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Driving to Exeter


white90

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I happened across an 18tonne lorry delivering a steel building

he had tried to get up a sloped entrance to a farm but the rear T bar had dug into the ground lifting the axle slightly and losing drive, so there he was stuck fast

as I couldn't get past easily I offered the assistance of a Tow,

Rigged the 90 to the truck but no grip and it just span the wheels on dry tarmac

so rather than damage the transmission I stopped.

a Farmer with tractor was in the q so he spun the tractor around and they proceeded to connect the tractor to the truck with Chains :o

Standing well back I watched as the tractor then proceed to try snatch pulling the truck

most alarming.

No joy whatsoever

I then suggesed we try jacking the rear of the truck a little to aid the efforts

The distain of the looks on the farmers and truck drivers faces was a joy to behold :)

I said well you've managed to get no where so far why not give it a try.

The high lift was deployed and a small amount of lift was applied to the rear of the truck bed(surprising how strong a high lift is)

the tractor then pulled again and low and behold the truck was unstuck, the road unblocked and approx 30 cars were free to continue their journeys.

The truck driver to his credit said he would eat humble pie and thanked me for helping.

I didn't take any pics as it may have heated the situation a little after the bystanders started barracking the driver of the truck and the farmer.

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Thats class Tony i always leave the Hi-lift in the truck but havent has to use it very much not for helping lorries out anyway!

How much do you think your truck could realistic pull/tow if it were legal plus what did you attach the recovery gear to - that must have put it under some strain??

Has anyone else had any experiences of pulling lorries out of harms way?

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I use my 90 for shunting our 26 tonners around the yard if they are towed in for clutches etc

Towed a tractor unit off a grass roundabout once . but its all work related, I doubt if I would do the same in a non work situation , what if your clutch went bang or worse , I doubt if Mr Lucky trucker would put his hand in his pocket .

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Had a 2.5 tonne dive boat dumped on a harbour wall by some freak waves. Lots of nice big holes in it the morning after, so would sink pretty quickly if it was floated off.

The water was only about waist deep, so I drove in, tied tow rope on, pulled it off the wall and then pegged it to the beach where there was a waiting trailer. Hand winch got it onto the trailer, then pulled the whole lot out over sand. Only got stuck when I tried to go over the dry sand at the top of the beach...

Not the heaviest tow, but one of the more interesting ones I have done....

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How much do you think your truck could realistic pull/tow if it were legal

It's very much related to rolling resistance - a five tonne truck which is well bogged down will be much harder to move than a fifty tonne truck on flat smooth tarmac. Given the appropriate conditions you could probably move several hundred tonnes as long as you were patient with overcoming the inertia of getting it rolling and didn't cook the clutch (an auto is best) - an original promotional item I once saw for the early Tdi Discoverys showed one pulling a 200 ton train :)

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I was called out to a removals lorry that had slid sideways on a sloping gravel drive into a house - the roof of the tilting lorry was resting against the 1st floor of the house! Every time the driver attempted to edge the lorry in any direction the lorry slid harder against the property. Access was very limited so no heavy recovery vehicles could get near it. We spent 2 hours with lots of snatch blocks and triple lining the winch ( 8274 ‘XP’ on a Discovery ) and managed to drag the lorry sideways to the relief of some very grateful removals men!!

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I use my 90 for shunting our 26 tonners around the yard if they are towed in for clutches etc

Towed a tractor unit off a grass roundabout once . but its all work related, I doubt if I would do the same in a non work situation , what if your clutch went bang or worse , I doubt if Mr Lucky trucker would put his hand in his pocket .

Jase I agree I tried just a tentative pull and the tyres slipped so I stopped.

the tractor was far worse being only 2WD

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Weirdest thing yet I have had to tow....

post-1230-1196444328_thumb.jpg

Still haven't got a clue as to why the bus driver decided to drive of the road and onto the field.... No obstacle in sight, and no reason whatsoever....

But the bus was carrying 60 teenagers on a "outdoor education" course, which I was responsible for.....

This was late in the afternoon, the light was fading fast, and the campsite was another 10 km further.... I needed to get that bus free:

post-1230-1196444595_thumb.jpg

I placed the my sand ladders behind the wheels of the bus, attached my KEER, and drove gently away in first low. Everything went as planned, but it took another full hour to get the bus positioned so that it could be driven onto the road again....

I could have used the winch instead, but then I would have had to use a considerable amount of time to improvise some sort of ground anchor - the weight of the Landrover would not have been enough.

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Thats class Tony i always leave the Hi-lift in the truck but havent has to use it very much not for helping lorries out anyway!

How much do you think your truck could realistic pull/tow if it were legal plus what did you attach the recovery gear to - that must have put it under some strain??

Has anyone else had any experiences of pulling lorries out of harms way?

I used my 44 ton truck to pull a landrover that was stuck in the snow does that count?

post-1213-1196450502_thumb.jpg

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I was in heavy recovery so I wont list all the big stuff, biggest Antar tank transporter with tank, blown clutch was off route so he would have had a courts martial ( lady involved) pulled him a mile to get him back on route so he could call in as broken down Done with leyland 6x6 Martian.

Back to land rovers : In Australia Mack truck with excavator (54 tonnes) towed about 8 kms ,

push start on dirt Volvo road train with two trailers loaded, 110 V8 SW did it pretty easily really.

In UK tow start Cat D8 Dozer that was a bit harder :blink: same vehicle :o

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