Who Needs MaxTrax

As long as the mud came before the evening fire, OK :)

Regards

Shepherds, this is just as good, very ingenious, regards, Michael


http://youtu.be/mHyHlLTlP4A

Anyone who has ever had anything to do with bulldozers, knows about the "tying a log to the tracks" trick, to get out of hopeless bogs.

I've got bulldozers out of mud so deep, it covered the floorplates!

When I was contracting with dozers we always kept a good supply of 1/2" steel wire rope on hand, cut to the right length, to slip through the tracks and around a decent size log.

When a dozer sank to the makers name, it was then only a matter of sourcing a suitable tree (whitegum was good and handy, most of the time where I worked), chainsawing it down, cutting it to length (about a metre longer than the tracks were wide) - digging enough of a trench to slide the log in behind the dozer - tying it to the tracks with the cable - and applying steady power!

It was very rare that a log failed to get the dozer out in one go - although a couple of times we needed a couple of logs in a very bad bog.

When the log appeared at the front of the dozer, it was only a matter of swinging a 14lb sledgehammer to cut the cable where it ran over the sharp edge of the grousers.

Sorry - no pictures! I lost them all in a house fire in 1982!

Cheers, Ron.

Don't you carry a bit 6 by 4 to keep Fiona in check? lol

Is there a 4wd out there not sporting a shiny orange, red or pink max track they are the in thing in 4wd accessories and look great on the roof rack.
I still use a snatch strap or winch.

The U.S. Field Manual (link below) was compulsory reading for every GI who got licenced to drive any of Uncle Sams wheeled or tracked machines!

It's dated 1962 - but it dates back to before WW2 - and every basic piece of advice in it, is just as relevant today, as it was in the early 1940's! (well, apart from distributors and carburettors!).

The American military manuals are nothing short of first class in their coverage, their clarity of descriptions, and their diagrams.

See pages 46 & 47 - 85 & 86, as well as page 92 - just to see, that nothing is new under the sun!

U.S. Army Field Manual - Vehicle Recovery

Cheers, Ron.

Interesting and worth keeping in mind.


But not sure how the plank would have gone here, we had water and mud all around us - got caught by a massive downpour - blue skies and within mins a waterfall. My Cruiser was 100 meters further back and totally bogged.

Marooned for three nights.

Was looking for some other photos tonight, Stephen, and found this. Maxtrax wouldn't have been much good.........it was taken in April, 1984!



Can't recall exactly, but think they left the 2 vehicles for a couple of days to dry out and drove them straight out.

On this same stretch of road, back in 1974, there were a number of station vehicles bogged. One of the ringers was keen to get out(He'd called into the station to see the manager for a couple of days, and was caught there for 3 months!!!)so he took the station Massey-Ferguson tractor down to remove a couple of blackfellars cars out of a swamp. Bogged the tractor, so he walked home, and he & I took the stock camp truck down, and promptly bogged the truck before we'd even hooked up to the tractor.

Walked home again, and got the bore truck next. A V8 Dodge that had heaps of grunt....... be no worries to pull both the tractor and truck out. Yeah, well, that was the plan, but truck with plenty of grunt = heavy vehicle, and bogged it, probably where these 2 are, in the photo above.

No worries, we said, after walking back to the station again. We'll just get the Cat grader, it's got bogey drive, and goes almost anywhere! All 12 tonne of it! Might have gone anywhere in average years, but 6 weeks into the '74 Wet, the trusty yellow beast got to the edge of the red country, and promptly dropped onto the tandem boxes..........so we walked home again.

Bob