52 M37 – Now With Winch

[sturmtyger380]

My 52 M37 I am working on was a non-winch model. I had in the past thought it would be nice to be able to put a winch on the truck but it was not a burning desire to have one. I had looked at the manual and seen all the parts I would have to change to add a winch. Looking around on vendor pages, on VPW I saw they have a lot of the parts to add one, but too pricey for my truck budget.

So I saw on FB a guy who was parting out a 63 USMC M37. He was going to scrap the original engine if no one wanted to buy it in a couple of weeks. I contacted him and ended up driving about 4 hours to pick it up. Well he had a winch as well from the truck. So I made a package deal. I ended up with the engine with transmission and PTO. The winch came with all the bits to be able to add one to my truck.

Winch and parts from the 63:



Engine and Transmission with winch PTO



Pics of the winch bumper that needs some work to straighten out things.





Once apart the winch that looked good on the outside was rough on the end with the gears. The seals were gone and there was no gear oil. Someone had opened the case cover and packed wheel bearing grease in the gears. The cone bearings fell apart when I pulled the retainers off.

Totally destroyed winch worm



The bronze gear was totally gone as well. I found a new one but these gears are crazy expensive. I paid more for this gear than I did for the whole winch set up.



So now I have a winch. It was a good deal but still will impact my truck budget but I think in the long run is an improvement.

[06boblee]

winches are great! It is very fortunate that you were able to get all of the needed parts at one time. Repair is the name of this game. Looks good.

[just me]

Out of all the things I've rebuilt on my truck; trans, transfer, engine, pro, carb and winch; the winch was by far the most fiddly and difficult thing to get right. The carb was second after having it passivated and automated to resist alcohol fuels.
But if I ever need to do I second one I now have all the tooling.

[sturmtyger380]

by far the most fiddly and difficult thing to get right.

What made it so fiddly? I know Charles talked about getting the halves aligned. Other than the top plate the bottom bar is the only adjustable thing I have seen on the winch. There is the adjustment of the play of the worm gear.

My truck is an Army truck. If I put the USMC front bumpers on with the extra lift rings it won't match. I will have folks saying, you know you are missing xyz on your truck if you want it to really be USMC. I could cut them off or try to trade them to someone that want's USMC bumpers. Or just live with them. Any thoughts?

[just me]

The L in LU means light.. As such, it is mostly airplane metal.
The previous owner really abused it and the bearing retainers were warped, the bull and worm were ruined, water had flooded it.
Every seal surface was damaged.
I used MU ferrous bearing retainers. Had to repair every seal surface. Installed time-serts in every thread and had to make all the seal and bearing installers. Replaced the gears and made new drum bushings and reamed to fit.
It was just a job of work to do completely and correctly.

[Cal_Gary]

Well done Sturm!
I too, had to piece the winch setup together but am glad I did, even with the winch off right now due to needing to be refreshed (seals, internal inspection, etc.). I also had USMC bumperettes on mine, and finally cut them off (intact, if someone wants them-shoot me a PM with an offer. One is bent but could be straightened with a gas-axe). I too have an Army truck and couldn't wait any longer to find some USA bumperettes. I know UTTAS and some others have been looking for bumperettes for a long time so they seem to be hard to come by.

Congrats on the deal!
Gary

[PoW]

Yep, the bumpers were the money shot in that deal.

PoW

[sturmtyger380]

Since the roller bearings and races were shot I decided to take them out first. No need to do a careful extraction so I welded a couple of scrap pieces in the races and they came right out. The seals looked like the original leather ones.

Look at the strange extra metal on the face of the aluminum casting. How can that create a tight seal. I can run my fingernail over it and it is easy to hang up on. Maybe on the outside it doesn't matter.

[Cal_Gary]

Interesting how you pulled those races-I always wondered how I'd do that if/when I need to. Now I know. And yes, that surface needs to be tidied up for sure.
Great photos-thanks for sharing!
Gary

[just me]

Per Braden, the bearings and housings are sold as a non serviceable unit. Your housings definitely need to spend some time in a mill. And then thicker preload shims

[sturmtyger380]

That's the outside facing face of the bearing housing. I don't remember if this was the one that is the cover for the input shaft or the one that has the brake wheel and cover. But yes I plan on making that surface more smooth.

[sturmtyger380]

I am still taking the winch apart. I expected a battle to get the plug out to get to the snap ring of the shift handle.



It just fell out after I welded a bolt to it to use my slide hammer.



The snap ring looks good.



Getting the shaft out was a bear. Once it got past the galled part at the top it still had to get through the shift yoke. I thought I would break the yoke. Finally it came out.



Back looking at the shaft for the worm gear. The end that goes into the clutch housing has this grove in it. At first I thought the shaft was worn but it appears to not be a ridge but just a groove. Anyone else see this?



I held the worm shaft up and put it into the housing bushing. I can wiggle it around but don't know how tight it should be to the bushing/bearing. Anyone know?

[just me]

The specs are in the TM that covers the winch.

[Elwood]

I held the worm shaft up and put it into the housing bushing. I can wiggle it around but don't know how tight it should be to the bushing/bearing. Anyone know?

"Wiggle" is a rather imprecise measurement, so it's hard to say if you have too much clearance, but it would be enough to make me concerned about bearing (or less likely, shaft) wear, out-of-round, and taper. Especially from your description of how abused this winch was before you acquired it.

If you have a copy of Machinery's Handbook (or Audel's or similar), you can find the formulas for calculating bearing clearances based on materials, shaft diameter, shaft speed, lubrication, loads, etc. If you'd rather not wade through all of that information, a general rule of thumb is 0.0015" bearing-to-shaft clearance per inch of shaft diameter. This application is relatively low-speed and non-pressure lubed, so the tolerances and roundness of the shaft and bearing are not as critical as say, an old electric motor with plain bearings operating at several thousand rpm.

Remember, too, that a plain bearing, especially a thinner wall like these, will get tighter after it's pressed into the housing, so measuring the bearing before installation will not be very accurate. If you don't have the tools and practice to measure and size a bearing, a skilled, job-shop machinist might be preferable and shouldn't be that expensive.

I can't recall now which military parts vendor I bought from, but when I was working on the winch from my M37, the plain bearings sold to me for the shaft required a fair amount of work to get them to the correct ID. Don't assume that because a vendor says the bearings are for a certain application, that they will fit and work out of the box!

[just me]

tm9-8031-2
Find a PDF and download. Specs and overhaul in back.