Scary Experience Last Night! long post

[patrick_g]

See, every bad experience has a potential bright side to it.

...and so then after renting the worst possibly maintained backhoe from the sleaziest operation in the surrounding 5 county area our hero drives the rental out of sight from the house and carefully studies the equipment prior to staging a probable near fatal accident.

Later while faking pain and suffering for his wife's benefit he declares that even a much smaller backhoe of his own would be so much safer because of his careful use and thorough maint lavished on his equipment. No surprises when using your own well maintained equipment! Even a smaller less expensive unit would get more done as you would have it around for whenever you wanted to use it with no hitching a trailer and driving round trip to the rental thieves operation.

In the time time wasted on two round trips you could be getting useful work accomplished. You might not have to wait for weekends to use it since it is there and ready to go when you have time and need it. They hold their value well so if it turns out sometime in the future that you don't need it anymore, selling it would be easy.

Pat

 

[tjkadar]

...and so then after renting the worst possibly maintained backhoe from the sleaziest operation in the surrounding 5 county area our hero drives the rental out of sight from the house and carefully studies the equipment prior to staging a probable near fatal accident.

Later while faking pain and suffering for his wife's benefit he declares that even a much smaller backhoe of his own would be so much safer because of his careful use and thorough maint lavished on his equipment. No surprises when using your own well maintained equipment! Even a smaller less expensive unit would get more done as you would have it around for whenever you wanted to use it with no hitching a trailer and driving round trip to the rental thieves operation.

In the time time wasted on two round trips you could be getting useful work accomplished. You might not have to wait for weekends to use it since it is there and ready to go when you have time and need it. They hold their value well so if it turns out sometime in the future that you don't need it anymore, selling it would be easy.

Pat

You gotta love it when a plan comes together!

 

[exNCite]

I filed a complaint with the KY. Attorney General so we will see what happens.


When I came home from renting the backhoe I checked my credit card website and found that the rental had already been charged. They told me they were going to hold the card and charge it upon return of the backhoe. I didn't really have too much of a problem with that at the time because I still anticipated getting 8 hours of use out of it. So at this point I'd already paid in full and to this date I still haven't signed a contract / rental agreement or even received a copy of one like they promised when they came to get the backhoe. I think under the circumstances they should probably refund all of the money but at the very least they should at least credit me for the 5 1/2 hours of time I didn't get to use because I was injured as a result of the backhoe and obviously afraid to use it after I found out about the seat the hard way. I've got about 35 - 40 hours worth of backhoe work to do total here right now so I'd planned to use it for that day, then rent the backhoe 3 or 4 more times over the next month or so until I was done with the job.

You should also call the credit card company and protest the charge. Sometimes they are very helpful in solving disputes, but you should definitely contact them.

 

[JCS_in_KY]

Luckily my back is starting to feel a little better today. It's still pretty sore and is going to take some time to get back to normal but at least it looks like it will because I know with lots of back injuries they never do. I'm going to take it easy for the rest of the week I guess, doctors orders and RN's orders (the wife) but it's hard for me to do when there's so much I need to do. It's better to take some time off and get it to heal though, that's for sure. So it gives me some time to get caught up on some paperwork, reading posts here on TBN and being thankful that the injuries weren't worse.

I agree with what you said about the rental company and that they should load up your equipment you rent. Unfortunately none of them do that here. We used to live in California until about three years ago. Out there most people are really afraid of liability and being sued because it happens all the time. It's nice to be away from some of that craziness but I guess we should have tried for some place in the middle. Here in KY, at least in this part of the state it seems to be just the opposite. No one worries about it because they never get sued and it seems whatever happens it's just a mistake you made. Let me give you an example. Last year during deer hunting season my mom (who lives on the far side of our property in a mobile home we put in for her) had a bullet come through her home. It happened early in the morning when she was still sleeping. It entered the home through an outside wall, went through a closet door and it was headed right for her bed in the next room at this point. Luckily for her she does lots of sewing and the closed the bullet was traveling through was full of fabric. The bullet happened to hit some fur type fabric like you make teddy bears out of, it traveled through about 16 layers of it and that must have slowed it down because we had the sheriff come out and he found the bullet inside a puzzle box next to the fabric. The sheriff hands us the bullet and says "here's your souvenir" and left. He didn't even want to take a report but I finally got him to. The bullet was still in good shape hadn't deformed at all. We were able to find out what kind of rifle it was fired from because it had a unique number of lands and grooves on it (rifling marks). I talked to the property owner behind us and there were two people he had hunting there, one of them was using that kind of rifle and other people living in the area told me they saw that person leaving the property right after the shot was fired that morning. It turns out there were only two people that were hunting on the land behind us. The sheriff wouldn't do a thing, we out later the person that shot the house was a friend of the sheriff's. Anyway to make a long story a little shorter no one would do a thing about it. The state police wouldn't get involved because the local sheriff was already involved, the county attorney and judge executive (county manager) wouldn't do anything either. Everyone just said those things happen every year and that's what you have insurance for is to pay for damage to your home like that. Anyway that was kind of off the topic but just an example of how they see things like that, everything seems to be an accident and just something that happens.

The first time I rented a backhoe was about 2 1/2 years ago. I'd never used one before and I figured the rental company would go over some basic things at least, especially when I'd told them this would be my first time operating a backhoe. They told me there's nothing to it, handed me the key and said load it up and take it home. I was familiar with driving a tractor since I owned one at the time but once I got the rental home I got some advice from someone in the area that had a backhoe service at the time and then took it out away from the house to get used to using it. On a similar note when I became interested in buying a tractor (we'd just bought 20 acres here and found out hand tools weren't going to be enough to maintain the land) I'd never owned a tractor before. I found out pretty much everything I should get and shouldn't get by spending hours reading the forums here. I decided on a couple of tractors and contacted a dealer about 50 miles from here and made an appointment to go look at a Massey 1533 (what we ended up buying but from a different dealer) and a couple of different Kubotas since he sold both brands. I got there at the time we agreed upon, the guy told me he had just sold a tractor and was going to go deliver it so I could drive these tractors around and try them, then come back the next day if I had questions. I told him I guessed I'd have to wait because this was the first time I'd gone to look at tractors and had never operated one before or even touched one for that matter. He told me I shouldn't have any trouble figuring it out, handed me the keys and went on his way. I really wanted to try the Massey at least but at that point I didn't really have a clue about how to work the shuttle shifter, raise the 3-point hitch off the ground, etc. so I wisely just looked at the tractors and headed home.
It's a different kind of lifestyle, good in lots of ways but with people so laid back about safety issues you really have to be careful.
John

 

[JCS_in_KY]

I forgot to add, good story there Pat! Now you just come present it that way to my wife and we will see if you have better luck talking her into it then I know I would!

 

[RobJ]

...and so then after renting the worst possibly maintained backhoe from the sleaziest operation in the surrounding 5 county area our hero drives the rental out of sight from the house and carefully studies the equipment prior to staging a probable near fatal accident.

Later while faking pain and suffering for his wife's benefit he declares that even a much smaller backhoe of his own would be so much safer because of his careful use and thorough maint lavished on his equipment. No surprises when using your own well maintained equipment! Even a smaller less expensive unit would get more done as you would have it around for whenever you wanted to use it with no hitching a trailer and driving round trip to the rental thieves operation.

In the time time wasted on two round trips you could be getting useful work accomplished. You might not have to wait for weekends to use it since it is there and ready to go when you have time and need it. They hold their value well so if it turns out sometime in the future that you don't need it anymore, selling it would be easy.

Pat

10-4!!

 

[SLOBuds]

I'm a California boy and always been one. Worse yet - a LOS ANGELES California boy!

I've always kind of understood that California had its own rules. You know that anyone out this way is prone to Lawyer First/Questions Later syndrome. Just figure that about any time a friendly barrister could show up at your door with notes in hand. Some things you actually like about the 'California Arrangement.' I like the very restrictive smoking rules as an example. But other things are darn curious - like requirements to get a building permit to change out old water heaters. Simply unreasonable.

Having all of these rules in California isn't free and will drive out business and regular folk over time.

Once in a while I'm surprised by things that shouldn't be possible in California. I can rent a 40 hp tractor, with flail, FEL and box scraper for the day - only requirement being a credit card with enough credit on it. No experience required. I can send my 12 year old niece into Home Depot to buy a huge chainsaw for cash. Walk out the door, no questions asked. My 8 year old nephew and I can take a ride on a terrific WW2 Merchant Marine ship and be let into the engine room with exposed/moving gearing, 93 degree room temparatures, and rotating drive shaft also exposed. Big fun!

Looking at this thread from John JCS just amazes me. The California boys, on the one hand, are forced to deliver equipment having all safety devices present and in working order. And they also would have definitely rented that tractor to me - me having little or no experience. And THAT situation is not much more safe than what John faced with the L35. At least John has tractor experience.