Yeh, ID gets a bit chilly in the wintertime. Don't know about mounting a crane in the front center of the bed though, seems like it would be in the way a lot of the time. Actually, it seems to me the rear side is a more versatile mounting location, but the 1000 lb capacity kind of sucks. I'd like something with more capacity, but the way the Harbor Freight unit tucks out of the way under the troop seats is pretty cool. I suppose you could make an upgraded model with a higher capacity jack and a stronger boom and still keep it under the troop seats, but the HF kit is pretty cost effective.
I received a delivery today of two multifuel engines in containers I won from GL. According to the GL listing, a multifuel engine in a container weighs 2569 lbs. My transporter hauled the engines op on a 24' flatbed trailer rated at 10K lbs, although he has hauled 14K lbs on the same trailer. He said my two engines were a real heavy load. He had a buddy of his with a propane tank truck modified to a wrecker meet us to unload the containers. The propane lift winch was supposed to be rated at 6K lbs. I think the lift was either grossly over rated or just plain worn out, it was all he could do to lift one end of an engine container at a time.
What should have been a simple 15 minute job to unload and spot two containers ended up as a 2 hour job with the containers nowhere near where I wanted them. I doubt the HF winch would have worked well at all for this task, unless I lifted one end of the container and the wrecker lifted the other end at the same time. Maybe I need to rig up an "A" frame to connect to the rear shackles and a strong come-a-long for lifting. Still won't get the load in the back of my Deuce though. I'll have to work this through in my mind, eventually something will pop up, but I'll just have to make do with the HF crane and its 1000 lb limitation for now. It should handle most of what I need to lift!
