I have a 105 series and I've been doing it up now for a couple of years.

So when it came to choosing a winch, the trusty WARN M8274 high mount came highly recommended. It's known
to be a strong, reliable, and proven old school winch that's still widely used around the world.

I hunted around for a couple of months and eventually I found a reasonable 2nd hand 8274 on Ebay for AUD$810
delivered (from a guy in South Australia who said it was in his shed for over 10yrs. Seem a lot of people have
these in their shed for many years before deciding to part with it). To me it seemed to be in good working order
and was only missing the rope + hook.

The parts list and exploded diagrams for the various 8274 iterations are here:- Warn Industries - Replacement
Parts

Unless you have a really old winch (like mine which predates serial# 348069), then you need to look here beacuse
for some reason it's not / or I couldn't find it on the WARN
website:- http://www.dojodesign.com/toyota/warn/M8274_RPL_Old.pdf

This is how it looked when I unpacked it.

From what I have gathered, the motor fitments are like this:-
1974 to ~1986 - Prestolite motor / model MRV-B-3 rated @ 2.1HP with keyed shaft
~1987 to 1998 - Bosch motor / model MRV-B-4 rated @ 2.5HP with splined shaft
1998 - present - Warn motor / Warn Part# 7536 rated @ 4.6HP
Alternative - Warn motor / Warn Part# 68608 rate @ 6HP

I've never owned an electric winch before, and never seen an 8274 in action though I did have a PTO winch on my
60 series for the best part of 10yrs. Even so this electric winch stuff is all quite new to me so I had some
homework to do on the 8274. I was surprised at how much info there was available, and easy to find!

Here are a few threads I found / some good write ups on 8274 modification and overhaul:-
How old is your Warn M8274 ? - Patrol 4x4 - Nissan Patrol Forum
Rebuilding the legendary Warn M8274 electric winch step by step
Warn 8274 rebuild
My WARN 8274 rebuild part 1.....
Stronger Warn 8274
Warn 8274 experts, CONVERGE!!

I wanted to overhaul the winch regardless and after reading all this info, I also decided to make a few mods at the
same time. Being a fitter / turner in a fabrication business, most of the mods below turned out to be quite cheap
and easy, though the +76mm GP drum is a little expensive. And so is the synthetic rope if buying the branded
material.

Mods on the wishlist for this winch build:-

1) Fit drain and fill plugs to the main housing

2) Brace the floating end support
3) Fit improved friction material in the brake assembly
4) Drill and tap the brake shaft, machine washer to fit (to prevent circlip from flying off)
5) Drill and pin the OEM free-spool lever (to prevent untimely disengagement)
6) Drill and tap the brake pawl, fit grease nipple
7) Install Allbright solenoid pack
8) Fit +76mm Gigglepin air free-spool drum
9) Fit SS Hawse fairlead with synthetic rope and safety thimble
10) Fit high-output 6HP Warn motor

Before doing anything I hooked some jumper leads to the solenoid pack and tested it as best I could (there was no
winch cable or bar to mount the winch to). Even so everything seemed to be in good working order, no problems
yet!

Then it was time to strip down the winch, and once I had it apart I thought it looked pretty good considering it's
from 1983 and more than 30yrs old!
I'm interested to see the real condition of things once all is stripped and cleaned, and to see what prices are for
the necessary spares.
Last edited: Sep 29, 2016

1.
2. I got mine from Summit. Here is the link. http://www.summitracing.com/parts/spw-90-14452 $111 now I
see. Warn also sells a version of this but it's quite a bit more I believe. Search the part number or '8274
contactor' or 'albright contactor' and you'll find a more info on this mod than you ever wanted to know. Its
really simple to do, just fighting with the damn big ass power cables is the only part that is a pain. Just
mount it wherever you like (on the winch inside the warn box (it can fit into the original box if you want to
go that way), or under the hood (I fabbed a bracket and mounted on my passenger side TJ fender well,
resulted in a real clean install and has worked great). I pasted in a typical diagram below I found on the
web. Basically the contactor is just a big ass heavy duty relay that pulls in two different circuits depending
on whether you want to go in or out. Nothing magical happening and I think a ton more robust than the
solenoid rats nest. Then there is a hot from the batt (big cable) and 3 cables out to the 8274 motor
(armature A, F1 and F2). Then there are 4 (I think) wires to the controller (a hot, in, out and ground), some
have 5 wires but do some reading and it will be clear. I also welded a 5/16" bolt to my motor housing to
use as a ground lug and grounded all my grounds directly to that lug then used the big cable back to the
negative on the battery. Use welding cable not battery cables for your heavy wiring. probably anything
bigger than 2AWG will work but I went with 2/0 and frankly its too big (too hard to maneuver). Probably
would used 1/0 or 1AWG if I did this again. Just go to a welding shop to get the cable, the welding cable
has a better insulation on it (more resistant to crap) and more importantly will be many more strands that
make up the cable vs. batt cable wiring. Get the terminal lugs
from http://www.genuinedealz.com/ (thanks to @shawn ) and put on some mil spec battery cable
terminals while you are at it. When you get your lugs from genuinedealz, also get some adhesive lined
shrink tube for all these connections, good product and makes a nice install. On your controller extension
cord, nothing magical about that thing either. Both ends of the original warn controller cable come off
with some persuasion and you can figure out what does what on that and put a better end on the plug in
terminus and then use whatever type connection you please rather than the cheap ass warn plastic crap. I
used a metal trailer plug but I assume you can get something even better than that. If you are doing all
this, it's also not too much more trouble to wire it into the cab as well while you're at it. Google this stuff
and it's all quite well documented, just make sure it makes sense when you read it as like anything else
there is always a few bullshit ideas amongst the good upgraded on the innerwebz. PM me if you have
questions, I did this entire mod back in the spring and worked out great. Happy to try and help or take
some pics if needed too.
benmack1, Jan 3, 2015
#17
shawn likes this.

3.

benmack1
Here's my set-up using the superwinch contactor under the hood. All the big cables are 2/0 AWG welding cables.

Contactor under the hood. Use some boots on the ends of the big ass cables. The fuse is on the hot wire going to the remote
plug. The 3 small wires on the spade terminals are the ground and in/out from the remote plug.
Shitty picture, but this is the ground lug welded onto the motor housing.
More boots on the cables on the motor. Notice no warn plastic shit box anymore.
Contactor, top side. Mounted with a home made bracket to the fender. Picture looks like its close to the alternator but it's
deceiving, it's several inches away. I don't have A/C, if you do, you may have to negotiate that a bit.
Mil spec batt terminals on shitty battery. When you do this upgrade it's a good time to put new ends on your OEM batt cables.
remote plug, mounted in the grill. Fabbed a simple bracket for that and mounted to the side of the radiator on drivers side.
Full frontal
view
Another pic of the ground lug in the back and the F1, F2 and A cables
To insall the lugs on all of this, I used one of these and my shop press. Makes a really nice crimped connection that I can't see
ever coming loose. Like 10 bucks or something for this thing.
Last thing. While you are upgrading, it's a good time to shitcan the damn aircraft wire cable for some 3/8" dyneema or amsteel
synthetic rope. It's actually about twice the tensil strength as the cable, flexible, light and won't probably kill you if it ever did
snap. Also, with some reading, you can splice your own ends onto it at will, very simple to do and a nice upgrade. Do your
homework and you can get it for $125 or less for 125 ft (or you can also spend $350 if you don't look around).
benmack1, Jan 3, 2015

#18

drkelly and shawn like this.

4.

shawn
Somebody on here pointed out to me that the Warn brand contactors have an extra set of contacts to energize the pack. It's an
extra possible point of failure, but does add an additional safety margin against the contacts welding together. I'm using the
$100 Superwinch contactor on our 8274, but might try the Warn one the next time around.

Also, to anybody close to Raleigh, I have an actual crimp tool that you're welcome to use to terminate cables. I'm ashamed to
admit that I bought a bunch of parts from genuinedealz.com with the intention of redoing a bunch of wiring on the trailer and
the Jeep, but haven't gotten around to doing any of it.
shawn, Jan 3, 2015

#19

5.

shawn
I have purchased the military style battery terminals at NAPA before. It was a special order item, but they had them in a day or
three. I think there were two terminals to a box (box of negatives, box of positives):

NAPA military battery terminals

728222
728223

I'm not sure these part numbers are current anymore, but it's a starting point.
shawn, Jan 3, 2015

#20

6.

OnlyOneDR
I cannot take original credit for the connectors one, someone modded my winch before I bought it used, but I converted my rear
winch. The connectors are stout and since they screw together will never come loose when you are trying to use them. They are
sealed to the elements if you use the screw cover. They are not cheap but nothing good ever is.

I did do the soldenoid however. Here is how my solenoid looks under the stock solenoid cover, same one mentioned in the post
above from Summit Racing (Superwinch contactor). Turned sideways it fit pretty well and left room for me to install a terminal
block to make wiring the in-cab controls easier:
The connector is a circular MIL-spec Amphenol connector. The pictures are "representative" off of Mouser's website, not the
actual connectors.

Male Connector for Remote:

Mouser Part #:
654-MS3106E18-4P
Manufacturer Part #:
MS3106E18-4P

Description: Circular MIL Spec Connector 4P #16 PIN CONTACTS

Female Connector:

Mouser #: 654-MS3102E18-4S

Mfr. #: MS3102E18-4S
Desc.: Circular MIL Spec Connector4P #16 SKT CONTACTS

Screw Cover:

Mouser #: 654-APHMS25043-18DA

Mfr. #: MS2504318DA
Desc.: Circular MIL Spec Tools, Hardware & Accessories

Here is what they look like covered up:

Last edited: Jan 6, 2015