The only stumbling block so far...

[Skye Stage 1]

Friends of mine are renovating a house with an attached gardening business; they're doing all the work themselves and are astonishingly resilient to bad weather, midges, etc etc.

I was passing this afternoon and noticed one of them was struggling with a post that had been set in the ground - a big 8"x4" wooden thing. It wobbled quite badly but she couldn't get it out. Between us we struggled but couldn't budge the thing. I recalled from years ago, when I'd been doing some gardening work, the same thing: a post that wouldn't lift out, and couldn't be pushed over, but that a friend of mine simply pulled out with his quadbike.

'Hmmm', I thought, 'this looks like a job for a Landrover'.

So I walked back to the house, started the beast up and drove down. After getting into their drive (it's not difficult, I just can't get used to the mammoth turning circle of these vehicles), we hooked up some chain to the tow bar. I must confess I was somewhat blase about this task, so I left it in open high ratio first, crept forward to take up the slack, gently let out the clutch balanced with a slow increase in throttle... and spun the back wheels. So, we moved the chain on the post, I locked the diff, put the Landy in low ratio and tried again. And nothing - it just would not budge the post. The last tactic we applied involved a change of direction, and myself very slowly backing into the post with the tow bar - even that didn't move it.

So - the only task that the Landrover has so far failed in was one I thought would be the easiest. The only question that remains is: how far down is that post buried? Answers on the back of a postcard please...

Moral (if you really want one): sometimes the most innocuous tasks can cause complete failure.

I consoled the Landrover and entered the house a dejected man...

[jonnyboy]

I tried that with my old 88" and ripped the rear crossmember off

[Skye Stage 1]

Wow - that's a bit unlucky! Suddenly, I'm feeling much more fortunate.

[jonnyboy]

I had the pleasure of seeing a Range rover/series 2 hybrid trying to snatch recover a 90 last year. The guy in the 90 got a shock when the rear crossmember from the hybrid went flying past his window

[Skye Stage 1]

Would that be a kinetic recovery type of thing? I've heard lots of horror stories off those, and apparantly some off-road sites have banned them. Those who do use them say they needn't be dangerous, you just need to know what you're doing (a bit like winching, I guess). I must say, though, they'd be far from my favourite method of recovery!

[Larry]

Watching a recovery with kinetic ropes is always more dramatic than watching winching. People stand there waiting for something to go bang or snap . Winching has it's dangers but I've always found the slow and steady approach gives more room for dealing with problems.

As to pulling the post out, a friend of mine used to attach one of those hand winches (cable puller type) to the back of the Landy with rope then gradually pull the post/tree out, it took a while, but the rope would break before the cable and you could then blame the winch, not the Landy

[Skye Stage 1]

The idea of having the rope to act as a weak link seems very sensible - unfortunately all we had in this situation was some very thick chain, and I think a 'weak link' in the Landy transmission (if you'll excuse the very feeble pun) would go before the chain did. They do have tractor, but that was out of commission at the time; once that's back up and running I'm sure they'll try it with that.

As an aside - a lot of new posts today!

[Skye Stage 1]

The post was finally fished out of the groung today - turns out it was embedded in over a metre in depth; I don't know why. But that does explain why it was tricky to shift.