So here is the conversation last November….
Bossman: We need to take apart those large outdoor sculptures and put them in a truck and fix them.
Experienced Installer and All Around Good Guy: Sure, in my experience and training, and from seeing the actual jobsite, we need a crane parked on the road.
Bossman: Get a permit to close the street? Forget that lackey. Use the four wheel drive forklift.
EI&AAGG: Um, the ground is a little too juicy
Bossman: Do it!
one hour later…
EI&AAGG: O.K., its stuck,
Bossman: You Dummy- now use the shoot and boom with the four foot tires to pull it out!
EI&AAGG: Sure thing boss, and how about we lay down some of that one inch plywood that we have just for situations like this?
Bossman: How about you shut up!
five hours later…
Stuck to the friggin’ AXLES!!!
Next day used a crane.
End scene.
Replies
He, he, he, he.... thought those things were "all terrain".
Hey, I got my 10 wheel drive truck stuck in mud once. But mine came with a nice winch. Tree held, truck moved.
PAHS Designer/Builder- Bury it!
tom... one summer camp with our 155mm FA group at Camp Drum... it rained for a week..
we had every 5-ton prime mover we owned stuck to the floor boards..
it took tank retrievers to get them outMike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
it took tank retrievers to get them out
No winches? My experience is either the truck moves or you pull the anchor out of the ground. I have uprooted several trees, one was a 70' tall oak (rotten roots). That one really surprised me.
Once used my truck winch to drag my dead Cat up my driveway to the shop. Cat was heavier than the truck so I had to chain the azz of the truck to a succession of trees. Odd feeling to be standing on the brakes and be leaving 10 skid marks where the tires couldn't hold a 7 ton truck. Snatch block on the Cat and up we went. Sloooooowly.
Had a driver on the Cat to ensure it didn't go downhill. I could just see a chain breaking and the Cat pulling the truck, and me, down the driveway to the next bend and .... wooohoooooooooooooooooooooooPAHS Designer/Builder- Bury it!
Camp Drum is a peculiar geological formation..
about 18" of soil on top of the bedrock the glaciers left as they retreated..
becomes just a bathtub of mud.. and the trees have shallow root system ( the ones that are left )
long story short.. nothing to hook winch cable to.. hence the tank retrievers..
gave the enineers something to practise on anywayMike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
I've done that...with a 4WD, mid-articulated logging skidder. Felt like an idiot getting a 4WD skidder stuck--then I thought about it--it was quite an accomplishment really! Had to "un-choke" the logs and hook the winch up to a stump...got it out. That was in the middle of nowhere. Was glad to get that thing out of the mud.
At the time, I was glad not to have many spectators around. Word got out anyways. People I didn't even know would slap me on the shoulder, "Heard you got that Holder skidder stuck up to the axles." I'm wondering, "Who are you and how did you find out?"
When you get stuck in the mud, word of it should not get back to town before you do : o {
Oh, thats why I waited good and long before posting the pic (which is from a cell phone by the way)And I will never tell what musuem its from.
Watched some enlisted Army guys get a six-wheel drive deuce-and-a-half stuck in a swamp. The mud was over the wheels. They took bets on how it would do. Then they set the hand throttle and threw it in ultra-low gear. When the wheels became visible you could see the tires moving slower than a second hand goes around a clock face. The engine was whining and blowing smoke. And slowly, ever so slowly it crawled its way out.Tough truck. That's what they call 'private proof'.
Basswood--Yeah I heard about you getting stuck but I was in the middle of something and couldn't get over there to gauck.sorry I missed it--Yep--news travels fast--J/Kback when I was a block labour the guy running the pettibone got the thing stuck flat against a wall in between two pillions for Spancrete and with out him ferrying mud from the mix plant all we had to do was watch him try to get out--45 min , later he finally wiggled out with out distrubing the pillions and left a boat load of black tire marks on the wall--His own personal reminder of torture.Mike" I reject your reality and substitute my own"
Adam Savage---Mythbusters
Tough truck. That's what they call 'private proof'.
Hadn't heard that one. Part of my thought before purchase was that these things were driven by high-testosterone non-owners and designed to survive the experience. You wouldn't believe the stories I've heard at filling stations. Surprising number of guys want to climb in and just sit there a minute, reliving. Maybe half involved getting one airborne. Always hoped mine wasn't one of the fliers.
Expecting a call this AM about a second one. Know a guy who bought one and now doesn't know what to do with it. Got away from him and took out a large chunk of his house foundation. Seems his better half wants it off the property... NOW. I can sorta understand, as my front bumper has the indention of a 45' walnut tree it bulldozed (no driver). Other than the bumper, no damage. Appears I'm getting a second one cheap.
As you say, tough truck. Love mine.PAHS Designer/Builder- Bury it!
I grew up in the country near a state park. About 2 or 3 times a year, you'd have someone walk up to the house wanting a pull from a tractor to get them out of the mud. Typically it was 2-3AM and the immobilized vehicle would be surrounded by empty beer cans.
One I can remember, the guys thought they'd take their 4wd truck through a narrow spot of a river. The spot was only about two truck lengths across, but they didn't take into account the trouble engines have breathing water.
Another one, the guy and his gf had a 4wd pickup all jacked up... they were happily mudding away, and went through a mucky dip.... and it couldn't climb back out...couldn't go forward, couldn't go back, and didn't have enough running room to pick up any momentum. Personally, I think he could have made it with some weight in the back, but it was just too light to get any traction. That guy was seriously embarrased! To have this big, tough looking jacked up pickup with big tires...and then not be able to get it out of a low spot (a winch would have saved him the embarassment).
And then the usual collection of buried in the mud trucks/SUVs/cars/etc. Probably about half the people had damaged their vehicle in attempts to get it out (or damaged a friend's vehicle who had tried to pull them out).
I received the attached pics in a fWD a while back.
jt8
"Someone's sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago." --Warren Buffett
That's not a mistake. It's those wily tankers. Making a 'hull down' position look like they are actually stuck. Very sneaky way to throw the enemy off guard. Very realistic deception. This technique of faking a sunk tank is, of course, a NATO secret so they had to complete the illusion by calling in a recovery vehicle. Almost looks like they are actually pulling it out. Those guys are great actors.
I don't know how you guys can deal with the weather back there.
If I was raised back East, I'd most likely have ended up working in an office and commuting by train.
I dread even the annual trips "to the snow" for the kids.
Mike
Trust in God, but row away from the rocks.
I was born and raised in New Orleans, and when the DW gets all happy (Shes from Cleve, Ohio) about the snow falling, all i think about is the headaches and delays and dangerous situations that it causes. "But it looks like a whit blanket!" Shes says. Shut up and pass the Maker's.
We have a Skytrak 8042 that we buried last Feb. One of the guys was moving a lift of plywood to the back of the building and got it sunk pretty good. He then called me over and I got it to move about thirty feet before it was really buried. 8" of icy water inside the cab. It took the largest shovel on the job to get it out, we tried two smaller shovels that wouldn't even budge it.
MisterSteve,
I sell those for a living and you should see how some people abuse them.. No it's not impossible to get them stuck (especially with the training wheels (er outriggers)) Too much front end weight!
I've seen them over hip deep in mud and it takes a real technique to get them out in those situations! Certain models are worse than others, for example Gehls are the heaviest in their weight class and we all use the same power train so their power to weight ratio is the worst.. They do have a really stout transmission though so one trick (and only do this to Gehls, never to a Lull or Sky track with their weak transmissions) is rev up the engine in neutral to peak RPM and drop it into gear.. Do this only after lifting up the front axle out of the mud. At the same time you use the hydraulics to shove the boom out which pushes you backwards.. You need the engine at peak RPM to produce enough torque to do this. The turbo has to be at full boost so it won't do to pause as you attempt this.. without the load on it the turbo won't put out full boost. Another words, revit up and the nano second it hits peak RPM drop into gear (maybe even second or third gear if it's soupy enough)!
The Deere engine has a little faster torque rise than the Cummins or Perkins/Caterpillar thus it is ever so slightly less susceptible to these problems..
Using this technique I was once able to get a early model caterpillar out of a swamp where it was so stuck the operator couldn't open the door and had to climb out the window. Early Cats (not the TH models, they use a weak Clark transmission and even use first gear where most other manufactures skip first and start out in the stronger second gear). It shook like crazy and bounced so hard I had a hard time keeping my foot down but the bouncing got it off it's frame and thetires were able to get enough of a purchase that the boom pushed me back up on the harder bank. They said mud flew over 20 feet in the air, I got a heck of a sore neck/back and a real headache from it but we saved having to call in a bull dozer which is sometimes the only way to get one out.