Built a receiver winch mount

[Revco]

So I built my winch mount/receiver the other day, thought I'd share the process. Since my rig isn't a full time offroader, and I use my winch on my 18' car hauler trailer, I needed to it be versatile. I looked into buying the pre-made winch mounts, but none of them looked sturdy enough to get the job done. Most are made of 3/16" material for the plate and .120" wall for the receiver tube. I built mine out of scrap metal I had laying around in the shop...

First, a piece of 1/4" steel plate...

Cleaned it off and sprayed on some Dykem Steel Blue and scribed some lines into it, marking the holes for the winch bolts, and cut lines...

Then cut the piece to size and drilled the holes...

Then I cut a piece of 2x2x.250" tubing down to length and cleaned it up...

Marked the center of the tube for quick alignment...

Drilled a small hole dead center of the plate for alignment...

Laid the plate on top, aligning the marked centers with the hole int he center of the plate...

Then I got to welding. I had some 3/8" thick suspension tabs in the toolbox so I used them as gussets and finished welding it all up...

I cleaned off all the slag and Dykem, gave it a coat of black industrial enamel paint (no pics, as I was high and tired by then)

I still need to weld a front section on to mount the fairlead, so the paint was just to prevent flash rust. I loaned my plasma cutter to a neighbor, so once I get it back I'll cut out the fairlead bracket and get it welded up. I'll toss the whole thing in the sandblaster and give it a good coat of paint or drop it off at the powdercoating shop since I need to drop off some other parts for a hot rod project there soon anyway. I'll try to get more pics.

 

[High_Country]

Looks great man. Impressive welds - looks like you got some good penetration. I assumed you check to make sure you 2x2 tube would fit in the receiver first, right!!! ; )

I've considered doing the same thing - and now I have some pictures for a go by!

 

[Revco]

Thanks, yeah the 2"x2" slides right into the receiver.

The penetration is key on something like this. I did double passes on the sides of the 2x2. In the last picture, you can see the HAZ that is pretty even on all sides, proving that the penetration was consistent. I might beef it up more but I think it's strong enough for my 8500lb winch.

Those manufactured ones are usually only stitch welded, and use much thinner gauge steel. I'm quite confident in my welding, so I'm not worried about it. It took about an hour from start to finish using basic fab tools.

Sorry for the crappy pics, all I have is a cellphone camera and the lighting in the shop sucks right now since I took most of my lights down in preparation for my upcoming move.

 

[BurbanAZ]

looks good, great welds. I thought about doing this but just ended up making a bumper and mounting it on the front for good

 

[WeeJeep2]

Looks nice. Curious on what the holes in the side gussets on the underside are going to be used for? I ran a portable rear mount on my old Montero. It was the new place that would hang up and reduce departure angle. Not a problem for utility use or on the open beach where it went most often.

 

[Revco]

The holes probably won't be used for anything. Those are suspension tabs that I had laying around and used them as gussets. They already had the holes in them.

I don't plan on driving around with the winch mounted in the the receivers, on or offroad. It takes less than a minute to open the back door, grab the winch, slide it into the front or rear receiver, pin it, and plug in the power pole connector and it's ready to use. Knowing me and my schedule...the winch will spend more time mounted on the trailer than it will recovering my rig.