dperone

16 hours ago, TowZone said:

Hope you were wearing long sleeves and gloves. You never know what is in the brush and this time of year for us it's a poison ivy of some type. I know there are times I gotta get it, but flashbacks to the times I came away in pain trying not to itch weighs heavy on my mind. I try to carry cardboard or at worst use the cars floor mats. It usually a total anyway, allow these days you find fewer cars have their floor mats.

 

At least it appears to have gone straight in, I've though I would need to cut a tree down before. However using other trees to winch off of was a better option.

I definitely had a jacket and gloves on when I went in and the owner unknowingly donated a blanket from the trunk for me to lay on. I checked the area and didn't see any poison ivy, but there was a nasty looking caterpillar right by the car. He was a fuzzy looking bastard and he wasn't concerned about us messing around his area, which is always a red flag so we have him a wide berth. 

As far as pulling it out it came pretty easy since the ride in cleared the path for the way out. Luckily the steering was still intact so we were able to just use one line and steer around the couple small obstacles along the way. At one point the side I was hooked to started to out pace the other side and I thought I was going to have to lay in the yuck to run another strap, but it straightened out by itself with a little string wheel adjustment. One of those ones where you needed two people because I couldn't see the car for the first 50 feet or so.

4 hours ago, TowZone said:

dpreone, just remember Sunday is a short day so get there early. See ya there.

Yessir I already told the family we're pulling out early.

We'll be down for Sunday only

A few hours after our train track job we were called for another car that failed to stop at a stop sign and barreled into the woods. This one landed about 120 feet through some thick and pointy briars and wasn't visible from the road.

Your can just barely see the tail lights though the shrubs. I ran a line to it and had my dad keep an eye on it while I pulled it to the roadway. 

After it emerged from the woods we loaded it onto the flatbed for the ride back to the shop.

6 hours ago, EdsTowing said:

Dam that was an interesting one...Glad you got paid.

Me too, especially when it originally came in as an abandoned car. Kudos to the trooper for tracking down the RO and staying with us until he was sure we were getting paid. I'm pretty sure the guy was just happy to avoid a DUI since the crash happened the day before it was reported.

We were called this morning by the local State Police station for "an abandoned car in the woods" about 20 miles away from us. The area it was in has a lot of trails so we were thinking someone joy riding in the woods, car breaks down and they take off. Sent a driver out there and he found quite the opposite story.

Apparently a car had a brake failure as the driver approached a stop sign and he launched the car over a train track and into the woods approx. 130 feet, hitting a couple trees in the process at a height above my head. He was fine, the train tracks were fine, and even the woods were fine, but the car was toast. I took a ride out to see what we were dealing with and to come up with a plan of attack.

He came down the road that my truck was on and jumped these tracks

The trees were still intact between our only access point and the car which hampered our recovery plan.

We called one of our customers who actually rents this track in the winter to do a Santa ride, and he made the notifications to Conrail that we were going to be operating on their track. They flagged it and let us know that they had no trains scheduled to be on the rails until mid week. Not knowing who actually owned the trees we needed removed we askedthe State Police track down the appropriate parties about removing the trees. The owner of the car offered to do all the tree removal to save himself some coin and just use us to winch the car out and tow it away. We decided to let the SP and the owner figure out the property issue and advised them to call when they were ready for us, figuring it would be a few days to get a hold of someone from the state. A little over 2 hours later they called back and said they were ready, so we went back out to remove the car. 

My plan was to winch the car straight out of the path he cut for us, spin it at the end to get away from the switch in the rail, then load it on a flatbed hopefully missing the rail in the process.

Surprisingly it worked exactly how I envisioned it. It offered minimal resistance the whole time, even when we ramped the rear end over the tracks using blocks to avoid hitting the rails. The only hiccup we had was we couldn't get the bed as close to the tracks as I originally thought we would because of the angle the car came out at. We elected to leave the front hang off the bed until we could clear the rail and reposition the car. The troopers started on scene videoing our recovery so they could prove we didn't contact the rails at all and one walked the entire length we were working around with his body cam to show we left the area damage free. Once it was loaded and we were paid we headed for home with our new catch.

Looking good but I sure do miss seeing your cougar on here

Well I guess they arrived in style. 

Anytime the guy coming to transport your second most valuable asset arrives wearing sweats and pink sneakers you're in for a bad time. I hope he was brand new because if he has any experience at all he should know that the wheel lift was tilted way to low and the boom still had a couple feet to lower.

In the end we're the ones to blame, we accept low rates from a 3rd party then don't have the money to pay a properly trained operator nor do we have the money to train them ourselves. Until the owners of these companies realize their true costs and stop this race to the bottom for motor club work this is going to be our reality. 

Looking good as always Ed. It must've been the weekend for trailer wrecks, we got one in A.C. that "a car hit and broke the studs off". How a car managed to miss the fender and nail the wheel hard enough to break the studs all while leaving a chunk of concrete imbedded in the sidewall of the tire is a feat I'd like to see live. That one was fixable though, took longer for the U-Haul area rep to cover get the trailer than the repair took.

Has anyone gone through the new online WM/TRAA online TROCP recert? My 4/5 is up in December and I guess I'm going to give the new online system a shot. Curious as to how much it resembles the 4/5 test they used to give at the end of the class or if there's anything else I should be studying. Thanks

A few weeks back we attended the annual touch a truck that the local toy market hosts every year. It's always a fun event for us, even if I spend the next week cleaning tiny fingerprints off my glass. It rained for the first hour and a half of the event but it didn't seem to stop anyone from coming out. We had a hundred or so you truck trucks from Zips to give out and they were gone in less than 45 minutes. 

My littlest was stoked that "her truck" got to go, since her sister and her name's are on the doors of this one.

My wife took this and sent it to me. She said "I guess you don't need a paternity test for this one".

Not bad for 9 year old paint

I know a lot of "tree huggers" drive Subarus, but this seems a little overboard as far as getting in touch with nature

I've run in to this issue many times and it usually stems from poor communication in the dispatchers initial call to us, the general lack of knowledge in the police arena in what a qualified and competent operator can do with a wrecker, and a serious lack of said qualified and competent operators.

A few years ago our local state police station called for an impound. The only info I got was we have a car to be picked up for an impound, it's at this intersection. Click. I took my wrecker as that's what was in my driveway at the time. When I arrived on scene it was a chaotic scene with police, fire and EMS all crowded in a little dirt road in the middle of no where. I asked the fire chief what we had, thinking it was a serious accident or something. He stated that there was a murder and the body was laying next to his car. The detective in charge saw me and said they needed the car, a newer Infiniti, towed to the station to be processed. He then noticed my wrecker and took a fit, saying the prosecutor ordered all evidence tows be brought in on a flatbed. I explained that with my wrecker I could lift all the axles off the ground while eliminating the need to go inside the vehicle to put it into neutral like you would with a bed. He stood firm and said the prosecutor wants it on a bed. I said no problem, I'll be back in an hour then went to switch trucks at 16 miles each way.

When I got back they were ready for me to load it. First thing I told the detective was I need the car in neutral. He looked at me as of I didn't tell him this an hour ago before I left, then huffed and puffed about evidence. I told him the first truck I had here could've towed it without gaining entry, but he didn't want it so now I need someone to put it in neutral. There was no solid hook points and without digging through the trunk all I had were soft straps on the lower control arms and I didn't want to damage them dragging the car in park. He finally ordered a trooper to glove up and put the car in neutral. When we got to the station we went through the same argument as someone now had to put it back in park. 

The way I figure is the initial dispatch error cost an hour of both my time and the police's. If they would've given all the facts in the initial call I wouldn't have had to switch trucks. This isn't going to change anytime soon as they still call for just an impound and you show up to a mangled vehicle in the woods but the driver was drunk so it's classified as impound. They do have one dispatcher who moonlights as a tow man and I love when he's working because he gives every bit of info I need to dispatch the right assets to the scene. Unfortunately he's just one guy and the rest of the dispatchers pale in comparison.

As far as requiring a flatbed for evidence tows, I feel we're probably mostly to blame for that. How many times do you think they had a flip flop tow guy show up in a self loader and ripped a bumper off or couldn't tow it without someone taking off a parking brake. It reminds me of the neighboring county that required a speed crane for all rollovers with injuries on certain major highways as well as all evidence holds. Bottom line was they got tired of shutting down major roads waiting for amateur towers to figure out how to do the job so they went with one company that they knew had the equipment, knowledge, and people to get the job done quickly. If we as an industry made sure we showed up looking and acting  professionally we could probably explain our reasoning to the detectives in charge and they might start listening to us. Unfortunately it seems that there's more goof balls out there then pros.

I also stopped going to a tow mate vendor for replacements and started ordering them online from a battery supplier with much better results. I forget how I got mine in the bar it's been so long since I've had an issue, but I do know a hammer wasn't involved. 

You can't fix stupid, but you can sure charge for it

8 hours ago, Stubborn66 said:

dprone, I don't even get them to land on the same road I am on

 

We are pretty rural, it takes me 5 miles to get to a well traveled road.  Most of my calls have about 12 - 15 enroute miles. Police work for us is not regulated, we just have to post our rates. 

I work for 3 clubs and get pretty good rates because I am out here and I get calls from the others because no one wants to travel so it works out pretty good 

We're a little of both, our shop is in a mood size town with a couple 4 lanes within a mile or so of us, but outside the couple square miles of the center of town is farm land so it starts getting rural quick. We also tow for the state police who cover a few rural rural towns south of us, and those calls get to be 20-30 miles each way. Luckily the state rates are pretty high, so we get taken care of even without being able to charge towed miles. When they regulated our state rates they actually set the tow price higher than what we were charging for hook and milage before, so I can't complain.

I like what you have going on there, looks a lot like what we have. The only thing I would suggest is getting some PVC square fence post to keep the straps separate. I just set my dad's new bed up like this, and so far everyone who looks in the box has been impressed.

On 8/21/2021 at 8:00 AM, Stubborn66 said:

How do you charge enroute mileage on that one???

With the way our contracts and municipal codes are written, the tow itself is the same price if it's in our driveway or at the furthest point of the town. The price is still more than adequate for going to the furthest spots, and we can bull for anything and everything we need to do to complete a job. It works out though because we're right at a busier intersection for accidents, and we've had more than a few land in our parking lot.

Don't you love when the work comes to you for a change

4 hours ago, EdsTowing said:

LoL...We had one in the body shop yesterday!

 

 

Picked it up & brought it in for maintenance on the trailer & new tires...

 

Do you get to road test it?

Nice job as usual sir, always putting the tools in your tool box to the best use

One of our extinguishers just saved our bacon a few weeks ago on an impound. While in tow the car caught fire, luckily my dad noticed right away, pulled over and knocked it while it was still a small electrical fire. Easy access to a charged extinguisher saved our truck, the customers car and a much bigger headache.

She's a beaut, best of luck with her Ed!

I love towing those guys, they always remember you the next time.

Why are some of the hardest hits in parking lots and 25mph streets?