Mine has worked every time when called upon.
But it lives it's life at 6% humidity...
CK5
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why Superwinch sucks! (Warn saves the day!)
- Thread starter andyblack
- Start date
Mine has worked every time when called upon.
But it lives it's life at 6% humidity...
andyblack
Registered Loser
They're probably not. It would likely cost the companies a lot of money to get their recrational winches tested and approved by UL or OSHA or whatever agency does that sort of thing. I wonder what the difference is in the different types of winches.
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andyblack
Registered Loser
Wow. I bet that would eliminate almost all concerns of corrosion inside the motor housing. I'm jealous. In my area, the humidity automatically goes up to 100% at night, no matter what time of year it is. I'm sure that causes condensation to form inside there because the metal is so thick that it cools and heats at a different rate than what's outside of it. I think I'll move out there where you're at to avoid further problems...
v30mongo
Registered Member
About corrosion on electrical components. Up here in the northeast we have the same problems with electrical contact and wires. Dow Corning No.4 or No5 silicone dialectric compound smeared over all the parts seems to work well. I imagine any silicone compound that does not have any metal additives will work.
well i have not needed to use mine yet.. guess that either..
1. i need to get stuck first...
2. need to have the truck on the road to get stuck...
however i can say one thing.. im rewiring my truck (2.5 years in the making) and all that is left is the oil gauge.. seems to not want to work.. but truck will be on the road soon...
anywho..
my ramsey patriot 15,000 is sitting behind my frame rails under the bed...
it sits in the weather and elements.... probably not a good choice..
i also have a 60 amp alternator.. another not so good...
however I have 2 batteries in the bed (forget what ryoken said they were.. 80d or something.. )
they are huge...
now here is what im going to be doing.. this year is to get the truck on the road.. next year is the winch rewire and alt upgrade... i got all the parts...
so winch to batteries in parallel with 3/0 cable (winch can draw 460a max so need big wires)
in between cable and batteries will be a anl 600a fuse going to a 1+2 marine switch....
then charge wire will be 00 going to under hood to another 1+2 marine switch to which will go to the alternator...
my thing is if I got a big winch and needs lots of power... i want flexability too..
be able to charge batteries..... cut circuit off from under hood to bed.... cut power off to winch as the wires run next to my gas tank...
eventually i will be putting a mile marker 10.5k hydro up front.. on its own electric driven pump cuz if i was going forward.. i want to keep on going... but if truck stalls, blows up or whatever.. i want a massive winch to pull my pig out where i came in at....
here is my wiring thread that really will be done eventually...
http://coloradok5.com/forums/showthread.php?t=268871
Funny you should ask.....Thanks Fordum and K30guy. You both have a wealth of knowledge.
Fordum, don't you have an entertaining old story to tell about any of those old winches?
I don't have many stories about the winches per se, but plenty about their use or misuse...
Don't know about the entertaining part though....
I have already told about using the winch on my Jeep to pick it up vertical so that I could work on the U-joints sitting in a chair instead of crawling under in the mud.
And, of course about having my truck come off the ground and flip upside down.
Before I got the Jeep, my father and his friend used to use it to make roads.
They would walk through some dense brush and small trees pulling the cable with them.
Hook the cable to a large tree, walk back, put the winch in gear, pull out the throttle slightly and walk back to the other end and wait for the Jeep to show up.
I had two friends who I would pull out of places about 3 or 4 times per year.
They wanted one of the winches I helped build, but did not want to pay even the friend discount.
They found one that someone else had built using the same gearbox as ours. They went in halves on it and was so proud.
I noticed that whoever had built it, had added a sprocket and chain drive to increase the ratio.
I knew ours would break a 5/16 cable with no problem, so I wondered why he wanted to make it stronger.
I found out the first time they tried it. The original builder did not know how to take the slip clutch out of the gear box.
So he tried to make it pull with it in.
Got a call one night.
The boys had gone out and gotten stuck. They had not bothered to test the winch first, and of course it pulled up tight and started slipping.
Then the motor burned up.
I finally got them out, had to drive and winch around them, because they were hooked to a large tree and I could not pull them out backwards.
After they finally took the winch to my friend and got him to modify it correctly, then the fun started.
You folks thinking about buying winches, you have to remember that they are very dangerous if you don't think about what you are doing.
I only had to pull them out one more time, but the stories I heard were amazing.
First, they were winching out of deep sand. They managed to winch hard up against a tree and could not back up.
One of them stood on the other's shoulders and hooked the cable as high as he could reach on a tree off to the side.
Turned the winch on, and it picked up the front end and swung it over far enough to bypass the first tree.
In the course of a few years of pulling their friends out, I understand they managed to pull out a driveshaft, a gas tank, and part of a radiator......
I told them to tell the people to hook to the frame.....
I may post some others tomorrow or later on tonight. Some take so much backstory to be understandable they are not worth posting.
8D and 4D are the sizes you're thinking of. These are batteries used in big tractors and semi's.
I'd like to see pics of your battery setup. I'm interested in seeing how they're connected and wired to the winch and your standard battery.
well if you looked at the link i had above.. it shows the wiring that WILL be done..
right now it is just the winch... 3/0 cable to batteries in parallel and a 10ag charge wire... all that is going to get redone...
but i used a stop sign post to make my mount...
and here is what we came up with for the wiring that will be...
Cool idea on the sign posts. Plenty beef along with the mounting holes. I have access to lots of those posts at work.
Looks like a lot of work, and a little overkill. But that can be a good thing, right?
Looks like a lot of work, and a little overkill. But that can be a good thing, right?
im looking at it that way.. if im stuck... i want out...
I want to be a self recovery machine...
in addition i really most likely will not use the 200a relay... i want to as i can put a contura rocker switch in and jump the truck from either bank of batteries.... from within the cab...
however i can do the same with the manual switches but it is as it says.. manual....
andyblack
Registered Loser
I just had to bring this up so I could bash my old Superwinch one last time and let everyone know not to buy them one. The other day, I decided to check the winch to see if it worked before I tried a steep, slick. It didn't. Just as before, I could hear the solenoids doing their thing in forward and reverse, but the motor was lock up tight again. Looks like the drain holes I drilled in the housing didn't keep the moisture out too well after all.
I probably could have taken the Superpile apart and cleaned up the corrosion and lubed it up again, but I need a winch I can count on and not worry about whether it's going to work or not when I need it.
Enter Warn's new(ish) VR10000 - a cheaper winch than most Warns, but it's made in the USA and has a lifetime warranty. This should end my winch problems for a while. So you won't have to read my whiny posts for a couple of years.
Here's the Superjunk on the right and the new awesome winch on the left.
And here's a night time cell phone pic of the new winch installed.
The listed gear ratio is slower than the premium Warns. I think it's 261:1, but it sure sucks line faster than my old Suckywinch ever did. I only pulled out the first wrap of cable to test it though.
Overall, I'm pretty impressed with the VR10000 initially. Two things I don't like:
1. The remote control is not the normal Warn unit, but a really cheap looking rubber thing that actually looks sorrier than the one that came with the Superwinch. That doesnt' matter though.
2. The socket for the remote control to plug into on top of the control box is held on by two little smooth head rivets and two little flat washers that are just slid onto the rivets.
The rivets aren't swaged are anything, and the first time I tried to remove the cover for the socket, one of the flat washers slid off and fell down inside the control box. Fearing that something would short, I disconnected the battery, removed the cover for the solenoid pack and found the flat washer and put it back in place. I don't like that design and I'll have to come up with something different. Warn engineers who monitor 4x4 internet forums, take note.
So hopefully that's the end of me crying about winches breaking down. The moral of the story is this: Don't try to cheap out on your winch and buy some piece of junk that's made in China.
I probably could have taken the Superpile apart and cleaned up the corrosion and lubed it up again, but I need a winch I can count on and not worry about whether it's going to work or not when I need it.
Enter Warn's new(ish) VR10000 - a cheaper winch than most Warns, but it's made in the USA and has a lifetime warranty. This should end my winch problems for a while. So you won't have to read my whiny posts for a couple of years.
Here's the Superjunk on the right and the new awesome winch on the left.
And here's a night time cell phone pic of the new winch installed.
The listed gear ratio is slower than the premium Warns. I think it's 261:1, but it sure sucks line faster than my old Suckywinch ever did. I only pulled out the first wrap of cable to test it though.
Overall, I'm pretty impressed with the VR10000 initially. Two things I don't like:
1. The remote control is not the normal Warn unit, but a really cheap looking rubber thing that actually looks sorrier than the one that came with the Superwinch. That doesnt' matter though.
2. The socket for the remote control to plug into on top of the control box is held on by two little smooth head rivets and two little flat washers that are just slid onto the rivets.
The rivets aren't swaged are anything, and the first time I tried to remove the cover for the socket, one of the flat washers slid off and fell down inside the control box. Fearing that something would short, I disconnected the battery, removed the cover for the solenoid pack and found the flat washer and put it back in place. I don't like that design and I'll have to come up with something different. Warn engineers who monitor 4x4 internet forums, take note.
So hopefully that's the end of me crying about winches breaking down. The moral of the story is this: Don't try to cheap out on your winch and buy some piece of junk that's made in China.
gonefishin
1/2 ton status
How much did that run you? I am looking for a little better option for when I replace my smittybuilt 10k. Its always worked but the last pull I overloaded it and it started making lots of noise.
ion
1/2 ton status
Assembled in the USA with Chinese components. There isn't anything "USA Made" by warn anymore. Warn made a statement that they shouldn't have at SEMA 2010 when they were on the winning end of an award. It went something like, they couldn't make their winches possible without the overseas manufacturing plant that they built in 2007.
I wish i saw this before, i have the same superwinch LP8500 as you, i had the same experience with the corrosion to the motor/brushes. I figured i wasn’t the only one who happened to buy a faulty winch, sure enough the older LP8500's were recalled for a terminal seal issue that allowed water in the motor casing corrosion and ultimately failure, ( read this on pirate from a rep) i contact them (superwinch), they sent me next day delivery a new motor. It bolted right up and works like a charm. That was about two years ago.
andyblack
Registered Loser
I paid $579 at winchdepot.com. They claim the shipping was free, but they charged me over $40 for a "GA tax" even though it was shipped out of Jacksonville, FL. So about $620. Not bad considering I was about to spend around $1000 on the Warn 9500 a couple of years ago.
andyblack
Registered Loser
I wish you wouldn't have told me that. Dang commies. 
I was wondering how they were suddenly able to make a new line of cheap winches. I bet the crappy looking winch controller was made in China.
andyblack
Registered Loser
Interesting. I noticed that they changed the design of them a couple of years ago. I wondered if they had solved the problem. Hopefully they have, but I won't be buying another one anytime soon. Good to hear about the customer service though. I figured it would be a waste of my time to try to call them. Maybe I was too quick to bash Superwinch.
454Sub
5/8 ton status
The only products completely made in the US anymore are children and LINK cards.
wasted wages
1 ton status
I'm going to stick my neck out here and just say that BOTH Warn and Superwinch make good winches...
I use both and with reasonable service and care and use, they both perform great.
I had a warn winch on my 660 grizzly that was not rebuildable when it stopped working....too many rusted/corroded parts and Warn no longer provides replacement parts for it. So it went in the dumpster and was replaced with a Superwinch. The kit was awesome to install it.. 100%
better than the original Warn.
I just acquired a 8274-50 Warn winch on a truck I purchased...and will be putting a 9000 LB superwinch in the rear of this truck also....
again....I think a lot of the life of any winch depends on the care and useage by the owner...
just my .02.....
I use both and with reasonable service and care and use, they both perform great.
I had a warn winch on my 660 grizzly that was not rebuildable when it stopped working....too many rusted/corroded parts and Warn no longer provides replacement parts for it. So it went in the dumpster and was replaced with a Superwinch. The kit was awesome to install it.. 100%
better than the original Warn.
I just acquired a 8274-50 Warn winch on a truck I purchased...and will be putting a 9000 LB superwinch in the rear of this truck also....
again....I think a lot of the life of any winch depends on the care and useage by the owner...
just my .02.....
I'm saddened to see so many companies putting out such lousy products. I guess the old adage of "pay to play" still works.
