I've been towing my 5ver for 6 years. The first thing I bought for it was a torque wrench. I was pretty anal about checking the wheel nuts before each trip, but taking off the stupid plastic caps and hearing the same clicks over and over, became more of a nuisance than the reassurance it was supposed to be.
Well the 'never will happen to me', happened.
My new (to me) 2009 f250 was doing great things with the trailer and the two quads in tow, until 15 minutes out of Boyle going towards Lac La Biche I heard a vibration. My son in the back heard it too, opening the back window thought it was the genny cover in the wind. It stopped almost immediately after. All is good let's keep going.
Behind us was my sister towing their boat, my wife with my boat and my brother in law with their cargo trailer.
I got a message to check my tires......a chill went up my spine as my brain put two and two together. Sure enough after pulling over as far as possible (this is a ridiculously narrow highway from Boyle to Lac La Biche) the rear driver wheel on the trailer was gone, completely, vanished. All I could think was the people behind me and hoping no one was hit by it. Thankfully no one was.
Practically everyone who passed made sure we were okay, one fellow actually drove between our parties helping communications until we regrouped. His name was Dennis and he took my quads to his farm while we set up to fix the wheel. To him, thank you for your help and concern.
Amazingly the tire caused no damage to the trailer when it left, it just rolled along the highway where my sister saw it going into the ditch. They collected it and met up with me. A plan was formulated for repair and put into action.
We chained up the axle and limped into town while my wife went ahead to buy the parts we needed.
We pulled into the parking lot of extra foods and prepared. My wife had only an hour to track down what we needed and had no luck at all. She got the name of a repair shop out of town, Monkeys RV. They were all at an auction and would be back as quickly as possible so we went and collected the quads. I gave Dennis's mom some cash to say thanks for the help. She promptly gave it right back. I insisted she take some, at least enough to buy a six pack! She gave in as I pushed a $20 in her hands. Off to Monkeys!
This is where I judged the book by its cover and feel bad about it still. The place isn't much to look at, but they helped as much as they could. They had the dust cover and cotter pins but no wheel studs or nuts. The owner Silvia was still gone but she had her mom open the trailer (rv store in a box!) and let us rummage through to find what we wanted. After coming up empty handed they sent us to their dad's place down the road. Thank God for old pack rat farmers! Not only did he have a brand new set of wheel studs, and nuts, but he let us use his tools to punch out the old and set the new ones. Great guy! I asked how much I owed him, he said $20 sound fair? Okay, I still have to pay Monkeys for the parts there so I sad sure with the intent of over paying for the dust cap and cotter pins. They would have nothing to do with it and only took $5 for it. In total this event cost me $45.00. Unbelievable. Again to Silvia, her mom and dad, my gratitude and thanks. Keep in mind this was all at about 6 on Saturday night, after hours when 3 other parties were either not able or willing to help!
The moral of the story is always check your lug nuts and never judge a book by its cover. This story could have gone very differently and I am grateful to everyone who helped us out. A special debt is owed to my brother in law whose expertise got us back on the road.
Well the 'never will happen to me', happened.
My new (to me) 2009 f250 was doing great things with the trailer and the two quads in tow, until 15 minutes out of Boyle going towards Lac La Biche I heard a vibration. My son in the back heard it too, opening the back window thought it was the genny cover in the wind. It stopped almost immediately after. All is good let's keep going.
Behind us was my sister towing their boat, my wife with my boat and my brother in law with their cargo trailer.
I got a message to check my tires......a chill went up my spine as my brain put two and two together. Sure enough after pulling over as far as possible (this is a ridiculously narrow highway from Boyle to Lac La Biche) the rear driver wheel on the trailer was gone, completely, vanished. All I could think was the people behind me and hoping no one was hit by it. Thankfully no one was.
Practically everyone who passed made sure we were okay, one fellow actually drove between our parties helping communications until we regrouped. His name was Dennis and he took my quads to his farm while we set up to fix the wheel. To him, thank you for your help and concern.
Amazingly the tire caused no damage to the trailer when it left, it just rolled along the highway where my sister saw it going into the ditch. They collected it and met up with me. A plan was formulated for repair and put into action.
We chained up the axle and limped into town while my wife went ahead to buy the parts we needed.
We pulled into the parking lot of extra foods and prepared. My wife had only an hour to track down what we needed and had no luck at all. She got the name of a repair shop out of town, Monkeys RV. They were all at an auction and would be back as quickly as possible so we went and collected the quads. I gave Dennis's mom some cash to say thanks for the help. She promptly gave it right back. I insisted she take some, at least enough to buy a six pack! She gave in as I pushed a $20 in her hands. Off to Monkeys!
This is where I judged the book by its cover and feel bad about it still. The place isn't much to look at, but they helped as much as they could. They had the dust cover and cotter pins but no wheel studs or nuts. The owner Silvia was still gone but she had her mom open the trailer (rv store in a box!) and let us rummage through to find what we wanted. After coming up empty handed they sent us to their dad's place down the road. Thank God for old pack rat farmers! Not only did he have a brand new set of wheel studs, and nuts, but he let us use his tools to punch out the old and set the new ones. Great guy! I asked how much I owed him, he said $20 sound fair? Okay, I still have to pay Monkeys for the parts there so I sad sure with the intent of over paying for the dust cap and cotter pins. They would have nothing to do with it and only took $5 for it. In total this event cost me $45.00. Unbelievable. Again to Silvia, her mom and dad, my gratitude and thanks. Keep in mind this was all at about 6 on Saturday night, after hours when 3 other parties were either not able or willing to help!
The moral of the story is always check your lug nuts and never judge a book by its cover. This story could have gone very differently and I am grateful to everyone who helped us out. A special debt is owed to my brother in law whose expertise got us back on the road.
