Anyone use a "Freedom Offroad" Winch? $320 for a 12k w/ synthetic line

In regards to a winch being waterproof, here's some good info. The "non waterproof" smittybilt winch is rated IP67, whereas the waterproof one is rated IP68. What's that mean? The first digit (in this case the 6) means "the level of protection that the enclosure provides against access to hazardous parts (e.g., electrical conductors, moving parts) and the ingress of solid foreign objects." So for these winches, they are dust tight.

The second number is the protection of the equipment inside the enclosure against harmful ingress of water. The 7 means "Ingress of water in harmful quantity shall not be possible when the enclosure is immersed in water under defined conditions of pressure and time (up to 1 m of submersion)." The 8 means it can go deeper than 1m.

What I'm getting at is that although a winch may not be marketed as "waterproof", it's still plenty water tight for 99% of our needs. I personally won't be trying to forge through more than a meter of water.

http://www.dsmt.com/resources/ip-rating-chart/

 

But sometimes you don't know how deep it is until you drop your nose in it. Lol.

 

Then you my friend need to adopt the stick method!

 

Hahahaha....do they make an official "expo" stick?

 

It's carved from a Bavarian elk's horn and costs $300, but it's worth it

 

But seriosly that was some good info on what the scale means on waterproofing

 

Been wondering about these myself

 

Was looking at these as well. Ended up going with Dirt King, but these really threw a wrench in my hunt for UCAs.

Overall, they do look ok. I like the OE type bushings and it offers 3 gussets instead of the usual 2 like camburg, DK, TC offer. The FOR has a gusset behind the ball joint cup, between the two arms. They also seem to be thicker tubing material than the others.

The FOR ball joint cup does seem to line up with the more name brand UCAs. I spent a decent amount of time with pics of the FORs, DKs, and Camburgs up, checking where each ball joint cup lined up in relation to the front shock tower, all were on the back side of the tower, between the spring and rear edge of the tower.

Why I ended up not going with them:

- Lack of info. Their main site is...strange. You can use their "select a vehicle" menu to pick Tacoma, and nothing comes up under UCAs, any year of 2nd gen's.
http://www.freedomoffroadusa.com/153351/12/0/0/control-arms.html

http://www.freedomoffroadusa.com/front-lower-control-arms.html

- The very obvious "Warranty/Returns" link in the main link section. Why? Is this an issue with their parts? The placement of it is the strangest thing to me, different than what is normally seen.

- Lack of reviews, good or bad. Hard to find anyone talking good, or bad about them. Mostly find "Has anyone tried these" type of questions regarding the FOR UCAs.

- Only info/review I could find was regarding the BJ nut. It's a nylon threaded lock nut. I did read one of the few Amazon reviews that said the lock nut stripped out right quick when trying to install. I like castle nuts and cotter pins more.

- Lack of being open about their replaceable parts. You could probably figure out what parts they use, they offer replaceable ball joints through their website they say....but they don't say what kind of BJ they use. Moog probably, just admit it, everyone else does. Same thing with the arm bushings.

- Lack of a reputation. Any rep, good or bad, other than inexpensive UCAs. 66 Tacoma sets have sold on Ebay. 150ish F150 sets have sold on ebay. And not many reviews....

- Straight up, I didn't want to be "That guy" who cheaps out then ends up having the welds break and looks like an idiot (have read the SPC/LR UCA welds break also....)

 

Warn is lifetime warranty + extremely reliable...ie. you may not need the warranty. 40+ years personal history with Warn. Will not consider cheaper brands.

 

Thank you for the information.
I've been wondering, I'm struggling with the winch decision myself right now. Thanks again for doing the research.

 

How "cheap" is cheap? Just because a winch is lower in price, that has little if anything to do with it's value when all is said and done. Reliability and performance over time carry a LOT more status. And warranty, while of some importance, can be over-rated in some cases. One popular brand has a fantastic reputation for their warranty. Well earned by the boatload of parts they give out.... They hand out replacement parts like candy. My issue with that is, their NEED to hand out parts. To me that indicates nothing short of a high fail rate. It is of far less importance how fast I can fix a broken winch once I'm home than it is having a winch that doesn't break down when I'm in the middle of nowhere. A number of friends have this "less expensive winch". Several got theirs off of Craigslist, etc, where they landed a very cheap winch that someone gave up on....because it was broken. Several others had electrical issues, etc, and managed to get parts fairly easy....allowing them to fix their winch. One person trashed 2 of the less expensive brand....Then bought a Warn and hasn't had another problem. Another person I know somehow blames his Warn winch because someone stole it... (They might not steal less desirable brands???)

Over a period of 45 years, I've owned 3 winches, 2 of which saw use on multiple trucks. The latest is less than 6 months old, and has only been on my current Tacoma. That said, they get used quite a bit. The first one was used hundreds of times. It had ONE issue in its life. The original Warn 8000lb winches used 4 generic Ford 3-lug starter solenoids in their control box. One of them went bad. I called Warn, they sent me a pack of all 4 as replacements. 2nd winch got used a good bit over the 10+ years I owned it, with not so much as a whimper. Current one has made 12 pulls so far...The last 2 were hard pulls. (All 12 were pulling other people...I can count on the fingers of one hand how many times in my life I've actually used one on my own truck!) No issues.

And I hear quite a bit how Warns are "double the cost". Maybe so when compared to the extremely cheap brands....(Like Harbor Freight) But...A new Smittybilt is $475 (+ or -) for a 12K lb. I paid $625 for my 12K Warn VR12S. Do the math....$150 difference (+ or -) ....NOT "double" as mentioned (in another thread) Warranty is similar (but not same) Smittybilt is 3 years electrical/lifetime mechanical. Warn is lifetime unconditional. Warn does sell some high end commercial grade winches that are quite pricey. Those are US manufactured and very costly. Those are often found on vehicles such as Fire Dept brush trucks, etc...

A large majority of Smittybilt owners I know tell me the very first thing you have to do when you buy one is take it home, split it open and remove the "cheap grease" (their words, not mine) and replace it with a higher quality product. Not such an issue with Warn.

Long story short...People that know me will tell you I'm "frugal" to a fault. Just don't believe in buying expensive things when there's no return on investment. In this case, I'll spend the extra few bucks just so I don't have to be fixing a broken winch.

Not going to argue with people about the quality vs price issue...But I won't be owning a lesser winch either.

 

Actually, most electric motors don't mind water at all. They run perfectly fine completely submerged. That's actually how you break in to r/c race motors... Corrosion will certainly get you, though.

It's more of the electronics that need waterproofing to keep them from shorting out. I don't know how any of the winch companies do their waterproofing (haven't bothered to look), but ideally you'd encase all the electronics and connectors in a rubberized coating, and I mean like dip the circuit boards in goop, not just make the box sealed (O-rings etc can break down over time, plastic cases can crack, etc...). It's a pain to service them if needed, but they're waterproof.

 

I don't know anything about Freedom but I bought a Smitty 10k synthetic line winch off ebay for $489.88. Reputable company, good warranty...only a little more $.....you decide.