spare tire only drops 2 inches

[95_ESi_Person]

Yeah, no more than that, I tried forcing it to go farther (crank harder) and all it did was click...

I remember the spare going down to the ground before, now I can't figure out why it won't go down any farther than 2 inches (no, not enough to remove it either).

Ideas?

[rodeo02]

Keep spraying the winch assemby with liquid wrench, WD40, etc.. It should break free. If no go, you'll have to get a new winch assembly.

Joel

[95_ESi_Person]

Originally Posted by rodeo02

Keep spraying the winch assemby with liquid wrench, WD40, etc.. It should break free. If no go, you'll have to get a new winch assembly.

Joel

Doh! Hmmm, never thought of that, honestly!

I am retarded today.

[nydeer]

I just had this while on vacation.. I wound up having a tire place cut the cable, so I could use the spare if needed. They wound up giving me a bag of parts to show chevy. The crank housing sheared off from the mounting flange on the housing, cable came off the end of crank and became a cable ball, unable to pass thru the guide tube... The whole episode is even more interesting being I bought the truck new, and never used the spare, and the fractured crank assembley has rust in the cracked pieces, so this was cracked a LONG time ago...

[rodeo02]

Originally Posted by nydeer

I just had this while on vacation.. I wound up having a tire place cut the cable, so I could use the spare if needed. They wound up giving me a bag of parts to show chevy. ...

What year is your TB? Out of 3/36 warranty you will be SOL on that. It's a pain, but if you dont exersize the winch style spares once a year, they rust up in the rust belt. Any make or model.

Joel

[nydeer]

'02 short Tb LS, 59k, and out of warantee.. I'm thinking of hitting the parts yard for a replacement, I need to the resin skid shield for under the oil pan too.. The cable has no rust on it, the crank housing is shot. I was told GM uses stainless cables, whereas Ford doesn't. Don't know how true it is.

[rodeo02]

Yeah, they definately dont design these winched spares with longevity in mind. I don't *think* a new winch kit is all that expensive. I hear you on the plastic engine belly pan. My oil change door was gone when I bought my 2005 (used). That plate is useless IMO. One of these times I'm going to leave it off all together.

Joel

[maxwedge]

Originally Posted by nydeer

'02 short Tb LS, 59k, and out of warantee.. I'm thinking of hitting the parts yard for a replacement, I need to the resin skid shield for under the oil pan too.. The cable has no rust on it, the crank housing is shot. I was told GM uses stainless cables, whereas Ford doesn't. Don't know how true it is.

90 bucks they all go bad in rust country!

[jozuah]

hope this info dosent come to late for you...

read your owners manual for lowering spares ,, this spare tire winch system is a new concept and has a 2ndary lock mech. to it ,, i felt like a retard out back of my house on the ground for 2 hours trying to figure out why the tire wouldent come down only to break down and read the owners manual and find that IF it gets stuck up there a jack is required to lower the tire down past the secondary locking mech...

let me know if this info was of any help at all..
joshua

[jozuah]

Originally Posted by 95_ESi_Person

Yeah, no more than that, I tried forcing it to go farther (crank harder) and all it did was click...

I remember the spare going down to the ground before, now I can't figure out why it won't go down any farther than 2 inches (no, not enough to remove it either).

Ideas?

thats CLick is what releases the spare from the secondary latch ,, read the owners manual for info

[nydeer]

Thanks Jozuah.. I'll check it out. My crank housing was actually fractured. The flange where it bolts to the bracket broke away from the center where the crank spool is..

[rodeo02]

Originally Posted by jozuah

...IF it gets stuck up there a jack is required to lower the tire down past the secondary locking mech...

Really? How does that work?!? I gotta dig up my manual...

Joel

[jozuah]

the secondary latch works by a hook using sudden pressure (cable snaping) if its stuck up you jack up on the tire while going past the tightest setting youll hear a click , manual says do this upto 4 times or somthing like that nad recheck if it will drop after it NOT dropping you use the jack and raise the retaning tee in the center of the tire till you hear a click then lower it down viola.

felt pretty stupid sitting there with the owners manual lol.

joshua

[95_ESi_Person]

I went to the car wash and sprayed it for about 5 minutes with a power washer to see if anything was stuck in there.

I get home and decide to try it again. It starts going (yay), then gets hard to turn, so I go slow and it frees up a bit.

Then it just stops. And won't go back up.

I took out my handy dandy air compressor and a cut-off wheel and cut the edge of the plate that holds the wheel up. I just shaved 1/4 inch off of it so that I could get it through the hole.

Spare tire is now strapped down in the back of the trunk, and I'm out $130 for a new winch. I'm taking my grease gun to that new one when I put it in, before a wheel ever sees it.

[inthesnow]

I raised mine after lowering a couple of times and it finally released without catching the safety.