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Post by rdback on Sept 27, 2022 8:42:15 GMT -6
Well there's a big ol' bucket of smiles and satisfaction heavyhitterokra! Congratulations on your accomplishment!
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Sept 27, 2022 17:16:16 GMT -6
Man, that thing rides rough! I'd forgotten how tight a suspension that thing has. It's not like cruising the backroads in a pickup truck; it's more akin to driving a tractor, you feel every rock in the dirt road. I ate a few bugs today with the windshield folded down, but I had fun. It's hard to tell if it still smokes or not because there's so much dust right now, but it doesn't appear to be leaving a 'skeeter killing trail' behind it the way it did when we first started it up.
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Post by woodeye on Sept 27, 2022 19:15:51 GMT -6
That's all that counts, you had fun. Besides, bugs is protein. Me and Chester used to drive the dirt roads all the time, check out the creeks and lakes, even did drive-by morel hunting. I miss that. We went for a drive today, but it was all concrete and asphalt, bummer. Maybe it'll rain soon and you can plow and slosh through some mud, that might make the ride a little smoother...
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Sept 28, 2022 11:59:02 GMT -6
Dad bought that Jeep new, back in 1980. We drove it in some stupid muddy places. Dad used to take it to go hunting for Christmas trees ... Back in the early'80s Eastern Red Cedar trees were a rare find around here, as the old-timers had cut every last one of them to make split rail fence posts and cross ties for telegraph poles to sell during hard times. We always had a red cedar tree for a Christmas tree, but you'd have to ride horseback for a couple of miles to find one. Sometimes, by the time we dragged a tree back home with a lariat rope, there wasn't much left of it. It would be completely bare on one side, from being dragged through all the heavy brush on the way back home.
When Dad got the Jeep, that really extended our search parameter, after that, there was no limit as to how far we could range out into the rough country beyond the paved roads. Back then, they didn't have the huge numbers of road graders and heavy equipment to keep the roads up the way they do now, so even what was considered a decent road was barely traversable without 4-wheel drive.
Anyhow, Dad got it in his head that we were going to go find the biggest Christmas tree you ever saw, and we were going to find it with his new Jeep. He had just finished building a new house that was framed like an old barn, with an open loft upstairs and a 16' foot open truss ceiling. All my life before then, we had lived in an old, rundown, half way stage route house. Now, that he had the new house built, he was going to bring home a 16' foot tree to reach all the way to the bottom of the ridge beam, no matter if it hair-lipped the Governor.
We drove all the way over into the edge of Wagoner County, just cruising along the Corps of Engineer's land that encompassed the entire expanse of the flood plain of Fort Gibson Lake. That's when Dad spotted the 8th wonder of the Christmas tree world and headed straight toward it like a moth headed to a bright flame. There were elm groves and waste-deep Sericea lespedeza fields so thick that the wheels actually lost contact with the soil beneath them. We were putting along in first gear, when the Jeep just stopped moving. "What the heck?" Dad said, as he looked under the Jeep to discover the entire weight of the rear end of our vehicle was suspended above a giant matted mess of the stuff!
He just put it in 4-wheel drive and plowed on through, all the while, the terrain was getting less and less favorable to travel of any sort, much less by any wheeled vehicle.
That's when we happened onto a mounded terrace where someone a hundred years ago had probably worked for a year with a team of mules to raise a berm to route water away from their cotton field. Just on the other side, stood the most magnificent cedar tree he had ever laid eyes on. Unfortunately, just beyond the berm, there also laid a bottomless pit of mud and muck. Dad reached down, shifted gears, glanced at me, and said, "You think we can make it!?"
No sooner did the word, "No!" reach the cold, thin, air, than he let rip over the top of the berm with that little yellow jeep ... We went straight up through the air, all four tires off the ground as the backside of the berm faded away from under our wheels. Then, WHOP!!! It was a sound much akin to a fat man doing a belly flop from a considerable height, mixed with the sound of knobby tires throwing tiny gravel and huge plops of mud hitting the windshield. There was the faint smell of burning oil, mixed with choked exhaust, and the sizzle of red hot steel going under water.
We were belly deep in goo that would have made a mastodon wish for a tar pit to get some relief from the mire.
It was a long walk home to get the tractor. We spent several hours working to pull the Jeep back out, and never did get the tree.
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Post by macmex on Sept 28, 2022 12:06:10 GMT -6
I can't explain it but for some reason this meme made me think of Ron...
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Post by woodeye on Sept 28, 2022 12:12:55 GMT -6
Great story, heavyhitterokra. While reading it, I just knew that your dad and the Jeep would prevail, but it was not to be. I've never owned a Jeep, probably a good thing though, I've done enough daredevil Evel Knievel tricks in my life on a four wheeler, without having something bigger like a Jeep to kill myself with...
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Post by woodeye on Sept 28, 2022 12:19:55 GMT -6
macmex, that's one small step for man, but one giant leap for pipe wrench owners. Definitely took some deep thinking to come up with that one.
To the Redneck that accomplished this, I salute you!
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Post by heavyhitterokra on Sept 28, 2022 12:45:14 GMT -6
Best use of a pipe wrench ever! That makes me want to go hook up the welder and do some custom work on the back of my truck.
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Post by woodeye on Sept 29, 2022 5:39:12 GMT -6
Best use of a pipe wrench ever! That makes me want to go hook up the welder and do some custom work on the back of my truck. I'm not positive that this one has any custom work such as industrial heavy duty welding. But if it doesn't have it, it should!
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Post by hmoosek on Sept 29, 2022 5:50:38 GMT -6
Y’all are killing me with these pictures. I don’t have a picture of it, but it’s the truth. This was circa 1983. A fellow in the next town over had this beat up old red car. He took a small galvanized wash tub, cut it out so it resembled a hood scoop and bolted it to the hood of his car. You couldn’t help but laugh, it was the funniest thing I ever saw.
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