riderdan
Member
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- 18
- Location
- Central Kansas
Well, I'll bore you with all the details below, but I made it MOST of the way home from Tennessee to Kansas in my new-to-me M998.
I spent last week looking to beg, borrow, or rent a truck and trailer. It's a personal thing, but I wasn't willing to lie to UHaul. Partly because I figure if the humvee wound up in the road and someone got hurt, they'd have me over a barrel. In any case, I rented a car, drove to Tennessee and picked it up.
The seller was as surprised as you all that I was driving it, and threw in a spare tire. Which was cool, but not what went wrong
Here's the photo I sent my wife to prove I was spending that time and money picking up a humvee not vacationing with my mistress.
I checked everything pretty carefully, we aired up the tires fully, adjusted the mirrors and all that minor stuff. Fluids were OK, brakes and steering good, everything copacetic when I set out from Tennessee at 5:00pm. Put a hazard triangle on the back, turned on the hazards, and set out for home. It was a little odd being both convoy leader and tail-end charlie at the same time, but off I went, 55mph down I-40.
I made it to Illinois and stopped at a hotel. Next morning I checked everything again and set out. The one problem was that my phone's battery died, but I knew my way back (I-70 to I-35, to KS 60) and I'd been doing OK, so I bought one of those battery recharging packs at a truck stop and trundled off.
After 12 hours of driving, I made it to KC. I was a little nervous, because the rain was pouring down. And a lot of things about humvees in the rain came back to me: like how we used to put rolled-up towels along the bottom of the windshield to catch drips, how you have to drive with your nose pressed to the wheel to see out the 10" hole the defroster clears, and how wide this thing is. It was a lot worse on narrow German and Italian back roads (the Arabs have their roads done by someone else, and the paved ones are all nice and wide) but heck this thing is WIDE.
I stopped for fuel and noticed that the steering was a little stiff in the parking lot. I checked the level and it looked OK, got a tankful and headed out. Now, having experience the joys of driving one of these before, I was checking the gauges frequently. After about 5 minutes on the freeway the temp started to go over 220. I backed off the speed to 50, but it was still climbing. When it had almost hit 240, I pulled off and stopped.
As soon as I stopped, I could hear the overflow tank gurgling and knew it was overheated. I popped the hood and along about then the overflow vented some coolant, so I knew it was seriously too hot. That's when I saw that the serpentine belts had let go.
I didn't think I cooked anything, because I stopped immediately and lost hardly any fluid. But at this point I realized that my phone had died again. Thankfully a couple sheriff's deputies stopped and called a tow truck. So I got towed the last 60 miles. I ALMOST made it, but not quite.
New belts are on the way, and I'm searching the forum for posts on the easiest method replacing them. I might need a set of new tires on the rear (they're a little sketchy) and interior insulation, but I have the truck!
Anyway, below this post you can all reply with "I told you so!"
I spent last week looking to beg, borrow, or rent a truck and trailer. It's a personal thing, but I wasn't willing to lie to UHaul. Partly because I figure if the humvee wound up in the road and someone got hurt, they'd have me over a barrel. In any case, I rented a car, drove to Tennessee and picked it up.
The seller was as surprised as you all that I was driving it, and threw in a spare tire. Which was cool, but not what went wrong
Here's the photo I sent my wife to prove I was spending that time and money picking up a humvee not vacationing with my mistress.
I checked everything pretty carefully, we aired up the tires fully, adjusted the mirrors and all that minor stuff. Fluids were OK, brakes and steering good, everything copacetic when I set out from Tennessee at 5:00pm. Put a hazard triangle on the back, turned on the hazards, and set out for home. It was a little odd being both convoy leader and tail-end charlie at the same time, but off I went, 55mph down I-40.
I made it to Illinois and stopped at a hotel. Next morning I checked everything again and set out. The one problem was that my phone's battery died, but I knew my way back (I-70 to I-35, to KS 60) and I'd been doing OK, so I bought one of those battery recharging packs at a truck stop and trundled off.
After 12 hours of driving, I made it to KC. I was a little nervous, because the rain was pouring down. And a lot of things about humvees in the rain came back to me: like how we used to put rolled-up towels along the bottom of the windshield to catch drips, how you have to drive with your nose pressed to the wheel to see out the 10" hole the defroster clears, and how wide this thing is. It was a lot worse on narrow German and Italian back roads (the Arabs have their roads done by someone else, and the paved ones are all nice and wide) but heck this thing is WIDE.
I stopped for fuel and noticed that the steering was a little stiff in the parking lot. I checked the level and it looked OK, got a tankful and headed out. Now, having experience the joys of driving one of these before, I was checking the gauges frequently. After about 5 minutes on the freeway the temp started to go over 220. I backed off the speed to 50, but it was still climbing. When it had almost hit 240, I pulled off and stopped.
As soon as I stopped, I could hear the overflow tank gurgling and knew it was overheated. I popped the hood and along about then the overflow vented some coolant, so I knew it was seriously too hot. That's when I saw that the serpentine belts had let go.
I didn't think I cooked anything, because I stopped immediately and lost hardly any fluid. But at this point I realized that my phone had died again. Thankfully a couple sheriff's deputies stopped and called a tow truck. So I got towed the last 60 miles. I ALMOST made it, but not quite.
New belts are on the way, and I'm searching the forum for posts on the easiest method replacing them. I might need a set of new tires on the rear (they're a little sketchy) and interior insulation, but I have the truck!
Anyway, below this post you can all reply with "I told you so!"
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