thread that aldi are flogging winches from 22nd so will have to check them out also.

wow, wasn't expecting to hear that.
How similar were the two winches? not identical in everyway??

Am very keen to check out one of these repco 12000lb jobs to see if they are constructed as per my 4x4 point unit. That may be the reason for the higher rating.

Will be interesting if the repco and tmax are the same, to do a load comparo and see if the motors used are similar or not.

[harry]

[quote=Grimace;747430]wow, wasn't expecting to hear that.
How similar were the two winches? not identical in everyway??

dead spitting image, exactly the same.
i actually think this is a repco jobbie, as it is not the same as the t max's advertised in the latest mags - maybe tmax changed, or the supplier of this called it a t max.

[Shepp]

This is a late post but I have just seen Aldi of all places advertising winches at $450. Dont know what they would be like but they look ok in the picture in my junk mail. I think they are at the Labrador store. Might be worth checking out.:unsure:

[harry]

thanks shepp,
i was going to check them out, just didn't have time.
did anyone buy one???

[dungarover]

I did, haven't had the chance to pull it to bits yet. I did have a loose nut floating around in the control box though, is this a sign of things to come?? I hope not.

PS- I did pull the cover off the control box, it was a nut just floating around. All the connections were intact and on the right way round too but with a 2 year warranty I can't whing can I as long as it doesn't bomb out after that.

Trav

[philco]

I was wondering if anyone would buy 1, its ok i wont get upset if you don't want to buy my ones.
New stock of high lift jacks to arrive in 4 weeks.
found a few other gooodies from my suppliers and hope to have samples with the jack shipment :wasntme: