*A Sunny Afternoon Drive*
On a sunny afternoon, my wife and I decided to go for a drive in the mountains. It had been raining a lot during the past few days. We were driving down a nice two-track trail when the road went downhill and then crossed the creek. I stopped the truck and walked ahead to scout out the terrain. While walking close to the creek, I began to sink in about 6 inches. I decided that it would not be a good idea to try to drive the truck through this. I got back in the truck and backed it back up the road for almost a mile. When we got to a nice high spot I decided to turn it around. As soon as I got off the trail, the truck sunk. My truck was a new 4x4 diesel with new BF Goodrich mud terrains on it.
I have always carried extra equipment in my vehicles. I have food, water, survival gear, stove, wool blankets, CB radios, frs radios, tire chains for all 4 tires and recovery equipment.
In the area of recovery equipment I carry: 2 shovels (1 large and 1 entrenching tool), 2 come-a-longs (1- 4000 lb and 1-8000 lb), 50 ft of old winch cable with hooks on both ends, 100' of old ½" rescue rope (rated at 9000 lbs), an old 16' logging chain, a block pulley, and a high lift jack. I had just traded in another truck for this truck. I took the winch off of the old truck, but because of money, I had not bought the mounting kit to put on the new truck yet. Guess where the winch was. It was in the garage at home (nice place for it). After a few minutes of trying to rock the truck back and forth to get unstuck, I found myself buried to the frame. No worries, I live for stuff like this.
It was about 3 o'clock in the afternoon and I was with my wife. I began to figure out a plan. With the nice powerful 9500 lb Ramsey winch sitting in the garage at home, I had to do it the old fashioned way. I could not pull the truck forward due to the mud, so I had to pull it backwards. Even if I had the winch mounted on front, it would have just pulled the truck further into the mud. In order to reach a tree behind the truck, I had to use the 100' rope, the 50' winch cable, and both come-a-longs. The come-a-longs were not strong enough to pull the truck. I had to tension the come-a-longs as much as possible, dig under the truck, and have my wife try back up the truck. The rope would stretch and act like a rubber band to pull the truck out backwards. Each time the truck moved a few inches, I had to tension the come-a-longs. This whole process took 3 hours, but we got the truck out. After the truck was pulled back a ways, I was able to use the block pulley to make a 2:1 mechanical advantage. My wife was getting anxious, she had not planned for this to happen. She was afraid we would have to spend the night. I enjoyed it, except for my wife not being happy. Secretly, I wanted to spend the night out there.
I learned several things that day:
Soon afterwards I mounted the winch on the truck with a quick mount so it can be used on the front or back of the truck.
Haystack
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