The winch was a fairly easy choice, and had to be steel wire, not Dyneema. I'm not opening the steel vs Dyneema argument, it's just a personal choice. I have had some bad experiences with Warn, so was looking at the current Runva range. A friend of mine suggested taking a look at the 13000lb I-Max winch. It's a Chinese made unit, which seems to be getting some good reviews. They're priced at the same point that Runva were priced at when they entered the market. I picked one up for $328
It's a big, solid unit, no cheaping out on the castings here! When I got it home, I opened the thing up and found that it was properly packed with grease, and both the motor and the gearbox have a decent set of seals. They come with the usual hand control and wireless remotes. For the plastic fans, They also come in a Dyneema equipped model.As for what to bolt it on to, I decided to go with the Xrox, but with a twist; I decided to fit it without the wings (only the centre section). I bought one from my local Xrox agent, and merrily scooted home to start the install. And that's where the fun started
Pro-tip #1; the Xrox isn't really designed to take a roller fairlead. I had to make some 20mm spacers up to clear the fairlead mounting bolts.
Pro-tip #2; the I-Max is about the largest winch you can fit in an Xrox. The gearbox is a big mother of a thing, and I can't rotate the housing to a position where the clutch lever is readily accessible through the hole in the Xrox (the access hole is way too small for my hand, and I will be taking this up with Xrox). The front collision bar of the Triton also fouls the winch (details further down). The current position of the lever requires me to access it from the bottom. For the type of off-roading I do, it will probably be fine, but I'm looking to make a modified clutch lever to make it all proper.
First, I removed the plastic "C"channel at the bottom of the bumper, and the honeycomb part of the grill. Then I started trial fitting the mounting brackets, carefully notching the bumper as I went. As I'm not following the Xrox cutting instructions, I wanted to remove as little material as possible until I was able to work out the entire cut.
After much measuring, I finally worked out my initial cuts. I started at 105mm from the headlight bottom "peak", though the final cut ended up being 90mm to allow for the pinchweld.
I then drew the initial cut across the bar, which pretty much matched the number plate mount.
Out came the grinder, and the point of no return was passed. My thumb was reminded of how much it hurts to get molten plastic in the wrong spot.
Cleaned up all the burrs and fitted the pinchweld. It looks wonky in the pic, but I hadn't fully seated part of it due to a piece of offcut stuck in there. I pulled it off and re-did it. You also need drill out the spot welds that hold the number plate bracket. Don't throw it away, it'll be useful later
Now, as I mentioned, I had to cut part of the front intrusion bar to clear the winch. As the Xrox is a much better intrusion bar than the tinfoil OEM thing, I had no problem doing this. Nicely shaped cut, epoxy blacked and then some pinchweld.
The whole time I had been lifting the non-winch equipped Xrox for the fitting, so it was time to bolt on the fairlead rollers and the winch. This required some modification to the fairlead, and some 20mm stainless spacers, plus some additional length high-tensile bolts. I couldn't get the exact bolts (fully threaded) that I wanted, so they are on order, and I used some temporary ones. They do the job, but have washers packed under the heads, which is unsightly.
Then it was time to lift it into position and finger tighten all the bolts. After that, level it up and tighten. Then wind on the cable, which is always a dog of a job
Next up the number plate. It's always an issue to find somewhere to put it on an Xrox bar. I cut and modified the OEM brackets that I took off the intrusion panel, and used the winch bolts to hold them.
Then fitted the plate.
Side view. It's pretty compact, and IMHO, it keeps the sensuous curves of the Triton intact.
The last jobs will be to remote mount the control box, and fabricate an infill panel between the BushSkinz and the Xrox. I'm going to make this from perforated stainless to keep the airflow up to things. I wired the solenoid temporarily to wind the cable onto the drum, and have ordered some longer cable to complete the install. I will add this to the post when they get here.
