eye-for-detail wrote:2: haven't read anyones' experiences with towballs flying off yet
towball .... no.
entire towbar ..... yes on three occasions & by me personally ....
1/
Isuzu truck towbar came out completly and in one piece, the chassis rails however were twisted and torn badly around the bolt holes.
The towbar used an 8bolt connection setup and the bolts were all 1/2inch high tensile bolts.
Isuzu's weight is 4tonnes and the snatching rig (ford cargo was empty but rated at 8GVM).... speed was bloody slow in comparsion to a 4x4 recovery !!
truck snatchstrap used not a 4x4 strap.
2/
Nissan cabstar 1.5ton truckette ( too small to be a real truck ), towbar torn from one chassis rail only and the remaining side was bent beyond repair....... this was a "hard snatch" ( std 4x4 strap was used )
3/
commodore bash car bent towbar ...... again the ball wasnt effected at all nor in this case was the tounge either but the frame was bent 20degrees off line...... very light snatch backwards and slightly off line, hence the 20degrees..... again a std 4x4 strap in use
NB:
the towball was the "hitchingpoint" for the snatch strap in these 3 examples, the ONLY reason the towball was used was there was no other alternative place to attatch the strap, this included the use of a shackle to attatch the strap..... there was simply no choice but the towball at the time.
Personally I dont like the towball snatching option but in the three cases I've listed it shows that the ball isnt likely to fail...... more likely its the failure of what either the towball or recovery hook is attatched to that fails...... or in my case's if the mounting doesnt fail then its the broken strap that does the damage !!
Two years ago I saw a sigma stationwagon have its alloy bullbar ripped out, the bars attatchment was "as per the book" and it was snatched by an experianced 4x4 driver and his yota ute, the force distroyed the bar and the shackle struck the heavyduty toolbox on the tray of the yota ute punching a hole in it bigger than ya fist.
lets face it....... snatching isnt the safest thing in the world, even common sense says stand back just incase the unlikely happens to all this rated gear and approved attatchment methods......
only a fool would take the she'll be rite mate attitude.
Kingy
[color=blue][size=150][b]And your cry-baby, whinyassed opinion would be.....? [/b][/size][/color]
) a stuck vehicle.
