Maybe this post should be called "What use is a Winch on a dry flat road", or maybe "How not to react to news of an accident".
Either way Axles post about cars having a soul springs to mind here and a valid question could be did this car die or did it commit suicide ?
I am sure many will be aware of my 4800 manual GU Patrol which has been the subject of many adventures over the years which have ranged across the country from
Cape York to the Canning, the
Madigan line and countless trips and close calls.
For my requirements there was nothing that could be done to it make it any better, we even brought a brand new 4800 auto patrol and ran them side by side in a failed attempt to make the new one as good as the old.
Under some pressure I finally sold it to a
young adult in our circle of friends and it began its new life.
Within 24 hours, what I thought was the perfect car was declared inadequate until a giant sub-woofer was installed.
1 month and three winch rescues later it came up our driveway on a fateful Saturday night a couple of weeks ago.
The
young adults needed my electronic engineering skills.
I noted that the car sported a large banner in which the word Patrol had 2 letters added and it now read "Partyrol".
They had with them a 300mm diameter multicoloured plastic ball which I gather rotates and projects coloured light.
I think they have them at Disco's - forgive my terminology, this isn't my scene.
Anyway the idea was to make this thing work while hanging inside the car.
Ok, figured it out and about midnight they headed off to go to our 4wd property.
Its now about 1am and 3km from the destination on a dry but dark night on a very lonely narrow tree lined dirt road.
A half seen kangaroo jumps out from the driver side and the driver
swings left.
He instantly sees that the car is heading for a tree and violently spins the wheel right, the passenger side backend barely touches the first tree as they slew right.
Their speed is only 40kmh but the car now points at a second tree and they are off line.
The driver tries to swing back left again, the car begins to respond but the drivers front wheel hits a small
embankment in front of the tree.
Good effort, they almost made it but the drivers side front strikes the second tree a glancing blow as the
embankment is lifting the front end off the ground.
The forces cause the backend to come around and the car begins a roll onto the passenger side.
I have always praised the stability of these cars and this is when it was needed.
Still mostly on the road, with its nose still collapsing into the tree the car goes over onto its passenger side and the back slides around a full 180 degrees.
The momentum carries the sliding and rotating car, off and past the tree.
It does a full 270 degree spin , sliding on its side but does not actually roll over.
My son was a passenger in the car.
The car has stopped and the first thing he sees is dirt through the side window about 6 inches from his nose and is aware of pressure from the driver hanging above him from his
seat belt.
The ignition is on and electric windows still work so they clamber out the drivers window.
Now I have to be a little circumspect here. The driver was, shall we say "completely inconsolable".
By the light of a mobile phone they tried to make the best of things, both are tough motocross riders, they considered their injuries "Superficial".
Amazingly the winch housing was cracked but it worked noisily however it could do little to put the car back on its wheels.
Calling for outside help was low on their list of priorities, but the "mental" situation was deteriorating.
My son thought that they needed a focus and purpose, it was 2am.
He knew they were only 3km from our bush block and a hand winch and so off they ran to get it.
They couldn't find the hand winch but grabbed a drag chain and snatch block, had a short rest and carrying this load, ran back to the car which was still lying on its side across the road.
They rigged
the block, drag chain and assorted winch straps such that they could get a sideways pull on the car.
But the pull just caused the car to slide along the road.
By holding the winch on and rocking the car from its roof they got the wheels to dig in and lifted the car.
A minute later Partyrol flopped onto its wheels, its now 3am.
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It was a mess but the car seemed mechanically ok apart from the radiator and bonnet squashed into the fan.
Using the winch, its rope was put around a tree and back to the cross member above the radiator and it was used to pull the cross member away from the engine.
Some more hammer work and checks and with great relief the engine started.
The 3rd use for the winch was to tie the rope over the crushed bonnet and winch it securely down.
At 4am they drove the 3km back to our property arriving just as the engine began to overheat with steam pouring out of the holed radiator.
2 hours rest and a few bandages later they phoned the parents.
Unfortunately the inconsolable driver received a long irate lecture and nearly lost it again.
When our call came I asked only one question - how can we help ?
A couple of hours later we arrived on the scene carrying lots of water and cans of Bars Leak and tools.
Despite a lot of superficial damage the car was mechanically sound, we bogged the radiator and after a couple more hours work the car was driven back to
Melbourne.
We cleaned up the dirt road - and even the neighbours would never know of the drama that occurred there during the night.
P.S. Partyrol was declared a right off.