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Search didn’t yield what I am looking for so I thought I would just ask. I want to add a winch to my wife’s 90. Found the factory kit which I do like because everything is hidden and it doesn’t change the look of the vehicle. Has anyone done this to their defender? Are you glad that you went this route? What did it cost you? Looks like parts are around $6000 which seems very high. No idea what the charge to install would be.
Picks of why I am asking.
Nuckle:
Great pics, thanks for sharing.
You are arriving into this topic at a good time, as we only had the two versions of the JLR winch (U.S./UK and Australian) for long time, and now have the Sarek bumper/winch, the Lucky8 hidden winch version and a hidded winch from the EU (which was first installed on the site this week).
The "I need a winch" question for the new Defender is NOT as simple to address as on other 4x4 vehicles, unfortunately. It might be worth your time to spend a bit of time on this forum to see lots of photos and commentary of the installs, costs and options.
If you have any questions, plese do not hesitate to ask. There are 10 to 15 folks who have been through the process already and are not shy to try to help:
Have you seen the reul hidden winch mount? Far sleeker than anything LR or Lucky8 currently sell.
Just looked that up. Very nice.
I guess I'm in some sort of Goldilocks middle ground: I want it "hidden" somewhat, but not so much that I (and other off-roading enthusiasts) can't see it's there unless I really inspect the front end. So I guess I want to see it, but for what I see to look particularly neat and well-integrated and potentially OEM. But I can totally understand why someone would want one that's even more hidden than the Proud Rhino/Lucky 8 solution.
I too wanted a cleaner look and liked the Reul approach. Here is the final look of the Reul tray with a UK Explorer 2 Red Winch which has an air brake and air spool solution that allo s me to free spool without reaching in to the winch. I ended up installing an ARB on board compressor as part of the job. I will say that it was an extremely tight fit but love the final result.
Note that this solution requires you to relocate the control box to the engine bay but they provide all the parts to do so.
I am in the factory winch mounts, misc parts and bar for $1750, I found it at a dealer that gave free shipping and no tax. I ordered the Zeon12 winch but after a long wait, I called warn and they said it would be a 12 month wait but I could have a evo now. I found the evo 10 synthetic for $850 shipped and went that route. Both the winches have the same warranty. I am not a hard core off-roader but fly fish deep in the mountains down some old washed out roads,no cell service so I wanted some insurance. I am in this setup about 2700 and I’ll install myself.
Frustrating that there is no factory-installed winch option. Even if you go OEM, the dealer has to hack up your brand new truck while he "learns" how to install. I'm sure there is some crash reg or liability reason why factory installation is not possible but that would be the real way to go.
Hey All, I also installed the Lucky8 Hidden Winch kit, it works great, but I've noticed the front camera relocate is problematic. Now that it's installed the front view and off-road view shows me "driving into space", and the under hood view is no longer accurate. The new camera location in this install does not appear to have the right angle. Has anyone else noticed this, and if so did you find a fix for it? Few pictures attached.
The front view, with the new "wrong" angle New camera angle (flat) vs stock bracket angle (20 degrees or so down angle)
01-07-2022 | 07:59 AM
