OK, I'm stuck! Now what?

[EdC]

Jstpssng


I'm pretty new but couldn't that bend the bucket, there is not much support in the middle unless you have a toothbar. My dealer told me not to put on 3 bucket hooks for that reason anyway. Of course that could be cause I only have a 200CX.

 

[Jstpssng]

Jstpssng


I'm pretty new but couldn't that bend the bucket, there is not much support in the middle unless you have a toothbar. My dealer told me not to put on 3 bucket hooks for that reason anyway. Of course that could be cause I only have a 200CX.

Yeah it started to, but I grabbed the saw and cut a support to go between the top and cutter bar on the bucket.


TXDon; luckily I have about 120 feet of 3/8 inch chain, and there's nowhere on my property that you can be farther than that away from a tree.

 

[patrick_g]

DCS:

YEAH !! I used to use my come-a-long (and at times a Danforth type anchor) all the time to pull my little old Ford 1100 out of the mud.

Jay

Lets not let this WISDOM pass us by without emphasis.

A Danforth style anchor (originally designed by Danforth in 1943 to pull landing craft back off of the beach) has great holding power for its weight. About as good as it gets in a straight line pull (as winching and come-a-longs produce. A Danforth anchor makes a good dead man to winch to or deploy a come-along and DOES NOT require that you dig a hole and bury it.

Serious and extreme 4x4 devotees often carry a variation of a Danforth anchor with them on their treks. DIY versions are simple and inexpensive to make and work very well indeed for terrestrial purposes even in mud and sand.

Under tension the flukes dig in deeper and deeper into the "bottom" and can provide the holding power to allow tremendous line tensions to be generated by a come-along or a winch.

The marine version has moving parts but the terrestrial user doesn't need them as you "set" the anchor by hand and there is no doubt about which side of the anchor will be pointed down. Until you have seen just how much holding force a small lightweight Danforth style DIY anchor can produce, you probably wouldn't believe it.

Just about anyone could pull a tractor out of the mud with a BIG ROBUST come-a-long "IF" there is something to secure the "other" end of the come-along to but often there isn't a perfectly located tree or other suitable object. That is what the Danforth style anchor provides, something to hold fast to the other end of the come-along or winch line.

Pat

 

[bucmeister]

DCS,

I enjoyed the saga of your adventures, brings back old memories and let me relive some times with my dad. We were getting a TD15 International dozer out of a sink at the base of a hill on our place, he had dropped in onto the belly pan in about one hearbeat. Sure am glad you got it out especially ahead of the rain, "ah feel yo relief!"

That adventure and your pictures prompted me to offer this suggestion. I see there is a lot of small brush around the area and one way to combat the sinking of you boards is to make a mat out of a lot of that scrub before you ever put down the first piece of wood. Ends up working like a snowshoe and will substantially slow the rate at which the timbers will sink. That's what we did with the dozer, raised the blade, put an underbrush/treetop mat down, then cut the trunks of the small trees to build up cribbing to the bottom edge of the blade, after about two lifts we had the front of the tracks up enough to start building the mat for the small logs that went completely across. It took us a couple of hours, but we did get it out. The first time I ever saw the mat method used was in 1975 when a "little ole" D-7 with a root rake had to rescue a D-9 with 3" grouser extensions and a huge full "vee" clearing blade that had sunk to the belly pan in a sandy patch. Of course the D-7 version of the mat was downed logs, he built a nice pile then backed up on top of it before tying the winch line on, that way he was lifting up as he was pulling out. Worked like a dream.

As far as using the bucket and chains and bending the bucket, yes in a heartbeat (don't ask) if it has not been set up to take it, mine is now reenforced under the front lip with a section of 1-1/8" oilfield polish rod and a 3/4" sucker rod laminated in behind it. That said, if you had a pair of chains you could hook to the bottom edge at each side, run the chains back along each side of the tractor, then curl the bucket which might get you a foot, use the come-a-long to hold the progress then uncurl the bucket, take up the slack, and do it again. Looking at your pictures it appears 5 feet would have been golden. The problem is having two chains long enough and then having something to anchor them to. Which reminds me, it is about time I go ahead and get myself a couple more 5/16" transport chains.

 

[ChuckinNH]

Now if you had R-1's instead of those darn old R-4's you coulda dug right down to something solid, and drove out........... Sometimes it just doesn't make a difference does it? I did that once brush hogging in a game preserve, but there was a dozer there with a winch. It's amazing how fast they can sink, and how soon (about half a wheel revolution) you know you are really in!

 

[jbrumberg]

I've got stuck plenty of times with my R-1's once I could not go forward mad: . R-1's do not "goo" in reverse very well. Jay

 

[MadDogDriver]

Other than not entering the goo (if you know where it is), a reliable option to minimize getting stuck is reducing your footprint weight (like with duals if that were even possible on CUTs). The wider the better. I've only seen that option on row crop tractors though.

 

[bucmeister]

Other than not entering the goo (if you know where it is), a reliable option to minimize getting stuck is reducing your footprint weight (like with duals if that were even possible on CUTs). The wider the better. I've only seen that option on row crop tractors though.

My dad used to have a set on his Ford 1910 2WD. Had a set of hubs made up and bolted on the second set. By the time we got through with them it was an neat rig and they could be removed and replaced in a matter of a few minutes with the modes we put on the outer edge. Completely changed the nature of that little tractor, made it a man with the FEL, and increased the stability out the wa-zoo in the hills and hollows on our place.

 

[MadDogDriver]

Too bad you don't have photos of that, bucmeister. That'd be an interesting project, although probably not a realistic option for our puny little CUTs compared to the BIG BOYS. (Argh Argh)

I had the pleasure of discing on my Uncle's 9620JD and he had triples on that monster. The disc was 32' wide and the field was a mix of sandy tops and boggy bottoms (ugly in places), but with approx. 500hp and 12 tires pulling it wasn't even sweating.

When I was moving to another field, the foot print on the gravel road almost didn't exist. In fact you could see normal automobile tracks much deeper than the tracks of that behemoth I was enjoying driving.

OBTW: I couldn't believe how Star Wars like these monsters have become. Data link, GPS, auto steer, a whole variety of plug & play optons, the list is staggering.

 

[woodlandfarms]

Other than not entering the goo (if you know where it is), a reliable option to minimize getting stuck is reducing your footprint weight (like with duals if that were even possible on CUTs). The wider the better. I've only seen that option on row crop tractors though.

Power Trac has Dualies, and if you look around, there are a number of people taking the risk on dualies for their CUT's. Not impossible, but wouldn't do it if I was under warranty...