Subdeacon Joe Posted April 13, 2020 Share Posted April 13, 2020 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cyrus Cassidy #45437 Posted April 13, 2020 Share Posted April 13, 2020 Oh. My. Goodness. I had to pull an M1A2 Abrams out of the mire routinely in Iraq (yes, Iraq -- it's rainy and MUDDY in the winter!). Some of those DATs (Dumb...Tanker) used to see how badly they could get them stuck; I swear it was on purpose. The worst one I had was ALMOST this bad, and it too, me two M88s and another M1A2, several blocks and tackles (these things are HUGE, btw), to get it out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hardpan Curmudgeon SASS #8967 Posted April 13, 2020 Share Posted April 13, 2020 Well, the boys do seem to be cheerful about it. For now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Texas Lizard Posted April 13, 2020 Share Posted April 13, 2020 13 minutes ago, Hardpan Curmudgeon SASS #8967 said: Well, the boys do seem to be cheerful about it. For now. They should be...It is a crew of 4 and the 4th one is looking for the tow truck..... Texas Lizard Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sedalia Dave Posted April 14, 2020 Share Posted April 14, 2020 Who's tank is that? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lawdog Dago Dom Posted April 14, 2020 Share Posted April 14, 2020 Looks like an RV. Call the Good Sam Road Service. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J.D. Daily Posted April 14, 2020 Share Posted April 14, 2020 I learned that military tracked vehicles aren't that great in muddy conditions at Ft Riley. the Arty battalion had mechanized 155mm howitzers & command tracks for the FDC & S3 sections. Once a month the battalion would spend 3-4 days out in the ranges training & sometimes the ground was muddy, not bog deep just a few inches of mud. Some spots on the range roads crossed wet weather water courses so the slopes were steep. If you went slow on the down slope you didn't have enough speed to make it up the other. The tracks would loose traction. P.S. They probably stuck it on purpose. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Linn Keller, SASS 27332, BOLD 103 Posted April 14, 2020 Share Posted April 14, 2020 Very familiar with getting equipment out using block and tackle. Perry County oilfield in Ohio still uses an awful lot of late 1880s technology (lengthy presentation omitted) My father borrowed a cable blade Allis Chalmers ex-military crawler from another oil producer and tried taking her through a crick crossing. It did not go well. Instead of going in at right angles to the watercourse -- my father was afraid the weight of that cable blade would bury him on exit -- he took it at a long angle. This laid the tractor over so far the carburetor float flooded her out and she quit. We had to haul her out. With the only prime mover we had at the time. An Allis Chalmers WC farm tractor. We routinely strung up three and four shiv blocks to pull oilfield tubing or casing, using a pole erected above the wellhead and guyed off, a block chained to its crown, a bottom block chained to its base, hauling strings of pipe straight up out of the earth itself: we used these same tubing blocks and the same woven wire line to pull out that ex-GI cable blade Allis. (The cable blade was the problem. It is so unGodly heavy because its weight alone cuts into the ground, unlike a hydraulic, where you can use the tractor's weight to pressure the blade down ... but I digress, as usual!) ... we strung up every set of tubing blocks Keller Brothers and Company owned, and used nearly every bit of steel cable we had ... it took all day ... and an awful lot of stop and reset ... but by golly we got her out of there! It's a good thing my brother and I were in our lean-muscled teen years, we genuinely earned our pay that hot humid summer's afternoon in the Fisher Creek bottom near the old Corning water plant. It was genuinely a day's hard labor and we were wore plumb out afterward. Once she was out, once we coiled what felt like a couple miles of wire line and got it tied into neat coils with hay string, once we loaded all those coils on the trailer hitched on behind the WC, once we loaded blocks and big blocks and monstrous big blocks into the trailer and the oilfield Power Wagon (we called it the Lemon Dog, it was a gutless wonder but that's another tale for another time), we scrubbed the grease off our forearms with gasoline and rag waste, we ceremonially tossed our worn out work gloves in after the snatch blocks and standing blocks (wire line develops what's called wickers -- broken strands of the woven wire -- they bring blood -- voice of experience -- gloves are helpful but get worn out fast from that wickery old greasy oilfield line!) -- We looked at that cable blade Allis crawler as she sat up on level ground, looking powerful and capable, we looked at the tore up ground where we'd hauled her out of the crick bed, we looked at one another, father and two sons, all three of us tall and lean waisted, all three of our faces shining with sweat and dripping off eyebrows and chins ... I would tell you we looked at that crawler again and where we'd fetched her out, and we swelled our chests with pride and felt like Kings ... but I'd be lying to you. All we felt was tired. Looking at that tank up to the gills in mud, I can't help but think our labors were less than those poor fellows had to go through to get theirs out! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Subdeacon Joe Posted April 14, 2020 Author Share Posted April 14, 2020 British training films. A tank extraction starts on the second video about 20 minutes in and continues on the third video. Chin-chin, do carry on with your mud pies. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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