Review & Install Video
This Mean Mother EDGE Series 12,000 pound winch with synthetic rope is for those of you that have a 1987 and up Wrangler and you're looking to add a very strong winch onto your Jeep. This winch has a slightly larger body and is a little bit heavier than some of the other ones on the market even though it has the synthetic line because it is very well built and it is very strong. Now, it's not going to be as strong as some of those winches out there that have an integrated solenoid over the top. That's a little bit more of a one piece design but this is going to be very beefy as far as a winch goes and for that, you are going to have to spend a little bit more money. This is one of the more expensive winches that we have. Now, the general rule of thumb for pulling power is that you want your winch to be rated at about one and a half times your loaded trail weight of your weight of your Jeep. So, if you have a big heavy four door JK, you're probably going to want to go with 12,000 pounds. If you have a lighter two door, not as much armor, you're not planning on getting buried up to the axles in mud, you can probably get away with a slightly lower pulling power on your winch and save you a few dollars there. Now, one of the big differentiating factors between this winch and a lot of the other ones that are less expensive is the fact that this has the synthetic line on it. Now, synthetic line is beneficial for a couple of different reasons. One, while it will still stretch under a load like a steel cable will, it doesn't store that energy so if the line were to snap, it'll just fall harmlessly to the ground instead of snapping back causing damage to your vehicle or worse causing injury to somebody in the surrounding area. Now, a synthetic line also isn't going to kink up and it's going to be very light weight which makes it a lot easier to drag up a muddy hill to the tree you have to winch to or otherwise just move around spool in, spool out.Now the only downside, if you want to call it that, to a synthetic line is that it's not quite as robust. It's not quite as maintenance free as a steel cable is. You are going to have to replace a synthetic line more often than you would a steel line and even though the newer synthetic lines aren't as susceptible to damage from UV light as some of the earlier lines are, this is still going to be a little bit more susceptible to abrasions or just generally wearing out from being dirty and being under normal use. So, you are going to have to keep this a little bit cleaner than you would steel and replace it a little bit more often and when you do replace it, it's going to be more expensive than a steel line. So, a couple of things to consider there. All in all, I do still prefer a synthetic line to a steel line because of the safety and the ease of use.In general, this is going to be a very well-built winch. It's going to be a very high-quality winch. It does come with the synthetic line and Hawse Fairlead for the synthetic line so it's a very nice package but, as I said before, it is going to be a little bit more expensive than some of the other options out there.So, like I said, this is a very strong bodied winch. It does have a separate solenoid pack, like most other winches out there. You can mount this in a couple of different locations. Right up on top here, you can remote mount it. You can do a couple of different things with that solenoid pack but it does have to be mounted pretty close to the winch. That's going to be what your remote control plugs into. This does have a wired remote which is pretty standard. There are some winches out there these days that are coming with a wireless remote. That lets you be a little bit further away from the winch during the actual winching process which is a little bit safer. But this is going to come with a wired remote with a nice long line on it so you can still get well out of the danger zone of the winch while you are using it and it is a nice rubber coated remote because usually they're just going to get tossed in the back of the Jeep. They're going to get bounced around so there's rubber coated and the switch on it has a really nice positive engagement feel so it does seem that this is going to hold up for a good long time. Again, very well built like the rest of this package.Now, this winch actually produces a little bit less horse power than some of the other winches, even less expensive winches on the market. Now, the reason for that is this is going to pull a little bit less power from your Jeep because it has a little bit less horse power. So that's certainly going to be a good thing. If you are winching in a scenario where your Jeep is not running, of course you are only going to be able to winch as long as your battery is good and without the Jeep running, you're not recharging the battery so that little bit of a less power draw is going to be a good thing. Now, where this makes up for that slightly less horsepower is going to be in the gearing. This is going to have a lower gear ratio or a numerically higher gear ratio which is going to allow it to be a very, very strong pull and pull a ton of weight even with the slightly less power.For the installation, this is going to be a pretty simple one out of three wrench install. It's going to take you probably about an hour to get it bolted up to your Jeep and all you're going to need is a socket set and a winch plate or a winch ready bumper. Of course, you're going to need that for any winch out there. That's not specific to this winch. You're always going to have to have a winch ready bumper or a winch plate in order to bolt this onto and have the strength you need to use this for recoveries. So, the first step is really going to be getting the winch mounted up to your Jeep, bolting it on to that bumper, bolting it on to that winch mounting plate. Go ahead and mount your solenoid pack and connect all the wires that go to the winch body itself as well as feeding the rest of the wires, there's two of them, that goes from the solenoid pack up through the grill, follow along the inside of the fender and get connected onto the battery. And that's really the only place you're making any electrical connections, is those two wires that go up to the battery and the shorter leads that go from the solenoid pack to the winch body itself. So, even if you're not somebody who's comfortable with automotive wiring, this is going to be a pretty easy install for you. After that, you do have the Hawse Fairlead that you're going to mount onto whatever fairlead mount you have on your Jeep. You can pull the synthetic line through attach the clevis hook onto it and make sure you throw your remote in your glove box so you're ready to go whenever you need your winch.So, like I said, this is going to be a more expensive winch than some of the other ones out there. This comes in at right around $850. It is going to be a very strong winch, it has a lower power draw due to the lower horse power but still tons of strength due the gear ratio that's built into it, so it does have some things going for it. Now, if you're looking for a specifically water proof winch, there are some of those out there that are going to be a little bit less expensive than this. If you want an integrated solenoid pack, again there are those versions out there probably a little bit less expensive than this but if you're just looking for a very high-quality winch with the synthetic line that's going to be very strong, I think that this is going to be a nice option as long as you have a higher budget. So, if you're looking for a premium, very high-quality winch and you have a higher budget, I definitely recommend taking a look at this one from Mean Mother and you can find it right here at extremeterrain.com.
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