help with a winch install

I ha purchased a Aldi winch this weekend and fitted it in two hours.
It was all straight forward bolt in stuff to a ARB winch bar fitted to a TDI 300
Defender.
The latest batch of Aldi winches are different from the earlier ones and are not supplied by Ironman.
The price was $399 with one years warrantly.
The electrical cable supplied is heavy enough to do the job well and the lenght was perfect to reach the engine starter terminal.
It came with to wireless remotes and a old fashion cable and switch set up too.
I pulled the clutch lever off just to see what runs out........good quality grease and the lever is sealed with a O ring...........so I left it as is .
The fair head bolted perfectly to the bar as did the winch and nothing had to be rotated or changed.
I am very happy and it should do the the odd self recovery for many years.
The only problem I can see is you may need to keep an eye on how the cable lays its self on the the drum as any bird caging could cause the cable to hit the controller box or winch tie bars.
The above I think is a problem of many winch designs today or have I been spoilt by my 101 landies self laying PTO winch ?.
All in all money well spent.

now that youve all saved yourself a fortune in winch outlay some of the savings to proctect it a bit.

Go buy a snatch block and set it up on the cable, make a mount for it on the bull bar so its on there permantly.

get a winch extension rope or strap thats half the length of your existing winch cable and some shackles, a couple of pairs of gloves and a bag to carry it in.

IVe seen 1 aldi winch on fire, 1 broken after the event which was guessed at being stripped internal gears and 1 with a busted drum. From all accounts they were worked near or beyond the limits except for the busted drum which some idiot decided that he would use as a tow rope.

if your permanantly set up for 2:1 and have an extension cable to get back to the original reach your laughing so long as you dont try to then pull your new potential maximum pull. Apart from everything else its easier on you also gain some flexability in what you can set yourself up to do IF you absolutely have to.

Me I'll pay the same money and get another tirfor with all the trimmings. but Im sick like that....


as for where they are made its like sidcrome, king chrome and supertool. most of them all come from the same place but its the quality control that determins where they get sent to... assuming for a second that Sidchrome is best folowed by kingchrome then supertool a spanner that has a nick in the handle might not pass a sidchrome test but will pass the kingchrome test that same spanner might fail the kingchrome test becaust the jaws of the spanner are out of parallel by .5 degrees but that might be acceptable for supertool standards. Add a brand stamp and one cast can make 3 companies spanners. The Eliteist brands still make their own and in this example that would be someone like Snapon.

I have had many winches before of different types.
If you are serious a PTO winch is hard to beat.
For occasional use I have planed for it the Aldi should do.
The current Aldis are different from the earlier ones.
Time will tell.
I intend to give it the berrys in its first year whisle still under warrantly and keep the box it came in so if it fails I can return it.
On the road into the family property after any sort of wind it is a chain saw job to clear fallen trees and use the winch with direction change snatch blocks to clear the logs off the road.
For the money involved and the warrantly all good stuff for my intended uses.
Time will tell.

so a year on and hows the Aldi's been?

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Originally Posted by rovercare

They DO fail, its very frustrating:eek: funny to watch;)

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So do Warn, I hired a car trailer to p/up a SIII 109 and it had a brand new Warn 9000 high mount bolted to the front of the trailer, owner said it was the third winch on this trailer and he was ****ed off with Warn. Anyhow while winching this SIII onto the trailer (flat tar road) the famous Warn **** itself all over the place. Had to pull the SIII with the Disco. Hire mob removed all of their Warn winches, don't know what they replaced them with.
I have an Aldi style Chinese crap winch, which I pulled apart before use and filled with real grease, (not the waxy crap the Chinese put in) and I have used it a few times with no problems, $400 well spent, couldn't justify the over the top price of a Warn, Regards Frank.