ARCHIVE Wits' End- JDM Toyota Electric Winch Complete Rebuild

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PART SEVEN: Machining the Housing​

We had the elephant in the room to still contend with. The bearings were one issue but the really problem was the fact that the motor and the driveshaft were ruined when the cable separated the drum and motor and caused the two to grind down to a nub. Not it won't interconnect properly. After looking it over there was really only one option since the drive shaft is no longer available from Toyota. We needed to machine the motor's end plate to get the motor closer to the drum. Then we needed to flush cut the shaft so that it will fit in the groove on the motor. This required putting it in the lathe and turning some cuts. As it turned out, it worked like a freaking charm!!!

 

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PART EIGHT: Assembling the Pieces​

Now that everything has been vapor honed it was time to tape off the important bits and paint the exposed aluminum bits. Came out great. Couldn't be happier.

 

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One the drum, just in front of the bearings, is the drum journal where the X-RING seal rides along. The issue here was that there was some minor pitting that would absolutely caused leaking. The decision was made to use epoxy on this surface to build up the pits. One dried it was carefully ground down smooth. Another winner.

 

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The winch's clutch pack gets assembled into the modified driveshaft. As you can see, the motor now sits closer to the mounting bracket after the machining.

 

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The roller bearing gets reused because it was perfectly fine. Then the c-clip is installed. The clutch pack and driveshaft is then inserted into the motor.

 

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Now onto the planetary gear side. First step is to install the winch lock/unlock handle. Nothing can go in unless this goes in first. Once the handle is in the clutch fork is installed. This is what moves the gear in/out to lock/unlock the drum.

 

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Now its just a matter of reinstalling the planetary gear pack. All three of these gears have been sitting in ATF for about a month while everything was getting assembled and ordered. It took some time to get these gears all smooth running again but they all eventually did. There are three gear sets that really only go in one way. All three stack onto each other and then the final drive gear is installed.

 

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A new OEM gasket goes in and the freshly painted cover goes on with freshly painted hardware. The drive gear for the drum is installed and then the drum itself is then dropped in on top of it.

 

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The last step is putting all three pieces together and giving everything a quick spin. Spins super smooth!!

 

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Side view of the final assembly. You will notice the location of the fill plug. It must be set at either 3 or 9 o'clock because you are supposed to fill in the gearbox with Dextron ATF until it starts running out. And thats what we did.

 

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Damn it looks good!

 

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PART NINE: The wired remote​

Did a bunch of testing on the remote and it mostly working fine. But there was a huge section of it that was cut into for *I think* a repair and it was just a bunch of taped splices. It was horrible. Everything was stripped away and new splices crimped and individually heat shrunk before the entire cut section was heatshrunk using adhesive lined heatshrink. Now that it was done and tested again it was time to repair the cracked handle. The main reason to repair the handle is because if it gets wet or dropped in the mud/water then this remote is toast.

 

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The handle was opened up to expose the circuit board, the crack and the damaged or-ring. The circuit board was cleaned up using an electronic parts cleaning spray and set aside. The o-ring was trashed but Toyota doesn't have the o-rings available any longer. As it turned out the 1FZ oil pump o-ring is the exact same O.D. and type as the winch handle o-ring. The o-ring was spliced in place and RTV'd to join them.

At this point it was time to get the handle sealed and repaired. A two part ABS epoxy was used to bond and seal everything together and put into a clamp to let it dry overnight. It was then all reassmbled back together and its working perfectly. But before it was put back together, the wiring was used to test the winch in place after it was installed in the truck.

 

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The winch's remote connector was mostly fine so the only thing done to it was to clean up the cover and chain. The bracket was removed, cleaned up and then painted. The rusted mounting hardware was replaced by new metric stainless hardware.

 

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The winch was installed and all mounting bolts aligned the way we hoped. The winch plate was cleaned up and painted using Eastwood Satin chassis paint. Love this stuff. The winch plate was installed along with the new Factor 55 offset fairlead. With everything installed it was time to test the winch using the repaired winch remote.

 

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The 75ft 7/16" synthetic rope from Yankum Ropes arrived so it was time to install that.

 

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PART TEN: The winch handle​

One of the two last pieces of the winch puzzle was the winch handle, there wasn't one. I had a customer send me a photo of the one he had. That was all the starting point I needed. It then made sense why those formed holders were in the back of the winch cover. So with the winch's locking handle off the winch, I was able to start the hunt. Turns out Toyota doesn't make replacements any longer and it seemed most people I asked was also missing the handle. After a few trial 3D prints it was time to start making the final piece in aluminum.

 

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The aluminum CNC'd handles were machined and send to anodize. As soon as they arrived it was test fit then etched. The OEM version just says WINCH but that was boring. Since this was a JDM81 with Japanese writing everywhere, I decided to etch it in Japanese instead. Came out great. Because I felt like being a dork, I made a little case for the customer instead of him sticking it on the winch cover.

 

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Added a bunch of updates staring at post #32:

ARCHIVE - Wits' End- JDM Toyota Electric Winch Complete Rebuild

 

[DivByZero]

That's amazing work! I've always been curious about the factory winch. Never seen one in person, and there wasn't much about it online when I last looked. Thanks for the detailed write-up and great pics!

I've got a Warn 8274 on my 80, which is working but in need of a major rebuild. Your thread is making me think over that future job again.