Weirdest close call with-OUT tragic results

[Qapla]

What is the strangest, oddest, weirdest close call you have had on your tractor without any tragic results?

I'll start it off ...

We used to have a Case 420BD Backhoe. (this was quite a number of years ago) and I was digging a rather large hole with the hoe. I had repositioned the tractor several times and the hole was nearly what we were trying to achieve. I went to move the tractor one more time and, as I lifted the stabilizers, the dirt gave way under the rear tires. The whole machine, with me on it, slid down into the hole - BACKWARDS!. It moved like it was in slow motion.

It was so slow that I was able to pick a good time and spot to jump clear.

I could have stayed on the tractor because just as I jumped the tractor came to a stop. It was standing almost vertical and still running.

We got a neighbor from down the road to come and pull/dig the tractor out. We used it for several more years after that - neither the backhoe nor me suffered any ill effects - except that I am still very careful when digging.

 

[DKCDKC]

Driving fairly rapidly down a steep portion of my gravel drive after box-blading the gravel... Steep curve to left... Right front tire blew... Over compensated to left, and ran up on steep bank... Afraid of rolling so turned right again as slowed... Dropped the FEL and BB... Came to a stop with the bad front tire resting on the staked-down log that serves as guardrail before 20 foot almost vertical drop. The tractor was a 1974 JD 2030 with no ROPS.

Never ascertained cause for the tire blowout - but an old tire anyway.

 

[cartod]

Plowing snow down hill with a back blade and tractor started sliding. As it picked up speed it started going sideways. I jumped off not so gracefully and watched tractor slide down hill sideways and come to a safe halt at the bottom. I was pretty bruised up.

 

[DJ54]

Back in the late 70's, I was mowing the median strip of a 4-lane Federal highway (Rt. 33) in our area. Tractor was a 504 IH with a 5' Danco belly mower.

The mower picked up a rubber spring snubber, and threw it into oncoming traffic in the southbound lanes. It was like a scene from the Six Million Dollar Man, where things went into slow motion. It was in direct line with my vision.

It hit the door post between the windshield, and the open side window of the car, right at head level. It put a sizeable dent in that door post. I heard it hit, over the noise of the tractor, and mower running full throttle. Cars were probably running 55-60 mph.

The driver, a company salesman, immediatley pulled to the berm, visibly shaken... He wasn't the only one....!!

I offered to call the Ohio Highway Patrol, to make about a report, to get his car repaired, but he refused... He was just happy it did not hit a nano second later. Me too... Both our guardian angles were with us that day...

 

[Gary Fowler]

What is the strangest, oddest, weirdest close call you have had on your tractor without any tragic results?

I'll start it off ...

We used to have a Case 420BD Backhoe. (this was quite a number of years ago) and I was digging a rather large hole with the hoe. I had repositioned the tractor several times and the hole was nearly what we were trying to achieve. I went to move the tractor one more time and, as I lifted the stabilizers, the dirt gave way under the rear tires. The whole machine, with me on it, slid down into the hole - BACKWARDS!. It moved like it was in slow motion.

It was so slow that I was able to pick a good time and spot to jump clear.

I could have stayed on the tractor because just as I jumped the tractor came to a stop. It was standing almost vertical and still running.

We got a neighbor from down the road to come and pull/dig the tractor out. We used it for several more years after that - neither the backhoe nor me suffered any ill effects - except that I am still very careful when digging.

That was really freakish. Seems that the outriggers would have sloughed off much before the rear wheels did since they are further back. You were lucky indeed not to damage anything.

 

[hoseguy]

This isn't too wierd but it's the sensation you get when big heavy trailers start pushing the tractor around.
For example: running down a hill in a (damp) field with a turn at the bottom and as you start turning the trailer pushes the back of the tractor in the direction you were going so you end up with this wierd drifty, floaty, crossed-up, panicky feeling of 18 tonnes pushing a NH 8240 sideways.

Yet another one of these things to watch for, I guess considering the potential for disaster


Another is the number of people pulling trailers from the ends of the lift arms without using tie rods and having the drawbar too high and the tractor starts pulling wheelies. Probably supplies plenty of that kind of action. Pulled a few wheelies here and there with odd (dangerous) loads in my time.
A dude was killed here coupla weeks ago on a TE-20 doing that. Trailer too heavy, arms set too high, no front weights, no roll bar, going up a hill.
Inevitable, really.

Sorry OP, you did say without tragic results but hey it's a mighty thin line between the two.

Had many, many interesting calls in excavators though.
Opened a side cover one day and had a mouse run up the arm of my overalls.
THAT, was a weird feeling!

 

[jveretto]

Back in the 60s in the steepest hills in the Ozarks, Dad & I were raking hay with a small IH tractor. Rake was an old riding rake with a seat. Dad riding the rake and me driving tractor. I had already let the tractor die twice. As Dad tended to do, he yelled "Start that tractor! Now give it the gas! Now let out on the clutch!" I did. Tractor stood up and almost rolled over backward onto the rake and of course Dad. Scared up both! He never yelled at me again concerning my driving.

 

[tractchores]

I had one this winter. Just got a new tractor, had it for all of 2 or 3 hours and was making a first run down an extremely steep hill. It had snowed a little in the morning, so the hill had a combo of light snow and dry leaves on it. I started going down with FEL very low and very slow, however I didn't realize I was in 2 WD (stupid). The rear wheels slipped and I started to accelerate down the hill, at the bottom of the hill is a lake, which had a couple of inches of ice on it. I lowered the FEL and it caught a bit causing the tractor to spin 180 degrees on the hill and thankfully come to a stop. It felt like it was slow motion and I was totally sure I was going to get to test out the ROPS and seatbelt. When it was sideways on the hill the uphill wheels started to lift, but luckily the momentum carried it past and it stopped safely facing uphill.... I'm MUCH more careful about 4wd and 2wd on that hill now!

 

[slowzuki]

Close calls?

Rode the top of a stacked kicker wagon load of 250 bales of hay down a steep wet grassy hill. The bad part was the wagon was attached to a baler, which was attached to a Ford 3000 getting pushed sideways on the grass.

New to me 100 hp tractor was parked at the top of our hill. Did not realize the wet clutch lets off over time, and the parking brake was not set hard enough, nor was the loader down hard enough. Heard a noise in the house, went outside to see tractor sailing down the hill past my field of view then a crash. Luckily it ran into the parked loader off my other tractor and dragging that stopped it before it went over the next pitch. The next pitch is wide open leading to the neighbours house, the highway, then the river, in that order.

 

[jonyyuma]

My BIL was thrown by his brother from the draw bar on to the disc set he was getting ready to pull??..Never understood why he got on the drawbar..He was 25 yo..It nearly cut this left arm all the way thru at the bicep..Emergency room repaired the bad cut and feeling came back into arm in several months? Now it Seems to be fully functional again..He almost became a 1 armed diesel mech?? Close enough??