Help!!!!

[Illusion]

Got my bus home and parked it in the yard... terrible decision now it's stuck in my yard I've stuck wood and flat rocks under the tires just can't seem to catch a grip:/

[Elliot Naess]

I've "been there", and right in my own front yard too. LOL
If it is as bad as it can be... then "sticking" wood and rocks at it isn't what it will take to get it out.

You may have to dig enough in front and/or behind the tires to lay down a flat solid surface that you can drive ONTO, as opposed to drive UP to.

If there is any slope in the terrain at all, go for the low side, so gravity helps you get onto the new surface.

And wood isn't much good for traction. Maybe concrete blocks.

Don't try to move it again until you have a perfect "runway" installed at each tire for it to build a little speed on.

There are now timbers in my front yard that no living soul will ever see again -- a good foot below the surface! LOL

Now... there is an other method, if you have a jack. No, not the kind for lifting a car. A jack to lift a bus. A "5 ton" jack or bigger.

Use thick plywood and whatnot as a base for the jack, and jack each wheel up high enough to build your "runway" above ground.

Either way, it could take you a full day of hard work. But it can be done.

[PNW_Steve]

Originally Posted by Ms. Honey

Got my bus home and parked it in the yard... terrible decision now it's stuck in my yard I've stuck wood and flat rocks under the tires just can't seem to catch a grip:/

How deep are your drive tires buried? If you are not sunk too deep and it is just a matter of traction I can probably pull you out with my pickup.

I can come out on Friday or Saturday.

[PNW_Steve]

I PM'd you my contact info.

[cowlitzcoach]

Getting stuck is never fun. I had one of my buses just sink into the mire as I was watching. It settled low enough that the first step at the service door was ground level.

I decided the best thing to do was to wait until things dried out a LOT before I tried to do anything. As far down as it was stuck it was going to require an excavator and a HUGE tow truck to pull it out.

Once things did dry up a bit I used a 10-wheel dump truck with traction chains on all of the outside drive tires and a really long chain so the dump truck was on relatively solid ground.

Even still, it took two of us most of the morning to get the bus unstuck, two months after it got stuck.

If the bus is basically spinning the wheels because it can't get any traction it won't take much assistance to pull it to where the tires can get some traction. Wet grass on clay ground has about as much drag coefficient as oil on glass. I have lost traction more than once on flat level ground when the grass was wet.

If you have spun the wheels and have dug ruts then you are going to have to do what Elliot Naess suggested and you are going to have to either lift the bus out of the holes or dig runways so you can drive out of the holes.

You may want to try one old farmer's trick that has worked for me.

If you have any rope (not clothesline, I mean real rope that is at least 1". 2" or larger would be even better) run it through the hand holes of the rear wheels. If you can thread rope through a couple different hand holes they will act as a sort of traction chain that might help give you a little more traction. It won't help enough if you are trying to climb out of a hole. But once you have a runway it will give you enough extra traction to get out of the hole.

I have BTDT and know exactly what you are feeling. The worst feeling is that one that is saying I knew I shouldn't have tried to park the bus there.

Good luck and I hope it stays dry or gets really cold and freezes.

[SDR76]

I had my bus get stuck this winter. It sunk up to the bumper on the front. I actually got stuck inside because my front door would not open due to the lower track being in the mud and I had to use the rear door. I ended up digging for a few hours, got the bus back "UP" on top of the ground, then the next morning I went out at 5 AM when there was a heavy frost on the ground and drove out with no problem.