1. is my bronze bull gear screwed on this side? It looks pretty rough to me... the last genius to have it apart must not have set the backlash up right... I guess if all else fails I can flip it around, as the back side still looks ok.
Back side:
And
2. Is 4-5 thou bushing clearance too loose? I measured 2-3 thou on the drivers end cap shaft bushing, but measured 4-5 thou everywhere else... it feels sloppy to me, and Braden recommends 1 thou per inch of shaft diameter, so it should have 1.75 thou of clearance, but I have read where that was too tight.
Having never had a winch apart (unless you count fishing reels), I'm certainly no expert on them. From what I can see in the pics, my guess is that the bronze gear is shot. You could possibly flip it and get some more use out of it, but it would be weaker than originally designed because of the thinner teeth. By flipping it, you'd only delay the inevitable replacement. Better to replace it while you already have it apart, I think.
The gear is toast, I wouldn't try to reuse it. It will not be easy to obtain a proper set up, and it may fail under load. If that happens who knows, further winch damage and very possibly personal injury and damage to surroundings. A winch cable is very dangerous, not wise to do something that could cause a total loss of control.
Shaft bushing clearance should be as close as possible, but free turning. .002" should be workable if you are careful to align the end housings properly. Braden says a little much on endplay of the worm shaft in my opinion. My personal preference with worm shaft bearing preload is about 0, free running by hand with no end play. This way, end play will be slight under a load, they actually call for around .010" - .012" I think. In my mind that is a little much slack going on.
yeha, the numbnut that I bought the truck from rebuilt the winch, and judging from his other handy work, I frankly wasnt surprised to see the trashed bull gear. It had a hell of a lot more than 10 thou end play. I think I'll part it out (whats left of it), but, save the end cases to make covers for the Ramsey winch, so that way it looks like a braden, but is a 6 ton electric.
Cal_Gary wrote:Yeah I need a pair of those bad boys too, and VPW wants $30 EACH for them. I could use the PTO drive with shifter as well....
Thanks,
Gary
$30 is not a bad price at all, I'm surprised VPW has them that cheap.
Home 
I guess if all else fails I can flip it around, as the back side still looks ok.
