Towing adventures

[prometheus]

Yesterday I drove the 90 miles to our nearest large town building center. I pulled our heavy duty flatbed trailer since I had to pick up nearly two tons of decking and a bunch of dimensional lumber. This material will allow me to finish the final layer of roof on our backwoods house. Well actually it was purchased to end the parade of five gallon buckets around the house whenever snow melted or it rained. Most importantly it was purchased to end the near hysterical fits my wife had when the house developed impromptu roving waterfalls in random rooms.

The trip was a complete success, and I was heading back when I noticed I needed some diesel for Hoss. Hoss is our old one-ton 4X4 Dodge. He has been good to us over the years. He was the vehicle we hitched the Airstream to when we sold our prior home and wandered the back roads of the Rockies looking for our new homestead. Over the years I’ve called on him to pull more than his fair share of our homesteading dream. Once I loaded twelve thousand pounds on the very same flatbed trailer I used yesterday and made him pull it 800 miles, all through the high mountain passes of these Rocky Mountains. I’ve had very few problems from him and almost all of these I could tend to quickly by myself where they occurred. I credit most of this to his very simple design, he has only one computerize component; the automatic transmission overdrive what-not. In fact the only problems over the years I couldn’t fix by myself were all transmission related. I chose to purchase him knowing full well the automatic transmission was a weak link only because everyone else knew this too and I got him for two thousand dollars less than a comparable stick-shift. Not to disparage him but looking back I wish I had somehow come up with the extra dough for a stick.

Anyways, yesterday after fueling up I was pulling away from the pumps to wait for the family to come out from the store when a god awful noise came from amidships. Looking out the window I noticed the driveshaft, the entire rear driveshaft, lying on the ground two feet from the truck. Following the rule that anytime something embarrassing happens the witnesses are directly proportional to the level of embarrassment the entire family had just walked out of the store to witness this along with everyone else laughing at the pumps. These same bastards I had vacated the pumps as a favor for were basking in my troubles. The lil’ lady comes running up and asks “is that the drive train”. I tell her it is indeed a piece of the drive train; the driveshaft. Drawing upon her vast mechanical knowledge she then asks, “isn’t that important?” If I hadn’t been so busy cursing the pricks who were now pumping gas from the pumps I had just pulled away from I might have came up with some kind of witty remark like, “no, honey the people who make these always throw extra five foot long chunks of steel underneath to make sure the trucks don’t float.” But I was already using my extra non-cursing cognitive power to figure out how to fix this problem.

As I said Hoss is a 4X4 which means motivation power is split between both the front and rear axle when in four-wheel-drive. Since the rear driveshaft was sitting on the ground no power was going to be turning those wheels but I still had a fully functional front axle. Two minutes later I had checked the yoke on the rear of the transfer case which the front of the drive shaft use to be connected to, the yoke on the rear differential that the rear of the shaft attached to. I engaged the front hubs, shifted into four-wheel-drive and was pulling away in what I’d guess was the only front wheel drive truck on the road that day. I was strongly tempted to send some one-finger-salutes back towards the pumps but chose instead to crack open a Colorado Cool Aid aka a Coors. Montana has only a $50 fine for an open container and I figured I’d chance it.

I consider myself a generalist. Thinking about it, the only things I consider myself a real expert on are making socialists look stupid and ----ing off feminists, and these shouldn’t really count because of how easy they are to truly master.

When my wife and I were first married our finances were so tight there’d be weeks between any meat based meals. I wanted a steak so bad I went to the library and got a book on hunting. I didn’t fill the freezer that year or even the next but I learned enough those first two years that from then on there hasn’t been a year I didn’t kill at least a deer. Two separate years I’ve killed a buck, bull elk, and bear all within the ten day season of our prior state and all on public ground. Right after our daughter was born the brakes on our old truck were metal to metal and I didn’t have the money to get them fixed. I was able to scrounge up enough money for a Chilton’s book, brake pads and rotors and did it myself.

Several people I know have said they don’t think there is a single thing I couldn’t do, and this probably is true. Sometimes when I’m feeling cocky or lickered up I’ll let them believe I’m some sort of super genius. Even though I did score above the one hundred mark on my last IQ test, the real reason I can do anything is because I’ve always had to. It certainly helps to have thousands of books like we do, but anyone can go to the library and get most of the same information we have in our private library. I think the only real advantage I might have is I read these books for pleasure because I like to know how all kinds of things work and I have the time since I killed our television a long time ago.

[Darren]

I had a Dodge B300 van that served me well until someone decided they needed to be on my side of the centerline one night. Up until that time it did everything I asked it. The family was looking at moving from Mississippi to Pennsylvania so I built a 28' flatbed trailer. I left for PA and towed the trailer up with me so that I could finish it.

I learned real quick why you don't want the axles on a trailer real close to the point halfway between the front and back. Until I figured I had to hold the steering wheel rock steady and only move it gradually, the trailer made it hard to stay in the lane. Long story short, I made it to PA, finished the trailer, and got transferred back to MS before the family could even think about moving.

It turned out two other guys were getting transferred to MS too. One had a double axle camper and the other had a bunch of furniture. The camper went on my flatbed trailer and the other guy's furniture went in the camper and into the back of the van. Later on I figured I was running somewhere about 18,000 lbs. One of the things that saved me was that I had installed a transmission cooler and added temperature sensors at both ends of the cooler. I could tell what the transmission fluid temp was going into the cooler and what it was coming out.

Not far down I-81 a state trooper pulled me over because I was going too slow for traffic. At best on a flat I could do 40mph. Above that and the engine knocked. He diverted me to a side road to continue my trip through PA. That's were the temp gauges saved me. When the temp climbed too high, I pulled over and ran the truck in neutral. Eventually I made it to MD. At the rate I was going, the rest of the trip was going to be hell.

A friend in MD clued me in on Moroso fuel additive. That solved the detonation problem, jacked up the octane and actually gave the 318 enough power to keep up with traffic. I was doing 65mph going up hills in Tennessee. Over the trip I used most of the gallon can of the Moroso fuel additive. At times I've wondered if the stuff was still being made. It turned what could have been a nightmare into something that ended up being no sweat.

I wish I still had that truck.

[prometheus]

Yup darren, towing can sure be an adventure. Part of the load of the 12000# was my 10X12 workshop knocked down into wall panels. I was probably illegally wide but didn't really worry about it since most of the trip was on I15 with nice wide lanes. I plum forgot about the Salt Lake corridor with those itsy bits lanes that I was pulling at 5PM on a friday. That was probably the most stressful 3 hours of my life.

[Darren]

I can imagine that. Everyone else is wizzing along while you're trying to keep it even between the lines. I was only out that way once when I took a rental truck loaded with a friend's furniture and his Blazer behind it on a tow dolly to California.

Somewhere in Utah a road crew was close to finishing up for the night but they still had the cones up leaving a very narrow lane to travel in. I found out by running over the edge of a cone with the outside rear tire of the truck, I could squirt the cone several feet away from the truck. If I caught it just right it would shoot off to the side and still be upright. I had quite a game going there. When I finally got past the cones some of the people in the cars that passed apparently appreciated the show by their reactions.

[garymunson]

Anyone else had the inside edges of their trailer tires (2 axle trailer) all wear with a scalloped pattern reminiscent of older ford twin I-beam trucks? Trailer's new under warranty and at 5K, they replaced tires (scalloped down to the bottom of the tread) and adjusted brakes. Dealer claimed 'defective tires'. 5K later same thing...waiting for appointment to bring it in again....

[raymilosh]

My favorite towing adventures involve this truck which although it is rated to carry 1 ton and has carried up to 1.7 tons, only weighs a one ton.
I have loaded the trailer without enough tongue weight a few times and had a 6000 lb trailer push me around a bit. You'd a thunk I'd a learnt by now, however...

A few months ago, my friend Jim offered me a whole trailer of free lumber and he had loaded a little 8 foot trailer with probably 1 or so tons of 16 foot lumber such that it had a significant amount of negative tongue weight. I decided to drive it like that, knowing it wasn't far and I could go slowly. (Bonehead idea#1). I had a hard time getting up the gravel driveway, because the trailer was basically lifting the rear end of the truck up off the ground, so I had to get a running start at it. I decided not to do anything about it (bad idea#2).
It started raining on the way home, a'course, but I kept going (bad idea#3). I got off the exit ramp and when i hit the brakes I could skid, but was barely slowing down at all, because there was a decent downgrade. I decided to skid a bit until the truck began to jackknife, then let off and straighten up and skid some more. I got to repeat that process about 3 times as I got closer to the stop sign. It was like being in a wreck but in slow morion. I got to brake enough times that I was able to stop before the end of the exit ramp and the stop sign. I decided to keep going, but slower and I did manage to make it home alive. You'd think I'd a learned better by my age. Oh well

(huh, the picture won't post..it's a 1962 VW singlecab truck)

[Ed Norman]

We weren't towing, but we did have a Dodge 1 ton van loaded with my mom's furniture that she was tired of. We were crossing South Dakota and I kept hearing an occasional rumble under the motor cover. Hmm. I stopped and looked and couldn't spot anything. I even stopped at a quickie oil change place and they didn't see anything. We were cruising along at 60 and I heard something little let loose and hit under the van. Tink. Then another tink. Then the drive shaft let loose and went out the left side and under the rear tire and went spinning into the median.

The state trooper wouldn't let me go get the drive shaft. He went back and waded out in the muddy median and got it and got greasy and brought it to me. He called a tow truck and we took a tow to some town with a Cabelas, where we stayed for a few hours until they built us a new driveshaft.

It's fun to fix stuff yourself, but sometimes when you are 1000 miles from home, you get lucky and find nice people to help.

[prometheus]

My least favorite towing memory happened about ten years ago. I had just got my first snowmobile and borrowed my father-in-laws little (4X8) utility trailer. I had to dig ten or more years worth of pine needles out to get to the tongue. Being young I didn't really think anything about this and proceeded to load and head out. Right as I was passing the local Ford dealer, something felt "funny", the rear of my 1/2 ton truck was all over the place. I didn't know it then but the rod that holds the plate that clamps the ball had failed because of being buried so long. I anchored the brakes which snapped the safety chains and actually had my trailer, with sled, pass me on the left side. The real kicker was as it entered the on coming lane there was a BRAND NEW ford one ton crew cab that this sucker homed in on like we hoped the Patriot Missiles would on a Scud back in '91. This poor guy had just bought this truck and his eyes were as big as saucers. If he braked the trailer veered right, if he put the petal down it veered left. The tongue hit his front left wheel, dented the hell out of it, unbeaded the tire and broke his tie rod. I never borrow trailer anymore.............except the time I borrowed my friends 2 place sled trailer a couple of years ago and had the tilt fail and dump my sleds on the highway. But that's another story. NEVER BORROW TRAILERS!

[Darren]

My girl friend was packing up to move to WV. One of her sons had a double axle enclosed car hauler. By the time I got to her house her sons had already loaded the car trailer including an antique safe that had been placed all the way forward. The safe is so large, no one wants it even as an antique. I calculated the tongue weight and it was more than 2000 lbs. A hitch on a Uhaul truck won't handle that much. We unpacked the trailer and relocated the safe and the 1" plywood it was sitting on so it was between the two axles. They made it about 100 miles when one of the axles bent so that the tires were rubbing the frame. They had to leave the trailer at a truck stop near Baltimore. Drive the Uhaul to WV and unload. then go back to Baltimore and unload everything out of the car trailer into the truck which lightened the trailer enough that the tires didn't rub. I had to use a wrecker to get the safe out of the trailer when they finally got to the farm. The safe is still sitting in the pole barn. The floor joists in the house won't support the safe.