Dedman’s Custom 9000lbs winch and off road bumper

So as many of you may know my previous 4000lbs winch install failed quite badly due to a bad quality overloaded winch so I decided to upgrade to something more powerful.

The 9000lbs winch I got was far larger than the original 4k one meaning that it would not fit in the same location. The original mounting points were not really strong enough either so I decided to do a complete custom install.

I was originally hoping to get a cheap second hand SubaXtreme bull bar and mod it for a winch but after months of searching I gave up on that one….. However I still wanted something to improve approach angles and replace the plastic which was getting trashed

I was debating if I could modify a bulbar from a hilux or similar to fit instead of getting a SubaXtreme one when I just happened to stumble across about 12meters (in 3m lengths) of relatively thin walled galvanized steel tube on hard rubbish (what idiot put that on hard rubbish…) the perfect material to make a tube style bumper. I discovered that the steel I found is actually very hard to come by with most places selling much heavier tube which I took as a sign that I should definitely go ahead with this build.

After some investigation into other winch bar design I decided something like this would look good on the forester;



Went and picked up a sheet of metal and some angle from the steel place and was ready to go.
It was very interesting trying to securely attach a sheet of metal to the roof of the forester when the metal was wider and longer (6’x4’) than all of the mounting points……


I didn’t take to many photos along the way but here is what I have;




















And here is the finished product. It is the best approach angle obtainable with such a large winch and I am super happy with the result.












I also took a time lapse of the whole build which isn’t a bad watch if you can watch it in relatively high quality.

[ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4-vUoHTnnOo"]Subaru Forester Custom Winch Bar Build - YouTube[/ame]


You may also notice that I have a new sumpguard/bash plate.
It is made from 1.6mm steel with reinforcing angle protecting the sump which is damn solid. Mount in 6 places with 8mm bolts and provides great protection for the exhaust headers as well which my previous guard did not.

Here is a time lapse of that build but it isn’t as great to watch but still shows how much work went into it;

[ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGkUg6bmKP0"]Subaru Forester Custom Sump Guard Build - YouTube[/ame]

Super happy with how the forester is looking now =) Can’t wait to try it out!!!

Looks awesome!!! Great job, time lapse build is cool too.:ebiggrin:

Now you need to get out there and ummm, get stuck.:iconwink:

That looks wicked mate! Do you have airbags because if you do then I really want to hope you don't have an accident. You sure as hell wouldn't have any luck with insurance.

Are you making all these things in like a day each? Do you have any help or are you just extremely multi-skilled?
I need a hand to finish my home made rear bar for feel free to drive over to Perth anytime :lol: :iconwink: I got a spare bed for you :lol:

Nice build! This car is screeming for a set mud or AT tires! :ebiggrin:

taza said:

That looks wicked mate! Do you have airbags because if you do then I really want to hope you don't have an accident.

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No airbags. I have the base model so no safety features. Would not have considered this build if I did.

taza said:

Are you making all these things in like a day each? Do you have any help or are you just extremely multi-skilled?

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Im doing it all myself. Im a uni student so I have a 4 week break at the minute so I have lots of time to work.

Winch bar took ~6 days
Sumpguard ~1 day
Snorkel ~1 day
kings ~ half a day
trailing arm blocks ~ 1-2hours
diff breather ~ hour + half a day to get the stupid thing in...
cleaning carpet ~ half day

Tools used;
Arc welder
angle grinder
hacksaw
band saw (not needed if i wasnt lazy)
sockets and spanners
sander
tin snips

Pretty much anything (non precision) can be built with a welder and grinder

taza said:

I need a hand to finish my home made rear bar for feel free to drive over to Perth anytime :lol: :iconwink: I got a spare bed for you :lol:

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Haha If only Perth was not so far away.....

casperfromholland said:

Nice build! This car is screeming for a set mud or AT tires! :ebiggrin:

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Yep its on the to do list. once I have worn out the current ones and checked that the lift etc is not destroying tyres

you should be right for legality, the law for adr complains of bullbars isn't retrospective from 2001 (or so i've interpreted from reading the regs)

I've never personaly canceled a customers claim for having a bullbar when i was working in settlements and recoveries.

The lift should't cause any issues with the tires as long as they get a good alignement (which might need camber bolts... I did need 2 sets for my 2002).

Fantastic work & great vids too

Regards
Mr Turbo

Any close up shots/info in your mounting points?

hydrowill said:

Any close up shots/info in your mounting points?

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Did a little body work modification to mount it securely. Basically I just cut the ends of the frame rails open, slotted some angle into them and bolted it onto the frame. If you watch the time lapse it shows you what I mean. Ill take some pictures for you if you are still unsure. Let me know.

^ That's how you can make a rear bar for almost any Subie but the rails are already open as standard at the back.

Great vid...never seen anyone work that fast before! :rotfl:

Great job on the bar & winch...loks awesome with a fantastic approach angle

Some more pick would be great, its moving a lil too fast to quite understand whats going on. ha. One of these would look sick behind a subaxtreme bar.

So here is a better description of how the bar is mounted. Forester and I am assuming most other Subarus have pretty heavy rectangular-ish sections running between the front of the car and the firewall. I did heaps of calculations and worked out that they are heaps strong enough to take the winching load. If they were half they were half the thickness it would still be strong enough. They also provide a direct link to the front wheels which is where most of the winching force would be resisted when stuck.




On my previous Subaru (83 touring wagon) the ends of these sections are open however on a forester they have been annoyingly closed up. Basically I cut along the dotted line to open them back up again;




I used 75x50x5mm angle to insert into the now open section. I had to cut it down to 75x45x5mm as the section is only 50mm outer wide. Between the two angles is a cut down universal winch mounting plate which is ridiculously strong completely locking the two pieces of angle together from side to side.
This means that winching sideways puts far less stress on the car as the two angles can't twist in relation to each other.
I also mounted the winch upside-down so that the line of the cable pull is almost directly in line with the angle. This means that the winching force does not causing a twisting force (twisting about a horizontal axis from side to side)
Each angle is bolted into the body using 4 10mm bolts high tensile bolts (2 vertically 2 horizontally, horizontal bolts are also not inline with each other) Even if you ignore friction in calculations the 8 bolts have sufficient area to be strong enough not to pull out of the body metal or shear, with friction there is absolutely no problem.




One issue I found was that the angle can only be inserted so far before the internals of the body section change as shown below.




I carefully cut out bits of the angle to allow for further insertion. I didnt manage to take any good photos of this but this one kind of shows it. Each side is different. On one side i also had to remove an internal welded nut which wasn't doing anything but was in the way. That was a real mission.




I fish oiled the hell out of all the internal cavities and painted. On the final product I sealed the holes in the body work that I had cut back up again so less mud and crap would get in.

Hope that makes things more clear.
It is a bit over engineered but by god is it strong. I did a winch at 90 degrees to car pulling the front wheels sideways out of a rut and it didn't flinch at all.

Only issue is the weight (20kg for the bar and 20kg for the winch) So far not causing any issues though with the kings

Awesome that is exactly what I was looking for. Thanks a heep for that.

No problem. I didn't actually realise i had taken most of those photos or I would have included them in the original post.

Gen1 subaextreme bars are made the same way. Heavy angle iron inserts into the chassis rails and picks up the factory bumper bolts.

Thats a handy thing to know thanks

Great write up DedmanWalking especially with the included pics.
Well done mate

Regards
Mr Turbo

Few questions:

*Why did you use angle not RHS sized to fit inside the rail with bolts passing through?

DedmanWalking said:

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*why not use the nuts already there on the front (in the dotted area) for your attachments points? Are these welded to the front face plate so the face plate might peel off, not directly to the rail?

*Can you give a link to the winch you got?

I did heaps of calculations and worked out that they are heaps strong enough to take the winching load. If they were half they were half the thickness it would still be strong enough. They also provide a direct link to the front wheels which is where most of the winching force would be resisted when stuck.
.....
Each angle is bolted into the body using 4 10mm bolts high tensile bolts (2 vertically 2 horizontally, horizontal bolts are also not inline with each other) Even if you ignore friction in calculations the 8 bolts have sufficient area to be strong enough not to pull out of the body metal or shear, with friction there is absolutely no problem.

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You're not studying mechanical engineering by any chance? lol :iconwink: