Winch Install

Well, as promised, I am going to do my best to make a step by step tutorial on a winch installation. I will try and keep things simple, and the pictures to a minimum. On the 1st post I mentioned the desire to mount the contactor in a remote, isolated location sense the reason for stripping the front of the bike down. I abandoned those plans. There just isn't any room for the contactor that wouldn't require stripping the bike down even further. The Warn contactor has a good reputation for being waterproof, so I went with mounting it on the back of the winch plate as outlined in the instructions. If you have a 2000b winch, it will come with a brake to mount the contactor. Mine is a 3000 and didn't come with a bracket. I just drilled my own holes and bolted it directly to the winch plate. Once mounted, you can start populating the connectors with wiring. The main connectors are color coded, so it makes things easy. Use the short brown wire included in your winch box and connect it to the middle bayonet and the black main connector. The switch wires (green and black) will go on the outside bayonets.

Caveats: The only item that needs to be removed from the bike according to the instructions, is the front rack and the top plastic.. I chose to take the front bumper/brushguard, left front fender, all top plastic, and the front skid plate. This made for a very easy install and good picture taking. It does add at least an hour to the job though.

Also, this install is for the Yamaha/Warn installation kit. Other kits will work the same except for the fact you may have to manually splice into the ignition switch lead to make the winch switch hot with the ignition key.

Disconnect the battery leads, then you will want to mount the handlebar switch and rout the cables down near the battery. The handlebar switch uses a longer bolt and a sleeve included in the mount kit. Use the existing wire bundle to route the switch wires. Once down by the battery, look for the white connector coming off the ignition switch. Plug in the switch wire connector with the ignition switch connector. this will tap into the ignition switch making the winch hot only when the ignition is in the "ON" position. Now continue routing the switch wires down the left side of the bike. Use the pre-existing wire looms that the bikes harness uses.

Now you want to route the battery connections from the front of the bike up through the left side of the bike using the same wire looms that you used for the switch wires. This provides a good path for the cables. Route them right up to the battery. Don't connect them yet. Now is a good time to bolt the winch to the winch plate. I use locktite also.

Now you can bolt the winch mounting plate very loosely to the vertical frame rails, then re-install the left fender and front bumper if you took them off.

Now you can bolt the front of the winch mounting plate to the front bumper. Now tighten down all 4 mounting plate bolts evenly and to spec (37 ft.lbs.). Here are some side pictures indicating what your wiring should look like. Go for clean and out of the way. You will have a black and green connector coming off the switch wire, These are for a remote if you have the proper pigtail for one. My winch came with the remote, but no pigtail.

Now bolt up the fairlead, place the winch on freewheel and feed out a foot or two of wire and install the hook. Then place the winch back in lock. Now is a good time to re-install any other plastic and the front rack. Take your time. Once everything is together, give the winch a test. If you follow the wiring diagram for the contractor, you should have a perfectly functioning winch.

Here is the completed job. I have probably left out some information. None of this is hard. The dealer gets a minimum of $200. bones for this job. You can do it in a couple of hours. Its one of the more relaxing jobs I've done. I am new to ATV's, but have a lot of experience with motorcycles and snowmobiles. This ATV is by far much easier to work on. Just basic metric hand tools are all that is needed. And don't be in a hurry. Stop and think when you can't figure things out. Ask questions when needed. I myself am on this site at least once a day, as well as the grizzly forums. I hope someone gets something out of this thread. The money saved can buy some accessories or go towards some nice tires. Admins feel free to sticky this as needed. Thanks for looking, Jay.

Another Winch Install

I am a brand new ATV owner, Kodiak 700 EPS SE. I took the 18 month warranty instead of the winch, then purchased a Warn ProVantage 2500 and the Yamaha install kit. Last night I installed it.
I am not an experienced ATV owner, but have worked on British sports cars, which I thought was adequate training. It was. I spent about 2 hours in total on the install, and it was not difficult. Here's a few items I noticed that may be useful:

1. I ran the ATV front end up on ramps, makes it an easier chore.
2. Removed only the plastic battery cover and the plastic attached to the front bumper/grille (only the front two screws).
3. I followed the instructions in the mounting kit to the letter. There are a few small issues with that.
4. When it says to locate the accessory wire with the white clip, do so - then it tells you to follow that wire with the handlebar switch wire under the ATV on the inside of the frame. Check. Did that. But, it doesn't say to clip the handlebar switch wire INTO that accessory clip. I guess that was assumed. DUH.
5. The mounting kit does not tell you to remove the small bolt which holds the cable spool in place (for shipping I suppose) but that instruction is in the actual Winch instructions (not the mounting kit instructions). Make sure and remove the bolt before you mount up the winch to the ATV.
6. The red and black wires that run from the winch up to the battery are TOO SHORT. If you run them along the inside of the frame per the instructions, the won't reach the terminals!!! The actual winch box also had a red and black wire, I joined them and got the extra length I needed. If you do that, be careful that the red wire connection is well insulated and won't ground on anything in the battery compartment.
7. The mounting kit and the winch box have a lot of duplicate hardware. As a British car mechanic I'm quite used to having a few extra parts post installation, so I felt right at home.

Hope this helps.