Destination Unknown - 2022 JTR journal

[WILDHOBO]

I love my two husqevarnas. I think one 345 and one 460. I have a ripping chain and Alaskan sawmill for the 460. I’ve live edged a few trees for fun. I don’t take them with me on the trail though. I take an 18v sawzall and a couple long pruning blades. For me it seems easier for the occasional downed limb. But it wouldn’t help for a large downed tree. Then the ax comes out I guess. Hopefully that won’t happen any time soon. Maybe I should consider the 18v Milwaukee chainsaw as an addition to the trail gear.

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[Rusty PW]

If you want battery cables. Here's the place to get them. A lot of the PW guys get their cables from here.

 

[chorky]

Since I went to town today, I thought to myself - hey, let's get an updated weight. I have a nice spreadsheet calculating by math all the weights I have added, and OEM parts removed, plus factoring in my person weight, weight of food/water/camping gear, etc..

By the math, fully built (except for 2 items), I was about 50 pounds under GAW including my weight. But by the scale, I was more than 200 pounds under GAW. Which means fully built, fully loaded for a week long trip, I will be under GAW. Now isn't that awesome. I was concerned about this. And am no more!

 

[Rusty PW]

I love my two husqevarnas. I think one 345 and one 460. I have a ripping chain and Alaskan sawmill for the 460. I’ve live edged a few trees for fun. I don’t take them with me on the trail though. I take an 18v sawzall and a couple long pruning blades. For me it seems easier for the occasional downed limb. But it wouldn’t help for a large downed tree. Then the ax comes out I guess. Hopefully that won’t happen any time soon. Maybe I should consider the 18v Milwaukee chainsaw as an addition to the trail gear.

Been looking at the M18 saws.

 

[chorky]

I love my two husqevarnas. I think one 345 and one 460. I have a ripping chain and Alaskan sawmill for the 460. I’ve live edged a few trees for fun. I don’t take them with me on the trail though. I take an 18v sawzall and a couple long pruning blades. For me it seems easier for the occasional downed limb. But it wouldn’t help for a large downed tree. Then the ax comes out I guess. Hopefully that won’t happen any time soon. Maybe I should consider the 18v Milwaukee chainsaw as an addition to the trail gear.

I have seen plenty of videos of folks using the Milwaukee or Dewalt saws - they aren't as 'good' but they do seem to do the job, which is really what matters when theres a tree over a road. I have always been a Stihl guy for saws though.

If you want battery cables. Here's the place to get them. A lot of the PW guys get their cables from here.

No I have some that are fine. I will be hard mounting the electrical for the rear winch but will need to get some long 2 ga wires made up. I just don't want to do that one myself with such high amperage running through it. I crimped the 4ga wires myself but they are a standard style crimp. For something like this it would be best to have a hydraulic press.

 

[Rusty PW]

Since I went to town today, I thought to myself - hey, let's get an updated weight. I have a nice spreadsheet calculating by math all the weights I have added, and OEM parts removed, plus factoring in my person weight, weight of food/water/camping gear, etc..

By the math, fully built (except for 2 items), I was about 50 pounds under GAW including my weight. But by the scale, I was more than 200 pounds under GAW. Which means fully built, fully loaded for a week long trip, I will be under GAW. Now isn't that awesome. I was concerned about this. And am no more!

One good shit. You could lose another 50 lbs.

 

[Rusty PW]

I have seen plenty of videos of folks using the Milwaukee or Dewalt saws - they aren't as 'good' but they do seem to do the job, which is really what matters when theres a tree over a road. I have always been a Stihl guy for saws though.

All of my outside power tools are Stihl. Chain saw, leave blower/vacuum, weedeater/tree trimmer.



No I have some that are fine. I will be hard mounting the electrical for the rear winch but will need to get some long 2 ga wires made up. I just don't want to do that one myself with such high amperage running through it. I crimped the 4ga wires myself but they are a standard style crimp. For something like this it would be best to have a hydraulic press.

I redid all of my battery and winch cables on my PW. I crimped and solder the ends.

 

[WILDHOBO]

To my surprise, yesterday (Friday) another order arrived. This is possibly one of the most exciting bits of gear to me since this is pretty rare for most vehicles and something I have wanted for the better part of 15 years. Not really the winch, but the winch location! This item, and the front Warn bumper I had previously ordered from Quadrated due to some sales and discounts. However, for some reason they were unable to process the order. After some searching around I found them on, none other than, Amazon! I hate to love Amazon, but both items were each $200 cheaper on Amazon - and also being sold by some lesser named 4x4 off road businesses that are American, so I wasn't supporting non-americas business. So after 2 weeks of parts being in stock but not being able to process it I told Quadratec to cancel the order. And this arrived 5 days after I placed the order!

I made several measurements after installing the Road Armor rear bumper because it would undoubtedly be a pretty tight fit. The bumper is rated to handle an 8,500 pound winch according to instructions, and according to the company directly it is rated at 9,500. But I wanted to try this winch for 2 reasons. 1, I want to get another one if it works well for my TJ. 2, it is wireless. I did not want two wireless winches of the same company in the 1 in 1,000,000 chance that both winches are needed simultaneously. This could cause an issues as a wireless remote would be telling both winches what to do. So, after making even more measurements, I opted for this one. I doubt I will ever be making a 10,000 pound pull and pushing this winch to the limit and going over the bumper rating, so I think it will be fine. Plus, this winch, like Quadratec and others is fully water tight - a big deal considering it will be on the rear bumper, and winter ice/snow/salt/crap will be smashing into it 9 months of the year.

Unlike others, this winch came with two remotes. One is wired, the other is wireless. It also came with some decently long cable which I won't use as I need custom cables at about 22' long. But I was surprised to see how small the cable included is.

I knew several weeks ago upon install of the bumper itself that there would have to be some slight modifications. Although I give props to Road Armor for making the only currently available rear winch bumper, and though space is an ultimate premium, the fairlead location could be adjusted... The mounting bolts for the fairlead are too close to the winch bolts, requiring some cutting. Fortunately the farilead is aluminum, so rust shouldn't be a problem. With my neighbors grinder, I went to work and did the best I could without having access to proper fabrication tools and equipment.

I think this looks OK, and I doubt it will cause any structural concerns.

Now bolting on the fairlead was also a bit of a problem that just happened to turn out ok. The bumper offers inset bolt spots for the fairlead nuts. Because the fairlead and winch bolts are on the same plane, it is important that the bolts be flush to prevent any contact interference with the winch itself. Well... it didn't work. The nuts offered with the winch for the fairlead wouldn't fit in the pre-stamped hex holes on the bumper. But! Fortunately I just so happened to have some grade 8 nuts lying around. They, however; were a flanged nut. So I took some measurements of the flange thickness, and there was just enough room for the flange not to have excessive contact with the winch body when everything was snug. So on it went.

Now that the fairlead was on, it was time to install the winch. I was hoping it would bolt right up just fine, but based on measurements I was pretty confident it would not.

But I put it up anyway. This was a chore. Actually a really big and painful chore. I'm going to hurt all week probably. Unlike with Warn, these mounting holes for the winch did not line up well. It required a lot of finagling to get things to line up - I almost got out some drill bits to make the holes larger even. Clearances were very tight, and that certainly contributed to some difficulty.

The bolt holes finally lined up enough to all get started.

So I torqued everything down, and on it was. And it looks awesome!

Now if you note the position of the clutch handle above, you can see it is dangerously close to the tire location. Superwinch does provide for this super awesome feature of re-clocking the gears so that you can rotate the clutch assembly 90 degrees in either direction - this is a really really awesome feature that I dont think any other companies offer. My hope was that this would provide enough space to operate.

So the real question was - is it going to fit with the spare? The answer.... NO. It is just too tall. By about 4-5 inches. However, another reason I specifically wanted this winch is it offers a removable and remote mounted solenoid body. The Quadratec option does not as the solenoid body is cast into the winch body as a whole and is not removable. So, after some thinking, I found a location that will make space work appropriately, AND allows for relatively easy access if I want to use the hard wire option.

And here you can see access to the plug for a hard wire method.

This did require drilling more holes of course. Hopefully all the holes I have made are protected enough from my efforts to prevent rust with painting several coats, and a few coats of Amsoil HD Metal Protect.

And now for the final and hopefully successful space test.

It fits! Barely but it fits! And there is even a few inches on the opposite end of the tire before the heat shield, so I am pretty sure I can fit a 35" tire too. The clutch handle on the opposite side of this picture is easy to access. Reach under and it's right there. It has about 3" clearance from the tire, so plenty of space to lift and turn.

Also note in the photo above there is a wire going right next to the tire - the Superwinch also has a drum light, which I find super awesome to make sure no weird winding during a night operation.

And with that, it was time to stretch and wind the rear winch just the same as the front. I do have to finish wiring though. I used a temporary wire solution of the included wires, lying on the ground, clamped to jumper cables, and ran to the battery. Maybe tomorrow I will run and measure what length of wire is needed and try to get a custom order completed in town. So there is another couple hours of finish work. But the hard part is completed. All just in time before filming next weekend. Now if I can only get 3 more things delivered and installed before Friday - the build will be complete before filming.

So very cool. I just wish I could do the same, but there’s no good way with a 37” spare mashed against the front of the receiver. maybe a hitch mount rear at some point.

 

[WILDHOBO]

Been looking at the M18 saws.

I have so many m18 tools, and they always exceed my expectations. My current favorite is the 26,000 rpm variable speed die grinder. It’s amazing for automotive projects. Especially ones where you just can’t get a 4.5” angle grinder in there. I used it a ton on my bumper project. It was twice as fast as my angle grinder to clean up welds.

 

[chorky]

I redid all of my battery and winch cables on my PW. I crimped and solder the ends.

On the 4ga I have going to the bed I just crimped and heat shrunk it. Probably should have soldered it too but resistance tests said it was good..... It was tough to crimp though - for me. I can't imagine trying to crimp 2 ga or even 1 ga

So very cool. I just wish I could do the same, but there’s no good way with a 37” spare mashed against the front of the receiver. maybe a hitch mount rear at some point.

Yeah I have wanted a rear winch for a very very long time. I think it will be a tight fit with 35's and impossible with 37's. But I dont plan on ever getting 37's to be honest. Just not enough true off road action where I live to warrant it. Hopefully before too long I will get some 35's but in all honesty I probably will wait a couple of years as rims will be necessary to prevent rubbing.

There are some pretty cool looking rear swing out tire carrier bumpers though. I'm sure a shop could custom fab something that is a swing out and a winch bumper? That would be a lot of weight out back though. Receiver winch mouth work. Personally, IMO I would never use one. They are pretty dangerous from what I have seen. I think it comes down to how you use it though. But the receiver on the JT seems WAY beefier than any other receiver I have seen on a modern truck. It has some massive bolts, and bolts onto the Fram at I think 3 or 5 points on each side. SO I doubt that would go anywhere. It would be more of a question of the rest of the receiver and weld quality.

 

[WILDHOBO]

On the 4ga I have going to the bed I just crimped and heat shrunk it. Probably should have soldered it too but resistance tests said it was good..... It was tough to crimp though - for me. I can't imagine trying to crimp 2 ga or even 1 ga




Yeah I have wanted a rear winch for a very very long time. I think it will be a tight fit with 35's and impossible with 37's. But I dont plan on ever getting 37's to be honest. Just not enough true off road action where I live to warrant it. Hopefully before too long I will get some 35's but in all honesty I probably will wait a couple of years as rims will be necessary to prevent rubbing.

There are some pretty cool looking rear swing out tire carrier bumpers though. I'm sure a shop could custom fab something that is a swing out and a winch bumper? That would be a lot of weight out back though. Receiver winch mouth work. Personally, IMO I would never use one. They are pretty dangerous from what I have seen. I think it comes down to how you use it though. But the receiver on the JT seems WAY beefier than any other receiver I have seen on a modern truck. It has some massive bolts, and bolts onto the Fram at I think 3 or 5 points on each side. SO I doubt that would go anywhere. It would be more of a question of the rest of the receiver and weld quality.

For me to feel comfortable with a receiver winch on a class IV, I’d try to stick to pretty straight pulls number one. But I’d also fab up connections to the frame on both sides, maybe using something similar to a turnbuckle to the frame rails on each side. That way it’s braced and not just using the receiver hardware.

 

[chorky]

For me to feel comfortable with a receiver winch on a class IV, I’d try to stick to pretty straight pulls number one. But I’d also fab up connections to the frame on both sides, maybe using something similar to a turnbuckle to the frame rails on each side. That way it’s braced and not just using the receiver hardware.

thats a pretty good idea with the additional supports and would probably work plenty good I bet

 

[chorky]

Well it was a super crazy week, between work stuff and busting butt to try and get this build finish - I am almost there. Not quite sure if ti will be wrapped up tomorrow before filming though so we shall see.

One task I did accomplish was solenoid mounting. The following thread shows some discussion and a temporary solenoid mounting solution I came up in post #13 - https://www.jeepgladiatorforum.com/...-install-location-options.69958/#post-1150253

However, I was pretty unhappy overall as I had two winches, and allocated aux switches 3 and 4 for each winch respectively. So thinking of ideas, I recalled having a scrap piece of alum in the house from 813 Fabrication that I ended up not using. So taking some measurements, and cutting with a neighbors cutting wheel, I came up with the perfect 2x2 angle alum I was looking for.

And with a quick test fit, it worked perfectly!

So after sourcing 22' of 1 ga cable, it was all set to go. I am super excited about this!

Unfortunately though, when hooking up the negative cables, my persistent neighbor came over to chat it up. Nice guy but bad timing. He distracted me, resulting in some arc welding. This, I am pretty angry over. Not his fault, my own really; however, I really am hoping that nothing got damaged or fried. Guess I'll find out tomorrow

I also installed a power tank mount for a 5 pound propane tank. It holds about 1.4 gallons and is a lot nicer than hauling those small and very wasteful 1 pound bottles. And this should be plenty enough propane for a week long trip.

 

[WILDHOBO]

Well it was a super crazy week, between work stuff and busting butt to try and get this build finish - I am almost there. Not quite sure if ti will be wrapped up tomorrow before filming though so we shall see.

One task I did accomplish was solenoid mounting. The following thread shows some discussion and a temporary solenoid mounting solution I came up in post #13 - https://www.jeepgladiatorforum.com/...-install-location-options.69958/#post-1150253

However, I was pretty unhappy overall as I had two winches, and allocated aux switches 3 and 4 for each winch respectively. So thinking of ideas, I recalled having a scrap piece of alum in the house from 813 Fabrication that I ended up not using. So taking some measurements, and cutting with a neighbors cutting wheel, I came up with the perfect 2x2 angle alum I was looking for.

And with a quick test fit, it worked perfectly!

So after sourcing 22' of 1 ga cable, it was all set to go. I am super excited about this!

Unfortunately though, when hooking up the negative cables, my persistent neighbor came over to chat it up. Nice guy but bad timing. He distracted me, resulting in some arc welding. This, I am pretty angry over. Not his fault, my own really; however, I really am hoping that nothing got damaged or fried. Guess I'll find out tomorrow

I also installed a power tank mount for a 5 pound propane tank. It holds about 1.4 gallons and is a lot nicer than hauling those small and very wasteful 1 pound bottles. And this should be plenty enough propane for a week long trip.

Nice work. You use less propane than I do. For a week, I’d bring two 20lb cans. But I burn through a bunch with the fire pit.

 

[chorky]

Nice work. You use less propane than I do. For a week, I’d bring two 20lb cans. But I burn through a bunch with the fire pit.

Thanks! Yeah I'm making some assumptions on the propane. Most my camping life it was just to cook on a stove, coffee, etc.. Never had a fireplace before. I still don't since it gets too dry and hot here in the summer to really use one. But I will be curious to see how long this will last with the water heater (hint hint). I am hoping I can get by for 5 days but we'll see. Those small 1 pounders seem to last forever for just cooking.

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