Thursday, February 04, 2010

Stuck Trailer...If That Fence Pole Hadn't A Been There, It Would Have Come Right Out Without A Hitch.

Nine and a half foot gate.
Eight foot wide trailer.
Left front tire drops off curb, tilting trailer to the left.
Trailer meets fence pole.
Discussion.
Remove gate.
Chain hooked on axle, truck can't pull trailer sideways.
Hook second truck to first truck.
No success.
Call wrecker.
Wrecker pulls trailer eight inches south.
Wrecker shears pin on winch.
Trailer clears pole.
Truck pulling trailer get stuck in snow/mud.
$60.00 later truck and trailer in the street.

This is Sam and Frankie's trailer parked on our back yard. They came up from Texas to visit their daughter and grandkids who live two doors down the street. They parked their trailer in our backyard. Pride backed the 8' wide trailer through the 9.5' gate. It took him several approaches of backing and filing to get the trailer in the yard, seeing as there is a telephone pole and guy wire directly across the street from the gate, necessitating backing in at an angle.

Sam hooked up the pickup to the trailer and started pulling out of the yard through the gate. He planned to make a right turn and head up the street, so he could miss the guy wires on the telephone pole. As he swung right, the left front tire on the trailer dropped off the curb and tilted the trailer to the left. Lots of people hollering, "WHOA!" The trailer lodged itself against the fence pole and gate. I removed the gate from the fence post to gain some inches.

I got several chains and looped them around the right axles and pulled the chain between the tires to the back of Sam's dually pickup. The truck just spun its tires and made lots of smoke, it was too light to budge the trailer.

Another dually pickup showed up, this one with a diesel engine. I got another chain and we hooked the two trucks together. More tire smoke and the trailer didn't budge. Time to call a wrecker.

The wrecker was able to move the trailer sideways about eight inches before the winch sheared a pin. Luckily, that was enough to get the trailer out of the gate.


A tale of inches. Sometimes an inch is as good as a mile.

Sam had to drive up in the neighbor's yard to complete the right turn. But he made it.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Had the same problem 14-15 years ago. Hacksawed the center post and got a pipe that just fit inside the sawed post, stuck it in the post hole in the ground; slipped the post back over the top and wahla' fixed.

No, it wasn't my idea. My 74-year old back yard neighbor watched us scratch our heads and 'caned' his way over with the suggestion.

Wisdom=Age.

Horse-farmer said...

Why didn't you just jack the trailer up and put boards under the tires????

Oh well, if you had a FORD there you would have been free in just a few minutes.

Don't you watch commercials of the Fords pulling the chevies and dodges out of harms way????

Glad you ahd a good adventure, sorry I missed it.

tom

Busplunge said...

I wanted to jack up the axles and put greased plywood under the wheels and pull the trailer sideways on the greased plywood.

I was overuled by the owner of the trailer.

We should have 'bridged' the curb with 2x12s or 2x10s.

hindsight is 20/20

bus plunge said...

That what I did .... cut the post and slipped one inside it. Now, I have a 14' gate.