MattyzST
Member
Just wanted to let everyone that has a winch that you guys need to run it out more than you think.
I recently took my family to the snow for the day and on our return trip home i came across an accident on the snowy road. A young couple had slid of the road and down an embankment writing off her Holden Cruz.
The car was positioned in a way that it could be winched back up to the road quite safely and easily so as i was only second on the scene i offered to retreive her car from the ditch and at least have it on the road for the tow truck as it was indrivable due to damage.
Now i have a brand new WARN XP9.5 that came with the vehicle and it had never been wound off the drum. It is 2 1/2 yrs old though, but never used.
Anyway after positioning myself safely to pull her car out i free spooled approx 18m of wire out and then returned to my car engaged the winch and took the tension up on the wire. I turned to tell my wife to step away incase some thing went wrong and proceeded to winch but nothing only clicking! I tried to tap numerous items of the winch, solenoid box, motor, to no avail. By this stage there was a line of traffic banked up and time had lapsed.
With my tail between my legs I had to tell the poor girl i could do nothing for her but offer her a lift to the next town to wait for the tow truck and lift home.
I tested the solenoids the following day along with the motor following the instructions on the WARN website and found the motor to be knackered. After taking it out and to the local Auto Elec i was told it was full of water and looks like it had been from day one. The seals were just not sealing.
Now i havent been through any rivers, but i cant say if the previous owner did although the condition of the car tells me he looked after it very well and i dont think it was ever off road to be honest.
The Auto elec told me that you need to run these things every couple of months to keep the motor free and in working order.
I will run mine now every service if its not used in between. You only have to run it out 8 - 10 feet then back.
Just wanted to share my story so no one else gets caught out, luckily i wasnt stuck when i found out.
After returning to work the next week and talking about it with my work collegues one of whom used his XP9.5 the following week and guess what??................It failed with the same symptoms.
WARN were happy to help in fixing the issue but the cost of it to be rebuilt wasnt high and i wasnt the original purchaser so i didnt pursure it. Also if you Google it there are alot of stories of this happening all over the world with the XP9.5 being a repeat offender.
Anyway ramble over hope i can help at least one person from falling victim to the same problem i had.
I recently took my family to the snow for the day and on our return trip home i came across an accident on the snowy road. A young couple had slid of the road and down an embankment writing off her Holden Cruz.
The car was positioned in a way that it could be winched back up to the road quite safely and easily so as i was only second on the scene i offered to retreive her car from the ditch and at least have it on the road for the tow truck as it was indrivable due to damage.
Now i have a brand new WARN XP9.5 that came with the vehicle and it had never been wound off the drum. It is 2 1/2 yrs old though, but never used.
Anyway after positioning myself safely to pull her car out i free spooled approx 18m of wire out and then returned to my car engaged the winch and took the tension up on the wire. I turned to tell my wife to step away incase some thing went wrong and proceeded to winch but nothing only clicking! I tried to tap numerous items of the winch, solenoid box, motor, to no avail. By this stage there was a line of traffic banked up and time had lapsed.
With my tail between my legs I had to tell the poor girl i could do nothing for her but offer her a lift to the next town to wait for the tow truck and lift home.
I tested the solenoids the following day along with the motor following the instructions on the WARN website and found the motor to be knackered. After taking it out and to the local Auto Elec i was told it was full of water and looks like it had been from day one. The seals were just not sealing.
Now i havent been through any rivers, but i cant say if the previous owner did although the condition of the car tells me he looked after it very well and i dont think it was ever off road to be honest.
The Auto elec told me that you need to run these things every couple of months to keep the motor free and in working order.
I will run mine now every service if its not used in between. You only have to run it out 8 - 10 feet then back.
Just wanted to share my story so no one else gets caught out, luckily i wasnt stuck when i found out.
After returning to work the next week and talking about it with my work collegues one of whom used his XP9.5 the following week and guess what??................It failed with the same symptoms.
WARN were happy to help in fixing the issue but the cost of it to be rebuilt wasnt high and i wasnt the original purchaser so i didnt pursure it. Also if you Google it there are alot of stories of this happening all over the world with the XP9.5 being a repeat offender.
Anyway ramble over hope i can help at least one person from falling victim to the same problem i had.