From here I moved onto the winch install.
At this point I would like to make a brief interlude with a side story as it involves the origin of the winch.
When I was a kid my father had a '79 Chevy short bed pickup. It was silver and had a fleet side bed, but he called it Old Yeller, because in it's original form it had been Yellow, and a step side. He sold it in 2001 or 2 and immediately regretted it. He loved that truck and always talked about how much he wished he never sold it.
One day I was driving through Montrose, Co and I saw this sitting on the side of the road for sale.
Being that I owe everything in the world to my father, I couldn't pass the opportunity up. '79 step side with 75k original miles, fresh crate motor for a great price. It does however have about a 3-4 inch lift, with 35s, 4.56 gears and detroit lockers front and rear. Oh yea, and a warn 12k winch. Now My father has never had any interest in such things and has always expressed his feelings that tall trucks and big tires are "stupid". Fortunately I know how to turn a wrench and plan on returning it to stock for him as soon as we have the time.
For those interested in how it played out, we parked it on the side of the road with a For Sale sign on it that was basically just a happy birthday note to him and drove by. He of course noticed it and said "Hey look!!! That's just like old yeller and it's for sale, turn around quick!"
Tears ensued.
At any rate being that I bought him a truck, and he didn't want or need the winch anyway, he gave it to me. So the way I see it, I bought a really expensive winch that came with an awesome truck that was admittedly difficult to hand the keys over. That thing is so badass and fun to drive.
One more next to the runner.
On to the winch install. I pulled the winch off Old Yeller. They had tac welded the bolts heads so I used the dremel to break the tacs, then just got new bolts. I have read that it isn't possible to mount a winch in the Shrockworks bumper without removing it, but I found it much easier to simply remove the grill and a couple brackets behind the grill, and drop the winch in from the top. Piece of cake really. The biggest obstacle was a low pressure power steering line which for some inexplicable reason takes the strangest route through the bumper area. A little persuading of the tubing this way and that, and the winch fits right in, no problem.
So again to correct some of the misinformation on this forum; Not only is it
possible but extremely
easy to install a winch in a Shrockworks bumper without removing it.
This shows the clearance between the hood latch mounting bracket, the nefarious power steering line, and the winch. Not an abundance of room to spare, but it does fit and the control module for this winch does not separate. One with a removable control module would be a breeze.
Next time you're sad, just plastidip some shackles
All done!
Loaded up and ready to go.
Just utilizing the factory cargo tray for now, but it's pretty flimsy.
All the work in this post occurred over the course of 3 days working solo. I think I could have been done quicker but I took my time with the tedious stuff as I wanted it to be dialed.
A well earned beer at the end of this phase of the project.
At the end of all this we left out of Houston on a 10 day road trip back home to Colorado. That really is entirely another thread but here are some teasers.
Not sure when I will start the next phase of the build since winter is coming up and we tend to focus on skiing. But I'm not done yet. Phase 3 will be a full cargo system in the back, Camburg upper control arms in the front, Air compressor, and maybe some 4.56 gearing. The gears were at the forefront in Colorado with all the mountain driving, but now that we are down here in the flat lands of Texas, they have been back burnered. I would actually go as far as to say the truck is almost "quick" down here.
Till next time,
Cheers!
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