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Chinese winches. Smitty, Warn, etc. are they holding up worth a damn?

Kurt0

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Understanding that if a company demands and “”enforces”” the right QC on materials, tolerances, and assembly; chinese manufactured things can be “fine”. As inunderstand it, only the warn zeon and xp are still US made correct?

are these chinese winches holding up to repeated use? The warn or smittybilt gen3 specifically?

or are they not ready for prime time?
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From my experience with 2 Smittybilt winches, they worked great. I had an older XRC8 on my JK. More than once it pulled me, and multiple other Jeeps, through trail obstacles.
I only used the X2O on my JKU a couple of times, but it worked just fine. I did keep covers on them both, and cycled them once a month (pulled out 20-30 feet, and wound it back in).
 

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My shittybuilt has been fine, used it at least 10 time now. Yes, most of the Warns are Chinese as well, probably made in the same factory. FWIW the only winch I have ever had fail on me was a Warn, but that was decades ago.
 

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My Warn VR-10 has been fine, probably about 5-10 pulls on it in the last year or so (Thanks COVID). I've had a good $15 cover on it from Amazon and it's fine. It dragged me over rocks, recovered me and a couple buddies at Rausch this past summer, and my buddy's dad's car when he slid into a ditch last winther

I wouldn't worry too much. For me, Warn has a warranty that will back it up and you should be able to get parts for it until the end of time. I needed a Solenoid for my old XD8000i in 2014, and was able to look up the part number and order it from a local Warn dealer. That was after the winch had been discontinued for at least 8 years. That winch is mounted on my buddy's TJ Rubi now, and has been helping him out around his property. The only reason I replaced that with the VR-10 was because I wanted to err on the side of caution with the heavier Jeep.
 

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Understanding that if a company demands and “”enforces”” the right QC on materials, tolerances, and assembly; chinese manufactured things can be “fine”. As inunderstand it, only the warn zeon and xp are still US made correct?

are these chinese winches holding up to repeated use? The warn or smittybilt gen3 specifically?

or are they not ready for prime time?
Mine are. I've got an old Engo that is about 10 years old or so and it is doing as well as ever. My Smitty is 3 years old and has done quite a few pulls. No complaints.
 

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Kurt0

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Great. Thanks folks.
 

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My shittybuilt has been fine, used it at least 10 time now. Yes, most of the Warns are Chinese as well, probably made in the same factory. FWIW the only winch I have ever had fail on me was a Warn, but that was decades ago.
Actually the spindle assembly and wiring harness are the only parts made in China from the WARN EVO series.
 
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Kurt0

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Actually the spindle assembly and wiring harness are the only parts made in China from the WARN EVO series.
not being a dick;

how do you know that?
 

WAOLIFE

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not being a dick;

how do you know that?
Warn published the document with a comparison of EVO and ZEON winch capability datasheet. Country of origin was one of the fields.
 
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Warn published the document with a comparison of EVO and ZEON winch capability datasheet. Country of origin was one of the fields.
so it had country of origin for all the parts, and those are the only two that are chinese made??
 

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WAOLIFE

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But as soon as you read it, you want that darn ZEON over the EVO just for the gains in every catagory.
 
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Kurt0

Kurt0

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But as soon as you read it, you want that darn ZEON over the EVO just for the gains in every catagory.
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Actually the spindle assembly and wiring harness are the only parts made in China from the WARN EVO series.
Thats cool, I wasn't trying to down them, I think Warn makes good winches. They are a pretty high price point for some people though and I think there are some other good options out there.
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