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Do you have tire chains? Might make the difference in truck damage and not. These latest F-150's only seem to be able to use cable chains based on my 2013, so be careful with heavy duty chains. Not a lot of clearance. Odds of cleaning out your tires from this muck quickly are not good. Imagine you already know to prepare in the AM to get really dirty - take a plastic tarp.
Thanks for the note. I don't have any chains. Dumb question--do you mean chains/clearance on the tires themselves or for pulling from the hitch?
You have raised a good point about cleaning the tires. My new land is 150 acres in the middle of a rural area. I had planned to drive back home to my house (45 minutes) where I have a power washer to regroup/clean. Now you have me thinking that may not be a great idea if even possible. I can imagine all sorts of stuff flying as I get on the road. Sorry for the novice reaction...I hadn't thought of it until you brought it up.
Letting air out of the tires will gain some traction. It's a common short-term fix to get out of a bind. Have a plan for refilling once you get out. Surprised you didn't try 4LO. That's what it's for. When else would you use it?
If you take some strapping with you you can rig it up to give them a preferred pulling point. Have it ready to attach and they can just hook it up. Otherwise you'll end up watching them make their best guesses on what to attach to. I had a guy move my car with a fork truck once because he needed to get past it. Heavy equipment operators aren't generally concerned with the small dings and dents.
I'm new to being a 4WD owner and I had it in my head from watching videos/reading to use 4LO mainly coming out of a boat ramp when towing something. It never crossed my mind. I do have one of those tire re-filler devices that plugs in to the adapter so I'm good on that if we need to let air out of the tires.
I admit to being ill-prepared for this as I didn't know what I needed and probably don't have time to go out to buy stuff. They are going to be there to keep working in the morning so stalling probably isn't a tactic. I think I need to get there to manage it. I don't have any strapping or chains of my own. It's a stock F150. I think the 4LO may be able to get me out but I would need to move forward to a muddy open clearing to try to turn around and go back up the drive. That will be tough getting turned around. I hope I can make it out of this with no scratches or damage and with a lesson learned. Ugh.
Traction control is automatic off when in 4 low unless things have changed . Just give it time to shift you can hear it go in if the window is down . Oh how I miss a basic Mechanical Shift Lever so much more dependable .
If the rain is supposed to stop, maybe give it a day for the road to dry out. The equipment operators may be looking at the same thing. Might make the whole ordeal a whole bunch easier.
If the rain is supposed to stop, maybe give it a day for the road to dry out. The equipment operators may be looking at the same thing. Might make the whole ordeal a whole bunch easier.
I traded text messages with the contractor tonight and he plans to be out there working. It rained really bad Thursday and just a little drizzle this afternoon. It also rained Tuesday/Wed pretty steady off/on. So most of Friday no rain and no rain in the forecast overnight.
My truck is now blocking the drive so my concern is that they will just try to move it or get around it to do their work. I'm all for letting it dry out as I have a back-up vehicle but I know they probably want to get work done. I will try to beat them there tomorrow by about 15 to 30 minutes to see if I can at least get in the truck and try 4LO. I hope that isn't rash to try to do that on my own. My fear is they will beat me there and just chain it up however they want without talking with me.
Deep breath....go to tractor supply / harbor freight / lowes and buy something like this:
If you cant find something like it grab a nylon recovery strap and a hitch pin. Put the looped end of the strap into the receiver then insert the pin, works great.
Shouldn't take much to get you out, especially if they have something like a tracked skid steer.
Update: I was on-site around 7am to see if I could use 4LO to get out. That thing wasn't budging.
There were no stores open in time for me to meet these guys when they were there at 8am. They were there to keep working all day today and obviously needed me out of the way so there wasn't much to do but go with their options. I couldn't get out on my own. They noted the rain had made conditions bad quickly over the past 2 days.
The scene was that this was being cut as a 12 foot wide driveway with some extra buffer on each side (currently taken up with cleared trees/brush) about 1300 feet long. There wasn't much room for me to maneuver at all on each side given the trees. They ended up having their own hitch to put into my receiver. They had two skid type pieces of equipment, one very large and one smaller one. They desired to attach their solid looking chain to the hitch they had. They assured me they had done this before when co-workers had gotten stuck, they would take it slow, etc. They also wanted to get me out of the rut I was in to see if I could reverse out on my own the rest of the way. So we gave that a try. Each time I tried on my own, I went nowhere. The tires were caked in mud and had no traction and it was just very deep clay type mud. So they ended up slowly pulling me back out the entire way.
It had me a bit nervous as my truck was sliding off the sides of the drive at times where the brush and trees were but they handled it cooly. They could not have been nicer about it. Got me out. I've power washed off all I could and will hand wash it down tonight or in the morning.
Remember that the mud UNDERNEATH is much more-important to remove thoroughly than the mud on the paint (which will get washed off eventually by rain). Put on some swimming goggles & ratty shorts, and crawl under there with the garden hose & a toilet brush.
04-27-2018, 11:21 PM
