I just purchased a Warn Winch 9.5ti. I would like to know what kind of maintenance needs to be done on these winches. Should it be covered in the rain and snow?

I have an old 9000 I bought in 1998. It is garaged during the evenings, but is out a lot. I have never covered it, but do apply wax to the "waxable" parts (things I can get to that I can get the wax off of) when I wax my Jeep. It is in a very good condition. The only signs it's not new is some very slight fading and the cable is obviously used. It has a roller fairlead and it looks very used, but no bad effects from the weather. We don't get much snow here and freezing temps aren't that common, but we do get UV damage and our rain is full of stuff that is really bad on paint, etc.

I thought about a soft cover when I first got it. It was all shiney and new and I wanted to keep it that way. I worried that moisture under the cover might do more harm than good. So far I haven't been sorry I didn't cover it.

HTH,
Larry