What is the top tool for a recovery situation? [Poll]

[rayra]

The real answer is a buddy / second vehicle. and the means / tools to tow or pull one out of the fix it is in.

TWO shovels. A standard short shovel with stirrup handle and a long-handed shovel, both pointy and ground sharp, both with fiberglass handles. Shrubbery will serve as a traction mat in my deserts. If I'm helping someone else who is stuck, they get the short shovel, because they'd doing the hard work of digging down and around the wheels. I'm moving what they scrape out. And that's if a snatch strap doesn't get it done on the first go. But would probably try to dig out some 'ramps' so the vehicle moves easier. Or even under its own power.

/decades of offroading experience, in and on all sorts of vehicles

 

[billiebob]

File your plan with someone at home
Check in daily

 

[Happy Joe]

Haven't gotten stuck in more than a decade/this century;
1. Experience
2. Aggressive, high traction, High flotation, MUD tires (help prevent getting stuck and/or and sliding around when trying to recover a stuckee).
3. Lockers, NOT limited slips.
3. FRAME mounted, rated, recovery points, both front and back, (unibodies are normally sorely lacking, usually having light duty shipping tie down points).
5. A minimum of two, Rated, shackles.
6. A minimum of a stretchy recovery strap (stores better) or a kinetic rope (usually more trouble to store)... multiple uses; tree strap, line extension, recovery vehicle anchor, etc... Will work only poorly with a 4 foot Hi-lift as a manual winch/come-a-long.
7. For snow wheeling (in bumper deep or deeper snow) a winch and full sized shovels.
...If winch equipped assorted accessories; tree strap, rated snatch block, a heavy log chain to rig side pulls (and to drag logs) along with gloves... caution; use of, especially, multiple snatch blocks can result in recovering pieces of the stuckee's vehicle/pulling it apart.
8. A properly equipped, setup and experienced friend or stranger in a second vehicle (LUCK).
9? ...used to carry a short length of heavy chain with a grab hook on one end to use as a recovery point for vehicles without recovery points... stopped carrying it when IFS vehicles and unibodies with poor places to anchor recovery points became common.

History; gave up carrying a hi-lift jack after not needing or using one off road for more than 15 years. Didn't put a winch on the current vehicles after not needing one, for myself, for 20 years, or there abouts.
...still carry a mini shovel (USGI issue e-tool)... mostly to dig cat holes (sanitation)).
...Never needed an ax off road; I do carry a collapsible bow saw (mostly for firewood).. I also carry a matt-ax (USGI issue military combination ax and mini-mattock; for the mattock; mostly to dig fire pits in hard, unturned, ground); my WW-2 mini-pick mattock turned up missing... this is the best replacement (forged, not cast) that I have found.

Enjoy!

 

[jkam]

In most situations, common sense is your best tool.
Hardware just makes the job a bit easier.

 

[luthj]

It depends on where you are driving and what you are driving. If you are alone in the mojave, a winch is not terribly useful without a big ground anchor. Without the ability to adjust air pressure driving on sand is dicey at best.

Driving in forests a saw of some kind is just as important.

Operating in muddy or snowy conditions a set of chains and a shovel are absolute must haves.

There is no one best tool, other than experience, and a good first aid kit.

 

[MOguy]

Why dig when you can pull a cable?

 

[jkam]

We got my buddy's 42' Winnebago unstuck using a Glock E tool.
Took 3 hours but at the time it was the only shovel we had.

I've been in situations where the only tools you have are from the surrounding area.
Rocks, tree branches, etc.
Use your head and these will often get you back on the road again.

 

[Metcalf]

Why dig when you can pull a cable?

Because if you don't dig when you should.....the chances of breaking lot of stuff with the winch goes up dramatically.

The most underutilized off road recovery tool is the shovel.

 

[Thinman]

would have went with shovel, but they work really terrible as traction boards.

went with traction boards because they only make for a poor shovel.

 

[MOguy]

Because if you don't dig when you should.....the chances of breaking lot of stuff with the winch goes up dramatically.

The most underutilized off road recovery tool is the shovel.

I suppose so much depends on the situation.

If I am hung up in rocks I can't dig. Where I live the soil is hard and too many roots to do much digging with a shovel. if I am in the desert I might have nothing to use as an anchor. I carry a shovel, a strap, a hi lift, I never go very far alone, and I have a winch (with accessories). I have floor matts I could use as a traction mat.

 

[craig333]

I carry them all. It really depends on what your conditions are, mud, snow, rocks, sand and I've been on trips where I've experienced all that on a single trip.

 

[rayra]

I suppose so much depends on the situation.

If I am hung up in rocks I can't dig. Where I live the soil is hard and too many roots to do much digging with a shovel. if I am in the desert I might have nothing to use as an anchor. I carry a shovel, a strap, a hi lift, I never go very far alone, and I have a winch (with accessories). I have floor matts I could use as a traction mat.

shovel still helps in that situation. Helps you dig up some other rocks to jam under your tires long enough to get off a high center situation.

forgot to mention the e-tool that's always in my trucks. Too. And a hatchet. Poor man's Pioneer Tools.

 

[KenC]

OverlandTrade:

Review the following article as a recovery guide: Winching without the Worry

Helped me.

 

[MOguy]

shovel still helps in that situation. Helps you dig up some other rocks to jam under your tires long enough to get off a high center situation.

forgot to mention the e-tool that's always in my trucks. Too. And a hatchet. Poor man's Pioneer Tools.

I just pick up rocks and stack them if needed. I suppose there could be times you have to dig them up.

 

[Metcalf]

Sometimes you needs a shovel(s) and a winch(es)