XJ to the rescue

[93_xj]

Today it was pouring and some friends of my sister decided to go offroading in a 2wd ranger. :doh:. Anyway, they got stuck, and needed help. They called me up, and I went down there with my XJ , tow straps, and chains, and pulled them outta there. It was my first time ever helping someone get unstuck using my jeep. Felt good to help. Cant wait till winter when people's cars slide off the road , so i can pull em out and save the day again.

[Zuki-Ron2]

Cant wait till winter when people's cars slide off the road , so i can pull em out and save the day again.

Be cautious about this kind of thing, it can bite you in the butt.

Relatives, you bet.
Friends, OK
Aquantances, sure.
Stangers, if life threatening or it is an easy out.

Sounds harsh, but offering to pull someone out of a ditch is a bad move unless you know where to pull on that vehicle to safely extract it. You could damage it, or worse, dissable it. Then you are on the hook for the repairs.

Years ago two things happened to me which made me think about this.
1) I pulled a bumper off a Ford LTD which was stuck in the guys driveway.
2) On one icy day, I decided it would be a good idea to help some poor shlep who had slid off the road. I turned around, found that I was in trouble also, and got in an accident myself. I ended up paying for the second instance for a while.

You know, to this day, I have never been waived down by an Officer to lend towing assistace to a motorist who had left the right of way. They wait for the professionals.

Ron

[RichP]

Come up with a release form, make THEM do the hookup to THEIR tow point. I've pulled maybe 25 cars out since I got my XJ in 97, initially using the front hooks and later the rear hook. My sons friend made a killing two winters ago on our street, 12 inches of snow that was more slush froze leaving 4 deep tire tracks thru what looked like snow but was solid ice. He pulled out a H2 that got high centered and a lincoln towncar that got high centered. One bronco had his transfer case ripped off when the driver decided to power thru the slush, two others had their oil pans ripped open. He did all this with his TJ and a 9000lb winch. He also pulled a brand new landrover back over on it's rubber side down after it ended up on it's passenger side on a major road during a bad nor easter snow storm. State trooper asked if he would do it, acted as a witness to the owner saying OK, they knew it would be 5 hours before a tow truck that could flip it back over would be available. You need to judge each situation from a 'what will happen to me' view..

[Ghost]

Very good advise here. Also ditch and chains and straps with metal hooks. Death is a permanent. If you think all the missile talk is BS look around the forums. I remember a guy that got killed with a d-ring extracting a fellow wheeler with two straps hooked together IIRC.

[XJ_Vikings]

i cant even count how many drunk people ive pulled out of the woods up here. Good old UConn and its stupid drunk drivers

[bjoehandley]

I've only had to do one recovery, 2 kids in a Wrangler with no front drive shaft (said he tore it up wheeling) got stuck smashing through snow banks in the parking lot behind work just as myself and a couple of co-workers were leaving. My first thought was to leave his stupid arse stuck there it's only a well lit parkinglot, but my co-workers decided to help unstick it, by hand. After about 10-20 minutes of watching knucklehead 1 try and throttle it from fwd to rev while knuckleheads 2-4 jumped on, tugged, and pushed trying to get the thing unstuck (front axle was pretty well buried and the wide 30" Thornbirds probably didn't help any.) I finally realised that if that truck came unstuck the way they were working at it, somebody was going to get hurt so offered to pull him out. He had the looped straps and a tow hook on his truck and we just hooked it to the hitch on my truck and slowly pulled him out.

[THalladay]

Come up with a release form
Got any links or suggestions on where to find one?

[RichP]

Got any links or suggestions on where to find one?
This ought to get you started.... :D :D :D yahoo is your friend when a quickie is needed....

http://www.lettersandforms.com/free-forms/form-general-release.html

http://www.lawdepot.com/contracts/release/?pid=overture-release&s_kwcid=1180056700000009086&clicksource=standard&OVRAW=generic%20release%20form&OVKEY=generic%20release%20form&OVMTC=standard

http://www.ndsu.nodak.edu/general_counsel/forms.htm

http://www.lettersandforms.com/free-forms.html

[RichP]

I've only had to do one recovery, 2 kids in a Wrangler with no front drive shaft (said he tore it up wheeling) got stuck smashing through snow banks in the parking lot behind work just as myself and a couple of co-workers were leaving. My first thought was to leave his stupid arse stuck there it's only a well lit parkinglot, but my co-workers decided to help unstick it, by hand. After about 10-20 minutes of watching knucklehead 1 try and throttle it from fwd to rev while knuckleheads 2-4 jumped on, tugged, and pushed trying to get the thing unstuck (front axle was pretty well buried and the wide 30" Thornbirds probably didn't help any.) I finally realised that if that truck came unstuck the way they were working at it, somebody was going to get hurt so offered to pull him out. He had the looped straps and a tow hook on his truck and we just hooked it to the hitch on my truck and slowly pulled him out.

Now if you had had a good bumper you could have pushed him thru the rest of the way..... :D :D :D

Our property only has grass over the septic and leach field, gravel circular driveway comes in on one street, goes out the other, we're on a corner and the front acre is all woods. Some 19 something year old chick managed to get her taurus wagon across my drainage ditch at 1130 one nite and up into the front corner woods tween a rock and a tree. Dragged her out with the TJ using one of the tie down loops they put under cars now a days for a rear tie down point I guess on the delivery trucks. No damage to the TJ but her rear light was broken a bit, the yahoo who stopped to 'help' didn't understand the simple instruction I gave him of 'once I have her car on the road hit the brakes so you won't roll back any and run into my heavy steel warn front bumper', my spare was up against my neighbors mailbox which is a 3" steel pipe in 4ft of concrete so I was not going anywhere.

[THalladay]

This ought to get you started.... :D :D :D yahoo is your friend when a quickie is needed....

Apparantly google failed me. I think I was being too specific, but those links are exactly what I was looking for! Thanks!