Engo E10000 Winch Review - Page 7

**Siva283** · 06-29-2012, 07:06 AM

Just killed my second engo. The first one I thought was a defect. Yet here we are 12 pulls later and the second one did the same thing the first one did. Both times it happened with no load on the winch. The springs in the clutch break and get caught in the gears and bind everything up. And surprise surprise Engo will not return a call or email about the warranty on my less than 6 month old winch. It seems this is becoming a common issue as a quick web search turned up lots of people having the same exact issue. I am now eating crow. I am gonna give superwinch a shot. On quadratec there is a sale. $3000 for a 9500 pound one.

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Ross · 06-29-2012, 07:16 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Siva283

Just killed my second engo. The first one I thought was a defect. Yet here we are 12 pulls later and the second one did the same thing the first one did. Both times it happened with no load on the winch. The springs in the clutch break and get caught in the gears and bind everything up. And surprise surprise Engo will not return a call or email about the warranty on my less than 6 month old winch. It seems this is becoming a common issue as a quick web search turned up lots of people having the same exact issue. I am now eating crow. I am gonna give superwinch a shot. On quadratec there is a sale. $3000 for a 9500 pound one.

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Do you mean $300.00?

**Siva283** · 06-29-2012, 07:20 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ross

Do you mean $300.00?

Oops damn auto correct. Yes I meant 300

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**JeepAddOnsChris** · 06-29-2012, 07:56 AM

Siva, pretty sure you bought this from us. Let me get involved with it. I can say despite your experience that we have less problems with Engo than any other budget winch out there and the chances of this happening are slim as can be. There was a very small number of winches that had an issue with the clutch brake, but that has been addressed. No need to go out and spend more money on another winch. Shoot me a PM with your phone number.

**Siva283** · 06-29-2012, 08:07 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JeepAddOnsChris

Siva, pretty sure you bought this from us. Let me get involved with it. I can say despite your experience that we have less problems with Engo than any other budget winch out there and the chances of this happening are slim as can be. There was a very small number of winches that had an issue with the clutch brake, but that has been addressed. No need to go out and spend more money on another winch. Shoot me a PM with your phone number.

Thanks Chris. That's above and beyond considering per written warranty you no longer have any obligation at this point. You are correct I got this winch through you a few months ago. I have put some really hard pulls on this winch and it never flinched. I still can't say its not disheartening that it did this with no load but if it is a known issue that has/is being rectified that would definitely make me willing to give it one more shot as other than this one issue the winch has been awesome. One pull was hard enough to where it trashed a 3 year old 750 amp battery but the winch still didn't flinch. It had really impressed me up to this point.

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**Siva283** · 06-29-2012, 05:22 PM

Well Chris got it taken care of and the replacement ships Monday.

brunkhorse · 04-23-2013, 10:52 PM

I know this is an old thread but I thought I would add my 2 cents on this winch:

I received it for my birthday around June 2012. Like the OP my box also came beat up but everything was fine and undamaged. I even have the same front bumper as the OP (Smittybilt XRC) so I also had to take it off to get to the mounting holes. Quality was decent but you can definitely see a difference when comparing to my bro's Warn winch. However I park on the street in NYC and didn't want an expensive winch that could be possibly stolen or vandalized.

A few issues I found right away during install:

-The hook that came with the winch was downright awful. It was misshapen so it could not clip onto a D-ring. The bend was not big enough so the end of the hook was too close to the be beginning and the gap was not big enough. I also could not attach it to the looped end of the steel cable again cause the gap was not big enough. I ordered a hook from a different manufacturer and solved that issue.

-The fairlead roller is not the standard width as all other rollers I've dealt with are. It is not as wide by a good 1.5-2 inches. Didn't realize this until I tried to attach the Tuffy EZ flip license plate holder that is supposed to clip onto the fairlead.

Issues that have arisen in the last 10 months:

-I reused the hook pull handle that originally came with the winch. 2 months in the elements and it literally disintegrated in my hands as I pulled on it to unspool the winch.

-3 months out in the elements and the winch looks 20 years old. The Engo logo faded as well as the solenoid box. The clutch lever began to rust. Winter wasn't even close yet it was the end of summer... To be fair I did not put a cover on it. They have one available but after seeing the quality of the pull strap for the hook I opted not to buy it.

I got to put the winch in action maybe 4 or 5 months after I installed it. I used it to extract a Land Rover Discovery and a Nissan Pathfinder. Both were pretty easy extractions so I didn't really count them as a real test. The winch handled them with ease.

Finally about 2 weeks ago I had a chance to really test the winch. High centered in a mud hole in about 3 feet of water. Hooked up my remote and my buddy grabbed the hook. I began to unspool but the cable stayed put. I was confused cause the spool was spinning but it wasn't letting the cable out. Embarrassed I ended up getting pulled out of the mud hole via my rear D-rings. Came home and finally got the cable to come out. The end of cable that was attached to the spool had come apart. It was no longer attached to the spool which explained why it was just spinning while the cable stayed put. It was the 3rd time I had used the winch. I don't think I even let out more than 50% of the cable ever so there's no way it failed cause I let out too much. See attached picture.

I sent Engo an email with the serial number and they did send out a replacement cable free of charge. Just installed it tonight with my bro's help. With him telling me "You should've gone with the Warn bro" the whole time haha. I still don't feel I've really "used" this winch. I haven't pushed it anywhere near it's limit. Sadly the issues I've seen don't really give me much confidence that it will come through when I need it the most. Maybe in time I will change my mind and edit this review accordingly. Do I recommend this product to you? I'm really on the fence but right now I would be leaning towards "No". If I could do it again I probably would've just sprung the extra money on the Warn. If I had to buy another "budget" winch I think I would go with Smittybilt or even the Quadratec winches. The old adage "you get what you pay for" definitely applies in this case.

brunkhorse · 04-23-2013, 11:00 PM

Here is a picture of the frayed cable end.

**JeeperDon** · 04-24-2013, 07:14 AM

That winch (OP's top photos) looks exactly (EXACTLY!) like my 14 yr old Warn M8000. The Engo controller looks like crap, like the simple Warn toggle, but the winch looks the same.

bseblfrk09 · 04-24-2013, 10:09 AM

I haven't been here in awhile because I traded my TJ about 6 months after getting the winch. I will tell you that I put that winch through hell in the 6 months that I had it. I winched my buddies f-150 out of a lot of stuff with that winch. It got me out of a few sticky situations. I recently just bought a 2013 JK and I'm starting over. Whether I go with Engo again or not I don't know. I am just getting out of college with a good job lined up. I will have a little bit more money to spend this time around. I will say though, I trusted my Engo winch to work everywhere and every time I needed it.

HighlakeTJ · 04-24-2013, 10:10 AM

year nhalf mines going like champ

brunkhorse · 04-24-2013, 10:27 AM

The issues I've had haven't been with the motor or solenoid it's been with the other parts that came with it. Did you have no issues with your hook or fairlead?

bseblfrk09 · 04-24-2013, 10:50 AM

I had mine covered for most of the time that I had it so that wasn't much of an issue. It was also in Colorado for about 5 of the 6 months I used it. Rust isn't much of an issue here either. My hook was a little narrow if I remember right, but not so bad that I wouldn't fit around a d-ring. This was my first winch so I the fairlead never crossed my mind.