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Most 4x4 quad owners like to
drive their Quads in the mud. If you are one of these types of
people than a winch is a must have piece of hardware. Polaris
Industries has come up with a Multi-mount system that allows
you to mount your winch on the front or the back of the quad.
Having both Mounts allows you to move the winch from the front
to the back of the Quad. Making your winch even more versatile.
The MSRP for the mounts are
as follows...
- Front Mount: $74.99
- Rear Mount: $64.99
The price of these mounts
are slightly on the high side. We would like to see Polaris
offer a package deal for buying both the mounts and wiring all
at the same
time. We feel that a $99.99 price tag for both mounts would be
appropriate.
After
purchasing the Polaris multi-mount kit, we took a quick look
at the instructions and proceeded with the installation.
First a few observations about the package.
This kit is truly a first class product!
All welds are very clean, with a nice powder coat
finish identical to the frame parts of the Sportsman.
When mounted it is rock solid and uses rubber dampers
(1” heater hose) to keep the unit from rattling.
One odd thing about the “package” is the lack of
one. All three
pieces are sold separately and do not include wire and
connectors. We
purchased the quick disconnects at a local industrial supply
store, and the wire at Home Depot to make the electrical
connections to the Warn A2500 winch.
Installation
itself went pretty smooth.
The mounts use existing holes in the frame and the
supplied hardware kit allows you to remove the factory bolts
and replace them with the longer ones of the same type and
finish. One minor
problem with the rear mount is that it requires you to remove
the muffler to allow for bolt clearance when removing the
factory bolt from the frame.
This step was not mentioned in the instructions.
After
mounting the winch bracket to our Warn A2500 winch, we also
attached the roller fairlead.
The second step was to install the front bracket.
This involved loosening the screws that secure the
radiator shield to allow access to the frame bolts.
Once removed, we slid the bracket in place and secured
it with the provided longer bolts. The rear bracket was the
same process, remove frame bolts, and replace with longer
bolts that compensate for the extra bracket thickness.
Once installed, we remounted the muffler and checked
all bolts for proper torque.
Next we
slide the winch/bracket on both the front and rear bracket to
check its operation and secured it with the provided pins.
One minor modification had to be made on the front
bracket, to keep the unit tight when sliding it onto the
brackets, 2 pieces of 1” heater hose are used as isolation
dampers. Ours
were a little long and would not allow the unit to slide on
far enough to align the holes and pins.
To remedy this, we simply took a box knife and trimmed
the excess until a tight fit was achieved.
With the
installation complete, we completed the wiring to allow power
from both front and back and went out to test our new winch.
Even though pricey, the ability to move your winch from
front to rear in a matter of seconds really provided the
ultimate in winch efficiency.
Although there are many different options when mounting
a winch, we feel this option is worth the extra expense based
on versatility alone.
To move the winch, you pull
the two silver retaining pins, disconnect the winches power
supply, and slide the entire assembly off the mount. To
replace the winch you just slide the winch assembly on the
mount, replace the two silver retaining pins, and connect the
power supply. Moving our winch from front to back was made
easier with the quick cable disconnects we picked up at our local
industrial supply store. These are the Gray Blocks you can
see in the pictures below. You are now ready to winch yourself
out of your favorite mud hole.
One
other plus to the multi-mount setup is that you can mount a
number of Polaris racks and accessories using the same
receiver. A full
list of accessories is available at www.polarisindustries.com.
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