clutchdust
Millionaire Playboy
Long story
I needed to go out of town today, just the next town over so I could register my truck and park my trailer at our property so it's not sitting out on the street all the time. I get everything loaded up and finally get on the road. As I'm going up the mountain I'm having a hard time even doing 50. The truck just feels like I'm dragging an anchor. Then all of a sudden I hear BANG! Then I have nothing. Engine is still running, it's in gear but there is just this terrible grinding sound. I pull off to the side and throw it in park but the truck rolls back. I set the e-brake and get out to check, I look under the truck and see steam/smoke pouring out of the transfer case (truck has a PTO). So just to check I throw the truck in drive and sure as shit, the input shaft spins but I have nothing on the output shaft. I can't wait to see how expensive this is going to be.
But the day didn't go without its share of comedy. Now remember, I'm going up the mountain when this all happened. I called a friend who will come and tow me home but to make it easier on him I wanted to get the truck closer to town. So I slowly start rolling back down the mountain but with the trailer I'm all over the place. If I could just get everything turned around I knew I'd be fine. Problem is, the highway is really busy so turning both the truck and trailer around in a single one-shot effort with all the traffic is just not something I'm going to risk. So it strikes me that I should drop the trailer, turn the truck around, turn the trailer around and then reconnect everything. Sounds simple enough. Remember the part about the mountain? Well, I had a wheel chock which I thought I would just put in front of the wheel at the tongue, I have a wheeled jackstand on the front of the trailer. I put the chock in front of that wheel and jacked the tongue off the ball hitch. Next thing I know I'm chasing a trailer down the mountain. Fortunately, I had enough of a grip and I was able to steer the trailer into the ditch and keep it from going into the travel lanes. Now I have a new problem, trailer is in the ditch and my truck only goes the direction of gravity. I let the truck roll back just up to the trailer and chock the wheels, then take out my one of my ratchet straps. 6 inches at a time I pull this trailer out of the ditch. Just as I get the trailer back on the road a DOT truck pulls up and offers assistance. They were kind enough to hook the trailer up and to their truck and pull it across the road to a large clearing. I thanked them and told them I had help on the way. Once the traffic broke I rolled the truck across the road to the same clearing. I was about to give up on the situation but thought as long as I have time I might as well hook up the trailer and see how far I can go. I ended up getting the truck and trailer back on the highway and was probably doing upwards of 50 for the better part of the way. I ended up making it about 10 miles back into town before I ran out of steam and had to pull over. Turned out to be about as good as I could have asked though because I made it to the intersection of a major crossroad and made it easy for my friend to meet up with me.
He couldn't get off work for a while so I had to kill about 3 hours on the side of the road before he finally showed up. Finally, he did, we hooked my truck to his with my strap and mosied on home at about 45mph. The tow was actually the easiest part of the day.
I needed to go out of town today, just the next town over so I could register my truck and park my trailer at our property so it's not sitting out on the street all the time. I get everything loaded up and finally get on the road. As I'm going up the mountain I'm having a hard time even doing 50. The truck just feels like I'm dragging an anchor. Then all of a sudden I hear BANG! Then I have nothing. Engine is still running, it's in gear but there is just this terrible grinding sound. I pull off to the side and throw it in park but the truck rolls back. I set the e-brake and get out to check, I look under the truck and see steam/smoke pouring out of the transfer case (truck has a PTO). So just to check I throw the truck in drive and sure as shit, the input shaft spins but I have nothing on the output shaft. I can't wait to see how expensive this is going to be.
But the day didn't go without its share of comedy. Now remember, I'm going up the mountain when this all happened. I called a friend who will come and tow me home but to make it easier on him I wanted to get the truck closer to town. So I slowly start rolling back down the mountain but with the trailer I'm all over the place. If I could just get everything turned around I knew I'd be fine. Problem is, the highway is really busy so turning both the truck and trailer around in a single one-shot effort with all the traffic is just not something I'm going to risk. So it strikes me that I should drop the trailer, turn the truck around, turn the trailer around and then reconnect everything. Sounds simple enough. Remember the part about the mountain? Well, I had a wheel chock which I thought I would just put in front of the wheel at the tongue, I have a wheeled jackstand on the front of the trailer. I put the chock in front of that wheel and jacked the tongue off the ball hitch. Next thing I know I'm chasing a trailer down the mountain. Fortunately, I had enough of a grip and I was able to steer the trailer into the ditch and keep it from going into the travel lanes. Now I have a new problem, trailer is in the ditch and my truck only goes the direction of gravity. I let the truck roll back just up to the trailer and chock the wheels, then take out my one of my ratchet straps. 6 inches at a time I pull this trailer out of the ditch. Just as I get the trailer back on the road a DOT truck pulls up and offers assistance. They were kind enough to hook the trailer up and to their truck and pull it across the road to a large clearing. I thanked them and told them I had help on the way. Once the traffic broke I rolled the truck across the road to the same clearing. I was about to give up on the situation but thought as long as I have time I might as well hook up the trailer and see how far I can go. I ended up getting the truck and trailer back on the highway and was probably doing upwards of 50 for the better part of the way. I ended up making it about 10 miles back into town before I ran out of steam and had to pull over. Turned out to be about as good as I could have asked though because I made it to the intersection of a major crossroad and made it easy for my friend to meet up with me.
He couldn't get off work for a while so I had to kill about 3 hours on the side of the road before he finally showed up. Finally, he did, we hooked my truck to his with my strap and mosied on home at about 45mph. The tow was actually the easiest part of the day.