How about the time one of my buddies decided he was going to sit on the front bumper of another buddies truck to keep from scratching it up, as they pushed his car up an incline and into the garage......it ended badly.
I have a "you may be a redneck if......" calender on my desk and I just thumbed trough it and I didn't see that in it. Great idea and I'll remember that for the future.
thats using your noggin ..and what you got laying around for a very functional way to tow in a pinch.
Redneck or idiotic? Reading these stories brings back a scary story. 30 some years ago I had a cool VW beetle, out with the boys the throttle cable broke, we were about 20 miles from homebase. Scratching our heads I said to the youngest guy that he would have to ride on the back bumper with the hood up and work the throttle, when I banged on the door he was to let off while I shifted! Believe it or not he went for it and we drove home on the highway with him on the rear bumper. People were blowing their horns and shouting but luckily the police did not see it. When we got home all he said was he was cold back there. Boy looking back we did some crazy stunts.
When we were lads in our teen years back in the late 70s we bought a '55 Chevy 2drhtp with no brakes! and in our excitement to get it home (15 miles!) we did the push it with a tire up hill and and at the peak get out and chock it and move the tow car to the front and use the tire between the cars as the "brakes", down to the bottom of the hill, stop, repeat! We did this several miles but finally the front wheel bearings on the '55 began to come apart so we left it at my uncles house, came back with parts and a pipe and chain, you know, to tow it right!
No, redneck would have been pulling it at 60 mph on a major highway then wondering why the bolt broke. Hell, I've pushed cars farther than that with the lawn tractor.
Back when there were real bumpers, standard rescue tow technique was to chain or strap a tire to the tow car and towed-car. This allowed some cushion and prevented over-running --- usually. Of course one tight turn and uh oh!. I remember towing my buddy's Audi "Super 90" with an old Suburban with a chain. I slowed down a hill, atarted up the other side and in the rear view, the Audi had the chain wrapped around the front wheel and was sparkin' up the hiway - sideways... Powerband
On the farm we take a 10 foot piece of about 3 or4 in round pipe and weld two straps of steel on the top and bottom of both ends with a hole in the end of the strap hanging over the end about 8 inchs. One end goes to the hitch and gets a bolt thru it and the other end goes over the truck, bus or what ever's front axle and a bolt dropped through and tightened. We have towed like that at highway speeds for over 50 miles... We do this only when things are to large to fit on the roll-back's bed.
That's better than my buddy's method back in H.S. I college.of putting a tire between the font bumper of his 'push car' a '69 Electra 225, and the cars he pushed around . The car was more than capable. He was a damn good shade tree mechanic and body man who did work for beer in those days. (circa 1981)
or an 100ft. orange extension cord..... lol... btw this is not me.... i stole the pic off the TLB site....
I need to PUSH a couple cars uphill - sounds like the pipe idea would work for that if the ends are properly rigged, right?
Coming back from the Nats South years ago i had a 32 Woodie p*** me south of Florence KY.I was driving my 1934 grey primered Airflow.I could hear the car misfiring and the car quit and he pulled off the side of the road.I had seen the owner around my town but never had met him.The Woodie was one built by Kirk out of Cincy Ohio.I stopped to help him but we couldnt get the car running again.I always carried a tow strap but i had cleaned out my car over the winter and forgot to put the strap back in.The owner asked if we could get the car off the highway somehow.I looked in my car again and found a set of heavy duty jumper cables.I told him we could try the jumper cables.We tyed the cars together with the cables with about six feet betwwen us.I asked how far he wanted to go this way.He told me if the cables would hold up he wanted to go to his house 70 miles away.We got on the highway and ran around 50mph at first but by the time we got closer we were running 65 to 70 mph.We p***ed a highway patrol man but he never pulled us over.I guess he thought we were too crazy.We made it to his house with no problems.I still have the cables and we still laugh about it whenever i see him.
Back in the 60's my friends and I towed a 55 Pontiac from Anaheim (Disneyland) to Paramount (Paramount Blvd./Rosecrans) (not a short distance) with a chain through a pipe...BTW, we never got on the freeway.
Growing up in Mo. it was common practice to use an old drive shaft with the ends cut off and a length of chain. I once used a garden hose to tow a car in a pinch, kept braking but I just kept tieing it back up.
We have a similar setup to the pipe connected to a hitch, except ours clamps to a bumper instead of an axle- Mom would not help dad move cars, so this allowed me to start driving the towed car when I was eight.... We still use it to the day! Necessity is the mother of all invention!
The hillbilly setup I use, is a chain inside a pipe. It flexes around corners and never jerks because it's always taught. - Dave
The Jalopy Journal
