Well on the short: The install went horrible...... I dont think ANYTHING went right.... and some of it stills needs fixing.

I dont know if the little metal peices that where connected to the tow hooks need to stay or go....... so one side has them and the other dont...........needs to be corrected.........

and I was NOT aware that you was suppost to install the winch into the bumper before the rubi skid........and now im going to have the take the rubi skid off to bolt on the winch......retarded.........I guess I should have payed attention but it wouldnt have hurt to have that as a side note in the directions which didnt come with the bumper had to have them emailed ot me(see i said nothing went right).......I installed the bumper.... then the skid...........then tried to the winch but no luck........ the winch is a being a bitch and i dont know how I am going to install the control box.....its so hard to get to

This is my first winch setup so I might just not know how but the smitty bilt directions are worthless

If anyone can give me some advice it would be greatly appreciated

Best,
Derek

 

ahh that sucks balls...wish i could help ya man.

 

If your winch is the Smittybilt XRC8, then I suggest relocating the control box under the hood instead of mounting it on the winch. There is not much room on top side of the winch to place it on some bumpers (on mine, there was none, I had no choice but to relocate). I placed the control box on its side velcro'ed to the battery. You will need to purchase two 1 foot battery cables to go from the control box to the battery. The long cables that came with the winch will reach from the control box to the winch. You will also need to swap out the cables. The long cables stock location is for the control box to battery run. Just dremel off a small piece of the control box (so you can get to the connections, move the long cables to where the short cables are, and put the new cables you buy where the long cables were. I like this configuration much better than leaving the control box out in the elements anyway.

Hope that helps.

 

Thinks for the reply, I cant really picture how to change out the wires but I will play with it when I get a chance to go back to the shop to work on it...... there is no doubt I will be mounting the control box somewhere else there, no room on the winch

 

Sorry for the Issues your having Derek.


If you can take some pictures we might be able to find a good place close to the bumper to mount the control box. I've got a few possiblities in mind....

I'm going to add to the install instructions on the Rubi Skid that "winches need to be installed first" and I'm going to bold the one on the Basic bumper install instructions so it stands out more......

 

Thanks for the reply ex one

I love the bumper but man I just had some install issues..(probably more my fault lol).... as far as the pictures go I am going to resume the process on thurs(day off) so might be then when I get those pictures out to you..........

And man where those tow hook bolts hard to get out lol...... i had a good vise and had to beat the crap out of it to get them out lol.....

I have the bumper on just need to fix the left side by taking out those metal spaces that was on the tow hooks, which I am assuming arent suppost to be on there since you add the washers for the tapered hook

Either way would you recommend puttin locktite on the 8 bumper screws? they came to hand loose driving on the interstate for 10 min..right after intsall........ lol not good i dont think - i tightened them back up, but ill keep an eye on them everyday

 

Those pressed in bolts on the factory tow hooks were the biggest problem I had when installing mine. I ended up taking a sledge hammer and beating them out at 11pm in the front yard. I am amazed I didn't have the cops called on me that night. Other then that, I think Expedition One did a pretty good job with the directions on their site.

 

Blue loc-tite. Usually we put that as a note on all our instructions, but with the basic bumpers we used to have lock washers. Last month we decided to just go with loc-tite But I'm pretty sure the basic bumper instructions haven't been updated yet......Another thing to put on the list....