I am not sure if this should go here or rants and raves, but I have never seen a tow truck get stuck, ,so if it needs to be be moved, I guess a mod can do it if they need to.
So on thursday I get a call from my mother-in-law at 8 in the morning informing me that she and her 10 children were standed out by Chugwater, Wy and she needed me to come help them as they had lost control of thier 15 passenger Ram Van 3500 and went into the center median.

So being the nice guy that I am, I headed out from Cheyenne to try to find them. The only thing that they could tell me was that they were north bound on I-25 just south of Chugwater. Nothing else. In a attempt to get some kind of idea of were they were, I used my CB to figure out where they were. A truker kindly informed me that they were turing around in the median and were now going to be on the south bound sholder. When I got there, I could see where they had been on the center median so I followed thier lead and drove across it with no problems.

When I looked the van over I could tell that the front drivers side was siezed. So I used my AAA card to get a tow truck who had to make the 90 minute drive from Lermie to Chugwater. After about ninety minutes, we saw a standard wrecker, we had asked for a flatbed truck, turn his emegancy lights on and turn into the center median and stop moving. (I took this on the way back to his tow truck after getting a trucker to stop, no easy task)

When I took that picture I was about half way to his truck from my truck.


I saw This when I got up to his truck
This drive, who I nicknamed Billy-Bob, how no idea how to drive, get himself unstuck, or tow a vehicle. At one point a Ram 3500 stoped and aske Billy-Bob if he could help. After Billy-Bob pulled the Ram about 10 feet I decided that I had to go back to my truck and grab my camera phone.

When I got back Mr. Billy-Bob was trying to flag down another truck. I asked him what he was going to do, it was now 2 full hours since I called AAA. He told me that we was going to try to get another truck to stop. I told him that I had a truck, but it wasn't going to do him any good, he was too stuck and too big. He was just going to pull everything down the hill and he needed another tow truck or a 18 wheeler to pull him out. He then proceeded to try to flag down a big rig. I then trotted back to my truck and proceded to try to convince a truck to stop. After 45 minutes and numerous cracks about a tow truck being stuck on stoped.

This is the truck that agreed to stop and help.
The next fun thing was when Billy-Bob hooked his winch up and started to pull himself out, he had it in park and the brake on. He then asked me to jump in his truck and take the brake off and drop it in neutral (can you say DOT violation?)

Then his front wheels start turning and he doesn't do anything about it so after they are fully turned and he hasn't even thought about it, I say excuse me mister Billy-Bob, but you may want to lock your steering so you don't mess your steering up. He then looks and says oh shoot, will you jump up there and hold them striaght?
So being the nice guy that I am, I take these while holding his steering straight




After another 10 minutes on winching he was free. And I could snap a few of where he was stuck


This is what the back of his stinger looked like

He then lifted up the Van and was going to leave, he didn't even think to take the drive line off. After 84 minutes, Yes I timed it, I was getting very upset about all of this crap, he got the drive shaft off at the rear axle and put it back on at the tranny. He had soaked it with WD40 and liquid wrench and thought that it would be okay to just take it apart at the trany.

Here is the only picture of where he sprayed the WD40 to take the drive line off.

 

gotta love the genius tow truck driver!

 

sweeet mother

 

Sounds like the wrecker from hell! They NEVER send me a flatbed either...

 

hey now, lay off the tow truck drivers! Although Billy Bob does give us a bad name. First rule of thumb, especially for a AAA driver. THE TRUCK NEVER LEAVES HARD GROUND. AAA will NOT cover a winch out if the driver has to go off road. Having said that, Billy Boob should have known better than to cut across a median.

 

He didn't need to go off road. The van was on solid ground. I had already pulled it to the hard sholder. Billy-Bob simply didn't know that his 2 ton wheel lift wrecker couldn't cut accros the shoulder. I mean it had only rained non stop for 2 1/2 days. Why couldn't a 32,000 GVW rear wheel drive truck make it across, my 3450 pound Sport Trac made it just fine

 

lol ill have to find some pics of my tow truck stuck, i had an 03 550 4x4, we have a lot of kids around here that get ahold of mommy and daddys trucks and go get them stuck so we put some agressive tires on. I figured i might as well go and see wehat it could go through (boss didnt know i was doing this) so we went to the gravel pits and buried it so bad that i had to get our gmc 6500 and my weekend guy bring his 550 for weight so the 6500 could pull me out. it took me almost all day to get the mud off that truck but it was well worth it! ive got a pic of the 05 i used to drive on my car domain.

 

when the aaa didnt cover it is when i made my money, we used to work off commison from the truck (town of 17000 ppl so hourly wage was no good) we used to get 35% of what the truck made before gas and everything

 

Reminds me of a time long ago. Sorry no pictures. At Cannon AF Base, NM the Mobility Unit got there 6x6 wrecker stuck trying to pull out a 6x6 truck. Both of them were to the frames in the mud. They called me cause my unit had a 5 ton wrecker. Duh.... I went out witha medium weight aircraft tow vehicle. 4WD, 4W steer and electric clutch. Had the wrecker hook the truck and the wrecker wench my tow vehicle. They were pissing and moaning it wouldn't do it. I told them I drop my hand out the window to dump the clutches and floor both trucks. They came out in one shot. Haha. Of course they didn't realize my 4 tires were on asphalt and I weighed in a about 25 tons and granny gear was slower than if you got out to walk.
Thanks for the memories. Glad the family got home safe.

 

It's right up there when snowplows and salters get stuck........days like that you just stay home. LOL

 

.......dumb

 

Wow the tow truck driver should have called a tow truck to get himself out.

Were the truckers laughing over the CB about the stuck tow truck?

 

Im sure they were. Almost as hard as we towers laugh when we have to go pull one of them out cuz they pulled of the road for a "quickie" and get buried.

Our policy is that NO truck goes off hard pavement. If it takes more cable than what we have on a truck, we send a second truck, and thats when the $$$ starts being made.

There was the one time that I had a customer go off the road into a huge drainage ditch. Only one way to get them back out...the same way they went in, over 450' from the nearest pavement. So, I put one wrecker in the mud and had it pull the casualty to it, and then pulled the wrecker back to me on dry ground. $750 later, the trucks clean, and I was on my way to the bank!

 

yall are strict where your at. the tow trucks even aaa will come all the way to the muddholes for us down here. 2weakends ago towtruck came out to the muddhole to pull a f150 on 38 boggers out and we chained the towtruck to my superduty and it still drug both of us to him till the cable broke. towtruck called it a day after that.

 

DUDE TOW TRACTORS ARE THE SHIZIT!!!!!!!!!

 

lol where is the 15 passenger van that started this story...?


JOSH

 

Sounds real brilliant...