Hey, you're gonna hear us in a second. It's me
and Gavin telling you about a recovery. I just
want to know Oh, this is editor Alex, by the
way, should I do some like time travel noises?
This is like a week and a half of the future
I just want to note. This is actually our episode
100 or the hundredth time that you have downloaded
a botches off -road podcast Yeah, we'll put it
that way because you know we got the trailer
we've got a bunch of uh unnumbered episodes uh
stuff like the drum and island drama you know
all that bullshit um i didn't number that i didn't
want to get credit for it i just wanted to get
the information out there i've kind of stopped
doing that we haven't done it in a while so this
is the hundredth time you have heard from us
i know let there be like Balloons popping or
something in the background or fireworks. It's
pretty amazing I just want to thank you all for
being on this journey with us and Glad you all
are listening because this is a hell of a lot
of fun to make Welcome to botches off -road recovery
join us as we tell you Toast stories and our
recoveries. Yeah, it's our stories trail recoveries
and Pulling out helpless old ladies out of the
ditch With help of a tow truck. Yeah, so we're
doing this impromptu because we were actually
getting ready to record our hour and we and one
of the white cloud Facebook pages or whatever
we Earlier in the day someone went into a ditch
and needed some actual like real help, not just
a toe strap. And we offered me and Alex offered
at the same time without asking each other. We
offered both of our voluntary services twice.
And they said, yeah, and they yeah, we didn't
do it without it. We did it without asking each
other. We just volunteered both of us to do it
separately and didn't know it. Yeah. I messaged
the lady. He messaged the lady. It was a good
time. Yeah. So. They ended up getting in contact
with me later and saying, hey, you know, we got
a tow truck that's going to come out and do it.
The issue was that she didn't have enough money
to call for a tow truck. So this tow truck was
going to do it free. Well, he never ended up
showing up. And what we started recording, what
was that, 7? About when we got the message? Yeah,
I'd say about 7. Yeah, about 7 o 'clock, we just
got done with our 30 -minute wrap. And then I
got the message from her daughter saying, hey,
you know, she's still out there. is it possible
for you guys to come take a look? I called the
owner of the car and had it on speaker while
we were in our video conference and got kind
of the gist of it. And we're like, yeah, you
know what? We'll come out. We'll at least take
a look at it, see what we could do. Except this
is the gist we got. It's about a foot bank against
the tree. It's only like a foot off the road.
It's not a steep bank. And it's a tree. And I'm
like, All right. It wasn't very descriptive.
She had back issues. And obviously, hitting that
tree probably made them a lot worse, she said,
because she had to climb out of the passenger
side. Yeah, she wasn't going out the driver's
side. No, that's for sure. So yeah, we ended
up fueling up at Westco and driving there. And
we got there. And we threw our side lights on,
our ditch lights, and boom, sitting in the ditch.
Man, that was a pretty deep ditch as ditches
go, as far as that shit goes. So the embankment,
I mean, I don't know what the degree angle was,
but it was maybe, the entire ditch might have
been two foot off the road, but it was a 10 to
12 foot drop. It was deep. And it went down into
a swamp. And the only thing stopping her from
sliding all the way down in the swamp was there
was like a big -ass oak tree or something that
she had slid into, and that's what stopped her
car. So yes, she was only like a foot and a half
off the road, but that decline was like a 70
-degree decline or something like that. Dude,
it was. And then she slid, like her front end
was, that had to have been a good, what, eight
foot off the side, off the road down there. Oh,
yeah. And then her rear end, which was a little
higher, was probably, what, six foot? Something
like that. It was taller than Alex, because Alex
went down there when he went to hook up stuff.
And it was way taller than he was. So anyway,
we're taking a look at it. We're planning. We're
trying to figure out our game plan for how we
want to try and do this. And she gives me a call,
the owner. And she goes, hey, I finally got a
call back from the tow truck. And in my mind,
I'm like, of course. Of course you did. Every
time me and Alex go and do a recovery out of
the kindness of our hearts. And you know what?
It's cool. It's free. We're banking on the good
karma. But every time we get either right there
or we're almost already out, they call us and
tell us they figured it out. Someone's on the
way, and they cancel. So this is the first time
we actually got there. And she was like, yep,
there's already a tow truck coming. I said, well.
You know, we'll stay and we'll see if he wants
any help. You know, typically tow truck companies
don't usually ask for help, you know, for whatever
reason or another. We all know why that could
be. And so anyway, we waited and probably about
15 minutes later. You know, we see some lights
and we're like, hey, maybe that's him. No, that
looks a little too small. Turns out it was a
sheriff. He saw our hazard lights because we
have all of our trail lights. Our strobes, yeah.
Yeah, our put on strobe for hazard because he's
in the rear of the area. I'm in the front. And
so the sheriff stopped and started talking to
us. He goes, hey, I just saw the hazards. I want
to make sure everything's OK. I explained to
him the situation. We're trying to help. He goes,
oh, yeah. He goes, we did get a call about this
earlier. And I said, yeah, you guys put the caution
stuff on it. He's like, yep. And so we chit -chat
a little bit, talked about his truck. And he
goes, OK, cool. And I said, is everything good?
We're good here? He goes, oh, yeah. Yeah, you're
good. And then he's like, I just wanted to make
sure you guys were OK. He turned around and left.
A couple minutes later, the tow truck showed
up. It was a flatbed. He pulled up. We chatted
with him for a little bit. We offered our help.
He said, you know what? Yeah, sure. Which was
surprising. Honestly. And that was cool. So we
got positioned. The tow truck backed up to the
front of the car on the left side of the road.
And I positioned myself originally on the passenger
side of the tow truck. Alex took the rear behind
the car. And looking back, I was actually thinking
we should have put Gavin back here. His truck,
it's quite a bit heavier. I'm glad we did it,
because we needed the winch. And we'll get to
that point in the story in a little bit. But
there is an issue with your winch. Yeah. So yeah,
we got Alex over there, and we started pulling
winch line. And the idea basically was to have
the flatbed get the front end of the car, on
the control arm or whatever, and Alex on the
rear end of the control arm, and have them both
um, wind shit up, up the grade. And that was
all fine and dandy, and it worked for a little
bit until the weight of the car started pulling
Alex's truck off the road. So... I mean, I wasn't
going off the road. I turned my wheel and caught
the shoulder, but... Yeah. But, I mean, honestly,
it was pretty possible that he could have got
pulled into if he kept going, though. I mean,
it's... And that's not anything to do with Alex
as much as it was that the whole road was ice.
So we kind of had a feeling anyway. So as I saw
Alex's tire move a little bit, I got in the FJ,
pulled behind his truck just to anchor it just
in case. And then we kind of stopped and we chatted
with the tow truck driver. We came up with another
plan to anchor my truck to the wheel to help
pull it out onto the road. and to keep tension
while he repositioned the truck so it didn't
fall back into the ditch. So we ended up trying
to get my winch line out so that I could get
onto the front end of the car. And my winch line
was frozen around the outside of the... What
is that called? Fairly. Fairly, yeah. So I don't
have one of those... Oh, yeah, go ahead. Yeah,
for context, Gavin has a... yank them a fair
lead that uses, it doesn't have any metal in
it, right? The fair lead's there, but the actual
hook is just basically the end of the line wrapped
over itself. Which is great, it's super safe
if it breaks, there's no metal involved. But
now we have found a downside to doing it because
if you've got it winched all the way in, it's
gonna freeze that way and it's stuck. Yeah, so
we tried yanking and pulling that shit out and
we were trying to get this done in a hurry. So
could we have freed it? Yes. Did we necessarily
want to waste the time to try and get that all
free? No. So we ditched the winch idea. I repositioned
again. We hooked his toe strap up to my rear
point on the back of the truck. And then so I
was, what, perpendicular with the road. Yep.
Alex was winching and keeping the tension on
the back end too. The guy, the tow truck driver,
which we won't name the company. Just in case,
I imagine. Right, Alex? You're looking in the
sky. I'm just maybe liability issues with having
people help. I don't know. OK. Better safe than
sorry. The tow truck's driver name was Shannon.
Yes. The company started with an N. Yeah. And
it's not Jerry's. The name started with an N
and ended with an N and then towing. Yes. And
it wasn't Jerry's, so. Super cool guy, by the
way, Shannon. Very cool. Shannon pulls up. He's
like, I would love your help. Your rigs are fucking
cool. Yeah. He goes, dude, fucking sick rigs.
I'm like, sweet, dude. I know you're going to
be chill. So yeah. So anyway, we all got positioned.
We all got ready. Then pretty much at the same
time, I drove to the other side of the road to
help pull the car out. Shannon, the tow truck
driver. He winched the car up after he had repositions
to get a better pull on it. And Alex kept tension
in the back and kept watch to make sure nothing
shitty was going on. And boom, just like that,
we started pulling it and we got pretty much
the whole car pulled right up onto the road.
We unhooked our ... Alex unhooked his winch,
I unhooked the strap, threw that in the seat,
and Shannon pretty much did the rest. He repositioned
a little bit, dropped the flatbed, got the car
on there, and we were able to help that woman.
So this was, as far as our recoveries that me
and Alex have done together, this was the hardest
one yet. And it would have been a lot harder
if it was just me and him. I think we would have
done it, but I think the weight issue and how
far the car was down there definitely would have
affected us a little. We had to get more technical
with it. Because Shannon was there with his big
-ass tow truck, he took a huge load off of us.
And I think it was a good recovery for us, dude.
That was not a tiny recovery. That was not pulling
a little car out of a ditch or out of a driveway.
That was a deep ditch that required some thought,
like some actual planning, which... Yeah. That
was definitely the most complicated recovery
I have ever done. And I know Alex has a lot more
experience, which is why I let him take the lead
on it. That was up there with one of the hardest
ones I've done. I've done one really similar
on a mountainside, which is way scarier, because
you fuck up once, and your rig and the rig getting
pulled out is going over. But effectively, it
was the same thing. Just no snow and ice. Yeah,
and less danger. The grip was the biggest thing.
If we had clear roads and grip, we would have
been a lot better off, I think. We probably honestly
could have done it with the two of us, one on
the front, one on the back, pulled it sideways.
Yeah, yeah, I agree with that. I think the biggest
thing with that was just, it would just him,
the way that he was set up, Alex was already
moving and that car wasn't even, it didn't even
go up a, well, you'd probably say it hadn't even
moved two feet yet. No, I started, I started
moving almost immediately. Yeah. So I was just
enough to keep it from falling farther into the
tree. That was about it. Yeah. So we would have
had to like counter anchor onto a tree behind
us. And then it would have got a lot more technical,
but other than that though, it, uh, it went really
well. Um, I am sure she is very happy that, uh,
and shout out, like I said, we won't name the
tow truck company because of Maybe we don't want
to get anyone in trouble just in case but shout
out to Shannon Because he came out there and
the tow truck company did it for free Yep, and
that's a big one dude people people don't do
that He did he took our number because I guess
he gets a lot of off -road recovery jobs that
he just can't do so Yeah, so we might be starting
up an LLC here soon here botches recovery botches
recovered clinic Just enough that we can get
insurance. That's all I care about. I don't want
to make money off it. I just want to be able
to hold insurance that if something goes wrong
and we get sued, we have something to fall on.
Yeah. And so that was the other big thing, too,
because once in the beginning when he told us
that, I'm sorry, when the lady told us that he
was coming, we kind of hands -offed it for a
second because we're like, okay, if he's going
to do it, he's got insurance. We're going to
let him do his thing. And if he needs help, we
can help him. Otherwise, we weren't there. You
know what I mean? So with that one, that was
one of those that you would be glad to have insurance
for. Because I shit you not, her driver's side
door was in the tree. She was not open. It all
caved in. And I should have took pictures of
that. I'll probably put some pictures up, and
I'll send them into our group chat for just the
show notes, the chapter. Maybe we'll throw a
couple chapters in here just for the pictures.
But yeah, no, somehow her airbags didn't go off.
Maybe her airbags didn't work. It was a shitty
Acadia. But honestly, her car. Equinox, yeah,
sure. Same thing. Same thing. So I mean, but
her glass didn't break. She didn't have airbags
go off. She must have not been moving very fast
at all and just kind of slid, which was her saving
grace. Because I think if she was going 15, 20
mile an hour, it would have been a lot worse.
she would have been down there at the bottom
of the creek. And then at that point, that might
have been easier for us to recover her, but she
probably wouldn't be driving it the next day.
And as it was, as we saw it, as shit boxes go,
you could probably drive that the next day. I
don't know. Yeah, it definitely could have been
driven again. I mean, it would have made a lot
of noise. What was that? What's the pillar? Was
it the B pillar or whatever? The one that the
door's on? Yeah, it was the B pillar that was
crushed. Yeah, that was crushed in pretty good.
So there was definitely a little gap from the
driver's door getting closed, but it opened and
closed. So you might have a little ventilation
issue going on. But I will say I was impressed
crawling under there. Usually those equinoxes
are pretty rotted out. That one was pretty clean.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Like I said, shout out to Alex
for doing the dirty work. I did some filming.
And because he is more experienced, I let him
take lead on it because I didn't know exactly.
Now, kind of as I was talking to them, I kind
of got a better idea. My original idea was maybe
just the wheels to help try to pull it out. They
went for the control arms, which is a lot sturdier,
obviously, which I knew, too, but I just didn't
know where else to hook it to other than that.
So, you know, and even control arms, I hate hooking
the control arms, but. on an Equinox like that,
there's nothing to hook to. Yeah, and that's
the problem with those types of cars, city cars.
We actually, what we ended up using in the back,
because that's the worst spot's the back. There's
nothing to hook to. Shannon had this strap that
he had made that had a hook to hook onto points
on the frame. And then he hooked that, ran it
to the back, and then I hooked the winch to that.
Yeah. So that worked really well. Yep. And then,
of course, when I went to help pull out, I did
hook up to the wheel just to help kind of slide
it out. Because the way that he was pulling it,
it just would have kept kind of pushing down
into the ditch. So we needed to have a way to
get it out onto the road and have a force to
keep it from sliding down. So honestly, it worked
really well for the three of us being there.
That was best case scenario. I'm sure he'll have
a nice little story to tell, too, when he talks
to his other drivers. So I'm sure we'll be getting
some calls in the middle of the night now. Yeah,
that'll be our luck. Well, and that's why I got
a hold of... I had Alex take the number, because
my phone's usually on silent most of the time.
Maybe I'll have to start putting the ringer on
now just for Alex, but... Were we going to get
calls in the middle of the night? I would say
that if I'm getting up at three in the morning
to pull someone out of a small ditch, then gas
money would be nice. It was nice that we did
it free for the old lady. We didn't even go and
talk to her after. So we left the tow truck driver.
We told him she was only 100 yards down the road.
So which is really nice for him, too, because
he doesn't have to drive it anywhere. Just up
the road a little and turns out he turned around
in her driveway. Anyway, so it was perfect so
we loved him to go drop it off and take care
of it and which a matter of fact while I'm While
I'm talking here. I'm gonna message the daughter
just in case and let her know that we already
messenger Oh, did you good? Sweet So that that
was our little fun for the night and then on
our way, you know and then I had some weird clicking
going on and I don't know what that was, but
it was kind of scary because I've never had that
click for. But I was pulling a heavy car in four
low. Heavy -ish. Heavy. Anything you're pulling
up a hill like that I feel like is heavier. So
that's like the second time that I've done something
pretty heavy like that. I'm just like... After
that, you're, of course, I'm looking for sounds.
You know, it's like the last thing you want is
like your diff to go or like snap a CV or something,
which I wouldn't have snapped a CV. I would have
broke loose before that, but it just, um, just
one of those things. And then, you know, we were
good. We, uh, we took off, said goodbye to Shannon.
You know, it was, he was, like I said, he was
probably the coolest truck driver I've ever met.
Cool dude. My cousin's a tow truck driver. He's
a pretty cool tow truck driver, so. Yeah, coolest
tow truck driver I've ever met. And so he told
us, hey, if you guys need any help, give me a
call. That's a good card to bank. We might need
that someday, especially with our shit boxes.
There might be a day where we're just like, hey,
can you flat tow us five miles home? So yeah,
that was really cool of him. We got out of there.
Started driving home and you know, we're we're
team flashing everyone who's flashing us You
know, we got it. We got like a Bronco or something
that flashed me and I couldn't get it fast enough
So Alex gives him the Sun and yeah We did that
a little bit and then the there was an oncoming
car. What was that again? The oncoming car. I
don't even know it maybe an honor either Yeah,
but it was driving and it got about window to
window with me on coming. They got you know,
that amount of distance from me, and all of a
sudden I hear a smack, and I'm like, motherfucker.
This thing, from where I was at, I just watched
this thing take flight. Like, it went a good
two to three feet in the air. Yeah. So I radio
back at Alex, I'm like, what the fuck was that,
dude? It sounded like he just hit me, but he
didn't hit me. And Alex goes, dude, I think he
just hit a fucking dead deer in the road, because
he just jumped that fucking cone. There was,
when I went by, like, that spot, there was this...
Dead deer had been hit recently, but it wasn't
like he had hit it, right? Yeah, like it was
really dead, but he hit that head on it just
Took flight. Oh, dude. Yeah, anyone slow down
kept going see and that's what happened to me
with my Subaru Baja I jumped it just like that
and And dude that was scary and then the cool
thing with the Subaru is I had no actual damage
I just had a hair all the way down my undercarriage,
but he hit he broke plastic for sure. So here
that I did that back when I had my little Buick
Roadmaster wagon. We were driving in Big Rapids,
and along Big Rapids, they've got like the shoulders
got a cement curb on it, right? And it goes down
for each entrance. Well, I was middle of winter,
and I thought that I was in the lane, but I'd
ended up on that section where there are all
those dips. And I hit one of those at like 40
miles an hour and put the whole Roadmaster up
on two wheels. Oh, yeah. No damage. The car was
fine. Yeah. Yeah, you get lucky sometimes. I
got lucky with the Subaru, but I'm pretty sure
that was one of the Xs out of the three strikes
that fucked my training cooler line, because
I jumped that. I didn't have any battery straps
holding down the battery. I'm assuming that's
one of the things that did the nice kink in my
transcooler line. And eventually, I started it
up and it sprung a leak probably a couple months
later. which is fine. I went to AutoZone, grabbed
some hose, got a pipe saw, cut the trainy cooler
line through the rubber hose on it, put two hose
clamps on either side, threw the battery back
on top, and I was good to go. Yeah, that was
a fun recovery, man. That was fun. Like I said,
a lot of the times we get called out, and by
the time Bach's recovery responds and gets there,
we have a quick response time. We do. You can
hear, by the time we're done talking, our pants,
you can hear our belts getting put on. Like,
yeah, Alex calls me up and he's like, you want
to go? And I'm like, ah, fuck it. I ain't doing
nothing else. Let's go. So that time you called
me at like two in the morning and we weren't
even off the phone yet. You're like, so do you
want to do this? I'm like, dude, I'm already
in the car. Yeah. Yeah. And then we ended up
meeting at the wrong spot. Like he, I thought
he used the old name for lep inks. Yeah, plums.
Plums. And I thought he meant jeans. So I'm sitting
at jeans waiting for him. He's sitting at Lepping's
waiting for me. And then I call him and tell
him, like, hey, she canceled. And he goes, well,
where the fuck were you? And he's like, I've
been here. He goes, no, you weren't. And I'm
like, the fuck? And then we finally sorted that
out like a day later. Well, you didn't even fucking
show up, and I'm like, I was here. I've been
here, motherfucker. I've been here like 15 minutes.
I'm like, I've been here, motherfucker. Yeah,
we had a coordination issue there. But hey, we
responded. That's all that matters. So it's good,
though. We got things figured out now. We don't
screw that up. Most of the time, it's in White
Cloud. I don't know what White Cloud's issue
is. But most of the time, everything's in White
Cloud. Math. Yeah, meth. So now we just meet
at Leppings, which I don't know why we ever do,
because every time we go to meet at Leppings,
by the time we both get into town, we're both
hitting the light at about the same time. We
always call an audible and go to Westco, because
we need to fill up. Dude, every time. I don't
know why we just don't meet at Westco. Well,
we'll make Westco the new default then. Yeah,
that's our default meetup for Bach's recovery.
So yeah, we might have to start a business up
here. I have a feeling it's only gonna get more
busy. I'm not really looking to, like, make money
off this. I just want to have insurance in case
something happens. Yeah, I mean, and depending
on how bad insurance is, it would be nice to
have all of us on it anyway. But, like, I guess,
you know, with my situation too, a little bit
of extra money to pay for recovery equipment,
that would be about all I would want. Pay for
gas, pay for recovery equipment. So whatever
people want to pay us is what I'm usually gonna
be cool with. And even, I wouldn't even be too
worried about, I wouldn't be too worried about
gas even, just enough to pay for the insurance
and some equipment, I'm happy. Yeah, the only
thing for me is gas is what gets me, literally
is what gets me out there. Right, right. So if
they're like, hey, we'll pay your gas, I'm like,
ah, good, because that's all I literally have,
and that's for something else. So usually...
That's when I'm okay with someone paying for
it. So, but yeah, no, it was good. I felt really
good about helping the old lady. I'm glad that
we could all get it done. Um, so yeah, that was,
that was pretty cool. I think, I think, uh, looking
back on that now, Alex, things that you wish
we had for that recovery that we didn't. What
were you, what do you think? I wish we had different,
uh, fair, well, not necessarily fair leads, but
different hooks on our winches. Um, I gotta change
that stupid, whatever, 555 fab or whatever it's
called. I gotta change that thing. It was like
the go -to three years ago, and they're annoying
as hell. Basically, the problem is I have to
use a D -ring for almost anything. Right. And
that just, that really limits what I can and
can't do. I'd rather get a small soft shackle
through there, can you? Yeah, and I'm technically
not supposed to, because it's not set up for
a soft shackle. Yeah, I know. I just did, because
I forgot my D ring. Right. Yeah, and I had a
couple, but they're probably frozen on there.
And for my end, actually, my end is really nice
for just about everything else. But I don't really
ever use my winch in snow. And we just got done
with a major melt and then refreeze. So everything
was frozen, including my line across that was,
um, it's kind of just looped onto the fair lead,
but it was frozen onto it. And it was so frozen
that we couldn't even get it off by, you know,
with hand. We only, like I said, we only tried
for like two minutes max. And then we were like,
fuck it. Let's move on to something else. So
I do think if I kept my heat gun in the truck,
that probably would have helped a lot. Cause
then we could just hit it real quick and off
it would go. Yeah. I think knowing that, knowing
what I know now, I have those D -rings in the
front. Maybe I just take my winch line, pull
it out about six, whatever inches I need to make
a small droop to get in the D -ring. And in the
winter, I just hang it from the D -ring. So I
have that little bit extra there. Because if
I need to, me and Alex, we're going to try, obviously,
to do the recoveries together. It's always better
two versus one. So, if the case that it freezes
like that, I could just hook up to him and back
up with the winch on free spool, and we'll get
that bitch unfrozen, but... Yeah, synthetic line
is really great. I don't like it in the winter.
Yeah, I mean, it is. When you get all the water
soaked into the fibers and everything freezes
together like an ice block, yeah, that could
be tough. I guess that's why they want them a
little bit more weatherproofed and covered, right?
but yeah I don't cover mine so mine is even worse
than yours actually mine is a lot more covered
than because it's a hidden winch bumper so I
do have a lot more protection um around it so
I guess I do have that going for it but it still
gets it gets you know moisture and water up in
it whereas mine just following cars mine just
hangs off the front of the truck yeah yeah you
just and I gave you a cover for that too yeah
I broke it What the fuck yeah, I didn't last
very long damn it I Had someone I had someone
else give me a cover too. I and I had the same
problem. They just Once it gets cold out they
crack Yeah, and then fall apart and it's like
What's the point in having a cover if I can't
even keep it on the truck without it breaking
when I need it, right? so other than that recovery
equipment wise it's made me realize that like
I didn't have blocks of tackle, which just would
have been nice to have. We didn't need it for
this one. I know Shannon used it on his just
to help with the angle. But it would have been
nice for us to have. We could have hooked to
a tree across the road and positioned our vehicles
in maybe a little bit better advantageous position.
And that might have been the better idea. Once
you get doing it over that amount of distance,
that gets to be too complicated. Oh, I mean,
I agree. I just mean as far as the amount of
weight that was pulling our cars, that would
have helped with that, I imagine. And then we
could have anchored our cars together on the
other end if we really wanted to. But yeah, I
mean, block and tackle in general, that would
have been nice to have just for any other recoveries.
If we find something that's more Uh, complicated
than this, it would be, it would be good to have
to help get different angles, uh, for recovery.
But, and then the other thing was, uh, which
we didn't need, but a tree saver. Um, I've been,
I've been thinking about it for a long time,
uh, that I need one and I know I do. I have like
a 30 foot, four inch strap, but I don't have
any like tree savers. So, um, I already have
some in my car. I'm just going to order some.
Get next time I get money don't get something
like some crawler off -road or so I say get some
from crawler don't We need to try and start getting
away from these cheaper companies like me only
Mst guys don't come at me. Me only is kind of
a junk product I'm sorry. They've worked great
for us so far their lines just they don't handle
UV very well And we don't know what's in them
whereas crawler. I can tell you where they're
made and what's in them. Yeah So I mean I haven't
like I said like he said already. I haven't had
any issues with me only So I can't really say
that it's a bad product per se There there are
just better products out there And it's just
not the worst one of not the best either exactly
and one of the things I I would have a hard time
You know all my me only stuff was given to me
I have a hard time with cheap recovery gear,
because that can get dangerous really fast. Yeah.
Very good tree saver, 30 bucks. Yeah, the one
from Crawler, the 3 by 8 foot. Yep. Crawler's
got good stuff, man. I've got nothing bad to
say about it. Versa Shackle, 716 by 32 for $64
.99. That's a lot, actually. Is that a tree saver
shackle, or is that just a... No, that's just
a long... Long soft shackle. That's just a long
soft shackle. My lord. Yep, that is a very long
soft shackle. Yeah, 32 inches. Is that the only
soft shackle they've got? I'm looking. Oh, they
have a soft shackle area. It's only got one in
it. I swear they had other ones. They must be
low on stock or something. So you think outer
recovery cure gets Wow, what did I recovery gear
kits? Nothing. Yeah, they're low on quality or
low on quality. Well, I'm assuming. Yeah, I think
I will. I'll look at some of their stuff, too.
Really got gatekeeper off road. Easy switch to
refunction. I do pods. All right. So Yeah, I
mean, other than that, um, everything went well.
I just want to. Wicked winch line. Monster rigging.
If you go to monster rigging, they've actually
got some smaller soft shackles. Yeah, those are
small. Those are about the size of the ones we've
got now. Are they? They look smaller. Yeah. Three,
eight by 10 inch. It's about the same. And they
are made from plasma rope, which is the highest
strength synthetic rope available. Stronger and
safer than steel shackles, yep. And which one
is this? What size are these? Oh, you can choose
your size. Yeah. 40 bucks for a 3 -eighths by
10 -inch though. Holy moly. Dude, that's good
quality. Yeah. I mean, I can't say that I disagree.
I'm just saying, holy fuck. Like, it sucks, but.
You're gonna pay for quality, you know? We don't
want to be back in a situation where shit's breaking
on us. Yeah. So, those are all 60 bucks for a
516th by 10. So, yeah, it's an investment, that's
for sure. And that's what I'm saying, is that,
like, it would be nice to have the money to pay
for more of this. So, like, a 3 .8s would do
the equivalent to what my Meole one supposedly
does. The 3 .8s by 10, which is 4 to 3 ,500.
And... With the recoveries that we do, I would
just be more comfortable with a larger one like
that. Might not be needed, but I just would be
more comfortable with using a soft shackle with
that much of a break on it. So. Yeah. I just,
for me, it's just, I want something safe. I don't
want to be limping along, hoping not to die every
time we use something. Yeah. I mean, I don't
think, I don't mistrust Mealy like that. I just.
they do fade quite quickly. I mean, my kinetic
rope from Mealy's great. But, you know, it's
just one of those where, like, it's an MST thing.
Like, they're cool. But, you know, in the future,
we might want to get our own partnership, maybe,
per se. We might want to work with someone else.
And if we can get with a Michigan -based company,
which Crawler Off -Road is, I believe right you're
looking yeah, they're out of Highland Yeah, so
we can get to get with one of those. I you know
obviously we'd prefer that so Yeah, so what do
you think anything else? Oh? No, I think we killed
it. It's not quite an hour, but I'll roll with
it Yeah, I mean other than other than what we
already spoke of the tree saver which we need
to get and some really nice quality shackle,
or not shackles, but, well, pulleys, whatever,
block and tackle. Anything else that would help
us. You know what? Orange cones. Some kind of
roadblock. Because while we had really nice flashers,
everybody liked our flashers, the sheriff, tow
truck driver. That was funny. We had our... What
company makes that? Lightning, mass ting, shine
ting. Oh, mic tuning. Mic tuning. See, it was
something ting. It was something Chinese. But
those are really good switch panels. We've had
no issues with them. We programmed them to have
our chaser lights and some of our auxiliary lights
flash for caution. because there was a hill pretty
close to us. So oncoming cars, from what the
owner was telling us, tend to fly down that hill.
So we had those on so everybody could see us
and that worked out really well. But some cones
to create a safe distance would be really nice
too. Maybe we could find some collapsible ones
or something. I'd like some that don't take up
much or any space really. Or like the triangles.
triangles would work, too, like the emergency
triangles. So that was good. We had plenty of
lighting between our two trucks. That whole scene
was lit like it was fucking daytime. So we were
good there. Our winches were good. We just have
to make some adjustments for winter. So I'm going
to have to make that small loop for mine just
so I have something. And I'm going to do that
before we do our poker run in January. That way
we have that all set up and ready because I have
a feeling someone's gonna need to get winched.
Someone. Say, why are you looking at me through
the camera, man? Yeah, because I'm gonna make
sure you remember your fucking GPS this time
and you're gonna lead. Well... Because last time
I led... That's because I wasn't even in my truck
and I had nowhere to even put a GPS. Yeah, so
this time he's gonna be in his truck. And he's
going to have the GPS, which, honestly, we know
the course pretty decently already. We did it
a couple months back. So we're already pretty
familiar with how to get to everything, which
is even better. I might say that gives us a leg
up as far as time goes, as long as nothing happens.
Yeah, I do. If a freeze like this. I do Everett
runs pretty often, so. Yeah. The freeze like
this that just happened. I don't love that. Yeah.
Because when that freezes over all those ice
puddles, all those giant chunks of ice, the roads
last year were slick as fuck. We were drifting
around corners at times. So, you know, I'd love
to do poker run in the winter on some fresh powder.
That would be absolutely sick, but it doesn't
look like we're gonna get that. Yeah, we don't
get that lucky. No, it does look like it's gonna
be a green winner from what Alex is saying Which
means that by January, it'll probably fucking
freeze up and we'll be on a sheet of glass again.
So That's unfortunate. Thankfully. We probably
won't be the first group to each of these unless
we volunteer in the mornings But I don't think
we're going to because of how far we are away
Yeah, cuz we're a little over an hour away and
it already takes us a good Bit of time to get
up and get everyone ready the kids and I was
thinking about volunteering But the amount of
time it takes to get Jasper ready, and if I do
that I have to do it with someone else I don't
want to go and do that whole thing alone. It'll
take me more time to do it by the time the actual
things start so yeah, I have to work beforehand,
so it's hard for me to Get up there because it's
already an early event Yeah, what does it start
at like 11? Yeah, something like that. I haven't
even looked. It's just like, it's a couple weeks
away. I'm more like, tomorrow, today's Saturday
or Friday? Today's still Friday. Okay. Tomorrow
we have a Christmas party. Sunday we have a birthday
party with my sister. So this weekend, I don't
even have time to do anything. So by then, it's
gonna be Christmas. Then after Christmas, it's
gonna be... Who knows? We're gonna have all sorts
of shit go down after the refreeze on Christmas.
Yeah. It's gonna be rough. Yeah, we can call
it here. Sorry you guys didn't get a long episode.
Everything's out of whack, man. This whole week
has just been fucking hell, so... Yeah, you'll
probably hear the rap episode first. For sure.
That way you know what our week was like. So,
our week's all been crazy. We've had some crazy
stuff happen. Everyone's feeling it. Probably
get the wrap on Monday. This on Tuesday. The
next wrap on Thursday. Yeah. It'll be good. It'll
be good. Thanks, everybody, for joining Botch's
recovery episode. As we get more weird recoveries
like this, we'll update you. We'll do another.
This could be a segment if they're crazy enough.
We'll keep it to 30 minutes though. So catch
you guys later. See you later.