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Discreet Winch Mounting for Discovery 2


elmscroft

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Hi All,

I already have a Warn M8000 winch, the older one with seperate solenoid box and was looking to mount it on our Discovery Td5.

We would prefer a discreet low profile mounting, if possible keeping as much of the original bumper as possible. There seem to be photos of what we are after, but no details.

There is a Land Rover part STC50260, but i'm not sure if this will give us what we want.

Any pointers or information welcome.

Many Thanks

Mike

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  • 2 weeks later...

The Land Rover part you've identified is actually to reinforce the bottom of the standard bumper & is the first part you throw-away when carrying out the discrete mount installation.

As suggested by Blanco follow, the "how to" on www.discovery2.co.uk - it's a good guide & with good photos.

Dependant on your front bumper type & how neatly you want it to look, you may need to modify the discrete winch tray mounts to fine tune the height & fore/aft position of the winch & fairlead.

I assume you already realise you'll have to find space in the engine bay for the isolator & operating relay / contacter & that access to the freespool lever will be difficult vs standard (very visible) winch installation.

I followed the how to successfully & have a really neat installation now (using a Warrior / Champion 9,500lb winch).

Paul

2001 D2 TD5 179,000 miles & climbing

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Thanks Paul. Out of interest which mount did you go for? As some are twice the price of others.

Did you run a split charge, with a second battery? If so any details or photos would be great.

It is early days on this, as it is the family car and finding time is the biggest issue.

This link is a good site.

Thanks

Mike

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Mike,

the mount I used was from a local fabricator (www.4wheeln.co.uk) - a copy of a TerraFirma or similar. I think most are almost identical, but I wouldn't be surprised if there were minor differences in hole positions & dimensions - dependant on which 1 was originally copied.

I don't think it matters which make you start with - apart from definitely avoiding those stupidly priced at over £100. They have no more features than the cheaper ones from what I've seen so far .
The only thing to probably check is that the steel is minimum 6mm (1/4 inch) thick, to make sure it doesn’t bend under winching loads.
I paid ~£70 & thought it a lot for 3 bits of relatively simple steel.

I ended up re-drilling the side bracket hole positions to fine tune the winch position as I said in my first post ( I tried slotting them with a file initially, but rapidly realised I wanted to move the positions more than I wanted to file !). I have a very short aftermarket steel bumper (FirstFour Shadow bumper), so I had less space to play with than the standard Land Rover bumper. Because of the size of the winch / winch cable position, I also had to re-drill the winch mounting holes about 25mm off to one side to centralise the winch between the chassis rails (Using 9500lb Warrior / Champion winch).
The front slot for the winch cable outlet was also made larger, longer & slightly higher to ensure that the winch cable didn’t drag on any sharp edges when pulling at an angle & to make sure it wasn't visible through the fairlead.

I think you’ve almost got to expect mods of some sort unless the winch is very small - because the space is so tight around it.

I did all of my installation work in a day, with the bumper still on, but loose & the grill off to allow access from above. If you’ve got someone else to help, great – but if not you’ll probably need to use wooden blocks or similar to support the winch mount while “fine tuning” & a trolley jack to lift the winch & mount assy into place before final fixing. Be ready for some bruised knuckles !

I've modified a steering guard to fit onto the discrete mount. If you want a steering guard as well as the discrete winch mount, I'm not sure if there are any you can buy that will fit without substantial mods.

I’ve not bothered with a second battery / split charge system as mine is also an everyday truck & winch use will be very occasional. I’ll just need to have the engine running when using it.

The end result is fairly neat

IMG_1313modred.jpg

I've also "cobbled up" a cover by modifying bits of my old broken bumper so thieving scr***s can't easily notice I've got a winch.

IMG_8969cropred.jpg

Paul

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Mike,

I've submitted a response to you additional questions, but it has not appeared yet (maybe awaiting moderator approval).

If it doesn't appear by mid-day Thursday I'll re-post in case its disappeared.

Paul

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