TooTall'sTruck
Observer
So with most newbie posts showing how their stock truck has such a better departure angle and how can clear huge obstacles once they have removed the front air dam and factory running boards. I had so much fun playing with all of the above in the mud this last weekend. Plus my front bump stops are contacting the front suspension but it sits level so I will not crank the torsion bars just to look cool, new HD shocks made the ride much more comfortable.
My wife's truck (put loosely, since she despises such a huge rig for her solo transport to work each day) is a business asset and so needs to fit many roles:
1st and foremost: Family rig that my wife can park, load our single kid into and not need constant advice on how to handle the beast.
2nd: 4x4 and able to load enough tools into it to to rebuild a semi truck engine in-frame
3rd: be comfortable enough to travel for hours at a time without "herding" it down the road
4th: be capable of transporting 6 people for road trips with my wife's sister/husband and their son ( I added a Suburban 3rd row to the Yukon)
What I purchased for the business was this: Too Tall's Truck #1997; a GMC Yukon SLT with the only feature lacking being heated seats. All stock except for the Wildcat AT in 235/85-16 10ply tires.
The tires were on my Jeep XJ before the Yukon and the chains have been with me for the last few rigs, however I never used all 4 at once until this last weekend!
So I bought Too Tall's Truck asset #1990: a Chevrolet Suburban that "used to run" but died and would not restart....just happened to be in a mud hole and parked 10 feet away from another vehicle stuck well past the frame!
So my plan was to get the Suburban started and drive it out of the hole, wait until my Duramax buddy fixed his tierods and was able to tow it to my house on his gooseneck. But I would not send his nice heavy truck with 22" rims and 14" of lift down into this hole, and he did not have a winch to pull the burb out. Hmmm....well I never have needed the chains with the Yukon's LSD and a smart right pedal....why not know the truck's limits ehh?
So with some tools and a new battery and a 5 gallon bucket of chains; I returned to the Suburban after the deal was finalized. Boots, rain coat, headlamp, shovel, come-along, lots of shackels and a cloth tow strap (4" for this much force) made the package complete! The previous owner laughed and said "Came prepared this time huh?"
We farted around with the truck to try to start it, but my google searches had me looking for a new transfer fuel pump and the check engine light told me it wouldn't be driving out of the mud hole today! So I dropped the chains behind the tires and got them mounted about 2 hours before twilight....first attempt was to continue the route that got the Suburban stuck in the first place. We made it about 10 feet in 4HI before the Suburban found a dent in the ground that would conceal a basketball and stopped our momentum, after digging 4 holes 12" deep with my chained up tires, I told the guy steering the Suburban that we weren't going up this hill and I would come through the bog and pull the Suburban backwards through the mud and up a much more gradual hill. This hill was much more promising even though it was soft field grass and it has been raining here for about a week solid. He was convinced that we could make the first line, until I got him out of the Suburban and showed him the holes and the apple sized rocks I found 12" deep!!! "Oh shnikes!" was all he said before he started grinning and reminded me that they were being foreclosed on the next week so who cares!!!
So skeptically I walked through the bog and it all felt very squishy on top and I could tell it was where the property drained to so I knew it would be more of the same the deeper I went down. Well no time like the present, so I backed down the second line and through the bog to the rear of the Suburban, one shackle through the hitch safety chain mount and around the 2" ball on the Yukon....I told him that I would not stop until we were on the top of the hill and level..."I hope you are good at backing up fast! And honk if you are going to impact anything and I will stop pulling."
So one stop before the hill started to remind him to put the transfer case into Neutral since that is how he stopped it from rolling back down the first hill ( it did make a huge difference in the resistance of the Suburban to have the transfer case in neutral instead of just the transmission being in neutral). I put the Yukon into 1st gear and tested the recently rebuilt 4L60E all the way to the top of the wet sloppy hill. Wheeeee! I could see the steer tires ripping back and forth on the Suburban (as if he could ever control them) in my side mirror. The Yukon did absolutely amazing pulling that pig up the soft hillside.
So I offered to pull the white car out since I was already chained up and there. A few front tugs with a chain wrapped around the engine crosmember just stuffed the thing into the dirt bank and didn't move....so backwards up the lesser hill it was! That was towed out a little sideways since all that car had thicker than 18ga steel was a passenger trailering arm in the rear!! The kid had a front row seat (or back row? not sure which it would be while facing the wrong way!!) on Mr Toad's wild ride!!
I would have taken pictures but you could not tell that I had done anything out of the ordinary with the Yukon...other than some big looking muddy chains wrapped around my tires it didn't fling but 3 pieces of mud and all I had to do was swipe out the fenderwells and remove the chains before I hit the highway and drove 55 mph home.
Once home I did the garden hose on the undercarriage and rear bumper to remove all the sediment I had dug up with the chains on, and the next morning my wife pooped little green apples when she saw the mud coated steering wheel and floormats......"If you really want to know I can tell you, but you probably don't want to know!" was all I said to her! She did roll her eyes when the truck didn't move in reverse after I released the parking brake! But a move forward broke loose the frozen calipers...it was rode hard and put away wet in February so the brakes needed to be cleaned off once we were going 25 mph. Other than a good cleaning there was no ripped off parts or bent air dams or creased running boards. There was one air dam sitting near the two rescued rigs, but they probably fell off the white car during removal!
So my point is to illustrate this: proper technique and a black 5 gallon bucket full of steel snow chains can really show what a stock "mom" vehicle is capable of. BTW the only time I have used 4LO in the Yukon is to compression brake coming down a very steep and long logging road that I didn't want to ride the brakes on. 4HI can definitely supply enough torque to dig 4 very deep holes!
I will get a few pictures of the bog when I pickup #1990!! In the meantime, don't do anything I would!!
My wife's truck (put loosely, since she despises such a huge rig for her solo transport to work each day) is a business asset and so needs to fit many roles:
1st and foremost: Family rig that my wife can park, load our single kid into and not need constant advice on how to handle the beast.
2nd: 4x4 and able to load enough tools into it to to rebuild a semi truck engine in-frame
3rd: be comfortable enough to travel for hours at a time without "herding" it down the road
4th: be capable of transporting 6 people for road trips with my wife's sister/husband and their son ( I added a Suburban 3rd row to the Yukon)
What I purchased for the business was this: Too Tall's Truck #1997; a GMC Yukon SLT with the only feature lacking being heated seats. All stock except for the Wildcat AT in 235/85-16 10ply tires.
The tires were on my Jeep XJ before the Yukon and the chains have been with me for the last few rigs, however I never used all 4 at once until this last weekend!
So I bought Too Tall's Truck asset #1990: a Chevrolet Suburban that "used to run" but died and would not restart....just happened to be in a mud hole and parked 10 feet away from another vehicle stuck well past the frame!
So my plan was to get the Suburban started and drive it out of the hole, wait until my Duramax buddy fixed his tierods and was able to tow it to my house on his gooseneck. But I would not send his nice heavy truck with 22" rims and 14" of lift down into this hole, and he did not have a winch to pull the burb out. Hmmm....well I never have needed the chains with the Yukon's LSD and a smart right pedal....why not know the truck's limits ehh?
So with some tools and a new battery and a 5 gallon bucket of chains; I returned to the Suburban after the deal was finalized. Boots, rain coat, headlamp, shovel, come-along, lots of shackels and a cloth tow strap (4" for this much force) made the package complete! The previous owner laughed and said "Came prepared this time huh?"
We farted around with the truck to try to start it, but my google searches had me looking for a new transfer fuel pump and the check engine light told me it wouldn't be driving out of the mud hole today! So I dropped the chains behind the tires and got them mounted about 2 hours before twilight....first attempt was to continue the route that got the Suburban stuck in the first place. We made it about 10 feet in 4HI before the Suburban found a dent in the ground that would conceal a basketball and stopped our momentum, after digging 4 holes 12" deep with my chained up tires, I told the guy steering the Suburban that we weren't going up this hill and I would come through the bog and pull the Suburban backwards through the mud and up a much more gradual hill. This hill was much more promising even though it was soft field grass and it has been raining here for about a week solid. He was convinced that we could make the first line, until I got him out of the Suburban and showed him the holes and the apple sized rocks I found 12" deep!!! "Oh shnikes!" was all he said before he started grinning and reminded me that they were being foreclosed on the next week so who cares!!!
So skeptically I walked through the bog and it all felt very squishy on top and I could tell it was where the property drained to so I knew it would be more of the same the deeper I went down. Well no time like the present, so I backed down the second line and through the bog to the rear of the Suburban, one shackle through the hitch safety chain mount and around the 2" ball on the Yukon....I told him that I would not stop until we were on the top of the hill and level..."I hope you are good at backing up fast! And honk if you are going to impact anything and I will stop pulling."
So one stop before the hill started to remind him to put the transfer case into Neutral since that is how he stopped it from rolling back down the first hill ( it did make a huge difference in the resistance of the Suburban to have the transfer case in neutral instead of just the transmission being in neutral). I put the Yukon into 1st gear and tested the recently rebuilt 4L60E all the way to the top of the wet sloppy hill. Wheeeee! I could see the steer tires ripping back and forth on the Suburban (as if he could ever control them) in my side mirror. The Yukon did absolutely amazing pulling that pig up the soft hillside.
So I offered to pull the white car out since I was already chained up and there. A few front tugs with a chain wrapped around the engine crosmember just stuffed the thing into the dirt bank and didn't move....so backwards up the lesser hill it was! That was towed out a little sideways since all that car had thicker than 18ga steel was a passenger trailering arm in the rear!! The kid had a front row seat (or back row? not sure which it would be while facing the wrong way!!) on Mr Toad's wild ride!!
I would have taken pictures but you could not tell that I had done anything out of the ordinary with the Yukon...other than some big looking muddy chains wrapped around my tires it didn't fling but 3 pieces of mud and all I had to do was swipe out the fenderwells and remove the chains before I hit the highway and drove 55 mph home.
Once home I did the garden hose on the undercarriage and rear bumper to remove all the sediment I had dug up with the chains on, and the next morning my wife pooped little green apples when she saw the mud coated steering wheel and floormats......"If you really want to know I can tell you, but you probably don't want to know!" was all I said to her! She did roll her eyes when the truck didn't move in reverse after I released the parking brake! But a move forward broke loose the frozen calipers...it was rode hard and put away wet in February so the brakes needed to be cleaned off once we were going 25 mph. Other than a good cleaning there was no ripped off parts or bent air dams or creased running boards. There was one air dam sitting near the two rescued rigs, but they probably fell off the white car during removal!
So my point is to illustrate this: proper technique and a black 5 gallon bucket full of steel snow chains can really show what a stock "mom" vehicle is capable of. BTW the only time I have used 4LO in the Yukon is to compression brake coming down a very steep and long logging road that I didn't want to ride the brakes on. 4HI can definitely supply enough torque to dig 4 very deep holes!
I will get a few pictures of the bog when I pickup #1990!! In the meantime, don't do anything I would!!