DIY Hidden Winch Mount

[BAUS67]

Thanks guys.

Yes it's a 2.3L.

Yes frame bumps had to come off, have no idea what they are/were for but they're gone now

They are for the 2.7. I believe an oil cooler.

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[Deleted member 32220]

As with all of my junk, nothing real exotic here just doing what I can to avoid the Bronco Tax:

It looks better than Rough County’s offering, utilizing the stock skid plates. Cleanest look I’ve seen yet.

 

[Lèòn]

How much for the bracket/cooling plate? I suddenly want to do this myself

 

[redflipppper`]

When's the garage open? On the west side..... looks great.

 

[Donkeygyrl]

Good job

 

[mpeugeot]

It looks better than Rough County’s offering, utilizing the stock skid plates. Cleanest look I’ve seen yet.

Really? What's wrong with the Rough Country offering?

Seems pretty clean

 

[mpeugeot]

Thanks guys.

Yes it's a 2.3L.

Yes frame bumps had to come off, have no idea what they are/were for but they're gone now

They were for locating the frame during production.

 

[Deleted member 32220]

Really? What's wrong with the Rough Country offering?

Seems pretty clean

Nothing, I just like the look utilizing the stock steel skid plate.

 

[SROC3]

So I don't know what's cooler.......the hidden winch or your home garage with a full car lift in it

 

[peetuhr]

This is a beaut. Really well done.

 

[Jhuff]

As with all of my junk, nothing real exotic here just doing what I can to avoid the Bronco Tax:

Very nice work! This option would make me more likely add a winch.

My only concern (and I hate to be a back-seat engineer) would be whether some beefy reinforcements should be added from your mount and the frame to the exit point on the bash plate (or even completely float any such reinforcement through the plate).

Just eyeballing it, I would imagine anything other than a straight pull might put forces on the stock bash plate that will try to bend it down.

 

[Markubis]

As with all of my junk, nothing real exotic here just doing what I can to avoid the Bronco Tax:

Looks nice and clean, but from an engineering/physics point of view it's not going to work well. The pass through for the cable is not aiming straight forward. When you start winching anything heavy your cables going to drag heavily along the upper side of that pass through.
Your last picture shows the angle pointing down at a serious angle.
Gonna have tons of wear on the cable and the pass through.

 

[broadicustomworks]

Looks nice and clean, but from an engineering/physics point of view it's not going to work well. The pass through for the cable is not aiming straight forward. When you start winching anything heavy your cables going to drag heavily along the upper side of that pass through.
Your last picture shows the angle pointing down at a serious angle.
Gonna have tons of wear on the cable and the pass through.

This does seem to be true.
Maybe he would consider amending the design a bit and making a "box" type add-on to the skid to bring the rollers more perpendicular to the road surface? Nothing too crazy to compromise a lot of approach angle.
As it stands it is an impressive job, clean, and overall really cool.
Just a tweak or two (and a couple of gussets maybe for added lateral strength on the actual mount) and I think he has the money shot there.

 

[toughtoaster]

great work, but how will you access the "free spooling clutch" ?

This was my question as well. There are some other hidden mounts I was looking at buying but had no clue how you'd access the winch clutch.

 

[1970AMCAMX]

This was my question as well. There are some other hidden mounts I was looking at buying but had no clue how you'd access the winch clutch.

I have the rough country hidden mount on mine and you can access the clutch just be reaching down through the engine compartment, the only complication I have is that I used a Badlands Apex winch and the clutch lever hits one of the intercooler hoses when you rotate it.

I am going to trim the handle to clear and then add a short extension to it to make it a little easier to reach (it's not hard to get to the way it is)

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