BREAKDOWN OPERATIONS.
Page 62
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Practical Advice on the Towing or Conveyance of Disabled Vehicles. Increasing Rear-wheel Adhesion. How a Gradient Can Assist in Loading a Vehicle on to
THE following practical notes are intended to be of assistance to the maintenance engineer who may be called upon to undertake the towing or conveying of a disabled
vehicle. When such an occasion arises, the towing home of a. vehicle more often than not has to be undertaken with an empty lorry. Should the disabled vehicle be laden and the roads happen to be wet or slippery, progress will be difficult, if not impossible when hills have to be surmounted, owing to the driving wheels of the towing vehicle not having sufficient road grip.
Obtaining Adhesion on Hills.
The obvious remedy is, of course, to transfer the load, or, at least, a part of it, to the empty vehicle. This may not be possible, owing to the nature of the load or the difficulty
in obtaining the necessary tools or labour. By adopting the following procedure, a successful tow may be accomplished under the most severe conditions.
The usual towing medium is a rope or cable from 12 ft. to 15 ft. long, attached to the front and rear towing hooks of the respective vehicles, as indicated at A in Fig, 1, which throws the minimum of weight upon the driving wheels. The distance between the vehicles should first of all be reduced as much as possible. Then a trestle, wooden blocks, a barrel, or a strong case should he stood at the rear end of the towing vehicle, as at B, and the tow rope, instead of being attached to the rear towing hooks, taken over
c40 the packing, as at C, through the transmission inspection doors, and fastened somewhere on the chassis. Should there be no door available, it may be worth while lifting a board or making a hole in the floor to obtain a fastening for the rope end. Should no other packing be available, a stout plank may be placed across the body sides, as shown at D.
This disposition of the tow rope throws a fair proportion of the load on to the rear wheels of the towing vehicle, thus ensuring a good road grip. Providing the road is fairly straight, the packing, etc., need not be secured in any way, as the forces acting upon it tend to keep it in position.
Should the road, however, be of a winding nature or have any sharp corners, it will be advisable to lash the tow rope in some way to the sides of the body, so that it is kept practically central.
Loading the Damaged Vehicle.
Other difficulties are met with 'when it is necessary to get a smaller vehicle on to a lorry for transport, should that method be more expedient than towing.
This is usually accomplished by means of planks or proper runners, as in Fig. 2, and the vehicle is pushed or pulled on by means of tackle fixed to the front of the lorry. Should the former method be adopted, it is found difficult to hold the vehicle in between "pushes." Scotches, as at A, Fig. 2, either get pushed away or run over. If a piece of quite light rope or chain be lashed around a spoke of a wheel and one of the runners, it will be found that the vehicle cannot possibly run back.
How to Avoid Fouling.
When the vehicle is half-way on the lorry it is very often found that the gearbox or running boards foul the rear of the lorry body at C (Fig.
2). This can be overcome by jacking up the front or rear axle as at D and putting packing under the wheels until a clearance is obtained.
The easiest method of all for loading is to tow or drive the vehicle to the nearest steep hill and set up the runners with the lorry facing down the hill. Then, the runners being nearer the horizontal, it is a much easier matter to push the vehicle on with half the exertion.
Upon one occasion a large touring car was loaded on to a 4-ton lorry by this method in less than half an hour, without using its engine and employing only a man and a bay.
This is quite. a creditable performance, as the load of such a vehicle is 30 cwt. or more.