SW PA/Pittsburgh and wherever camping, wheeling and beer trips

have yet to buy a set, but they have been on my Amazon list for 2 years. i carry a shovel. as well as ratchet straps. aggressive tires and turning off traction control in mud usually does the trick in slippery stuff. you can also ratchet strap something to your truck tire to get traction if need be. id put $150 toward a winch before i bought the traction boards, but that's me.

i do have a winch, but loathe using it. and have yet to need it to get out of a wheeling situation. best way to recover a stuck vehicle is to avoid the situation all together. chances are if you need them its not a normal situation and chances are as loco said youll have a buddy with you.

personally i think a lot of people get caught up in the "bling" associated with wheeling. if you carry something for a year and have yet to use it there is probably no reason to keep carrying it. make room for something more useful. all these rigs that are setup for overlanding and have all this gear are specific rides setup for only doing that. not daily drivers that wheel on the weekend. As its been stated before the tacoma is very capable in stock form with a decent set of off road shoes.

 

I have a set of Tredz Pros. Snatch and tow straps are on my list to buy ASAP.

 

I'd truly say one of the most useful off road tools is a CB. When I was in trouble, or had a friend in trouble, the CB was always the tool which pulled through. Whenever deep in the woods, there are slim chances cell service. GMRS is nice, but still not as common. I have a semi-permanent CB setup in my rig, and also carry GMRS for secondary if I ever were in groups that didn't have CB. My one time ride with this group was without coms, even though some trucks had CB and GMRS setups. There were two specific times that would have benefited all of us using communication radios because of course the cell service was horrible. So with that said, and wheeling all over the country from Oregon to Massachusetts, including the difficult places like Moab and canyons of Colorado like Left Hand Canyon, and also the easy places like the dirt roads of New England and Western Pennsylvania, I would say have a functional radio in your truck, and preferably a CB. From a car crash on the highway to being stranded in the woods, chances of getting any help or know-how on how to get out of the situation are a lot higher with a CB.

 

I have a uv5r now that I was considering getting an external vehicle antenna for. Also been thinking of getting my ham license and buying an actual mobile ham radio.

I like those because you can also input frs and gmrs frequencies and use it with others that have those types of radios. Not completely legal without license but not like id be interfering on ham stations anyways.

I have a handheld CB in my truck but never really tried it out. Its an old cobra.

But maybe getting a mobile CB would be a good route too like you were saying @Loco_Driver

 

Anyone down down for an evening ride soon? I still have lots of gas I need to burn...

 

this has been talked about before on here. in a group you can only use what the the others dont have. most people wheeling will always have a CB. if you have something better great, but if one guy only has a CB your only going to be using a CB.

i agree its probably the most useful tool period. spotting from behind is very helpful as well as being able to communicate efficiently.

i personally change my antenna out to a 7' firestik or my 102" whip when travelling alone for the extra reach just in case and nothing beats a 102" whip. not to mention they look bad ass

 

Where I like to go It’s the same as boating where it will take days for someone to find you. So with that said I tell a buddy my plan of return and have my CB ready. That way I’d I do get stuck a friend can notify authorities or help rescue me. One time my friend was in so much trouble he went missing. I went out on a search and rescue mission in the New Mexico desert once he went out of contact for 12 hours, going where helicopters frequently travel to recover naive people with hypothermia, and I was able to communicate with my friend from a good distance. He directed me so could easily track him down to rescue him. His truck was about to fall off a cliff without a chance of recovery unless there was a winch with a capable person.

This is an extreme example. A small example is when we left one guy behind in the group a few months ago and there wasn’t a way to let him know or the group know to hold up.

It’s also useful when the truckers tell you the path of least resistance during traffic.

 

What kind of range do you get in western pa with a CB? Especially in the mtns.

 

It all depends. Most radios are all dependent on the setup. CB’s will typically get 5 miles easy with a good setup. But as platinum said, you can put an 8’ cb antenna on if you really want distance. I rock a 4K’ myself and only need a couple miles for traffic jams and off roading. When I try hard I can do 12 miles. If you’re looking to talk to the space station, then you go HAM.

GMRS and CB typically only go line of sight. So if there are a lot of buildings or trees, the radio waves get interrupted and you get less distance.

 

Well I guess that is just bad timing on my part. Haha. I hope I’ll be able to get rid of them.

 

Are you all scared of the snow or something? Where is all the wheeling at?

 

Gotta concentrate on the diet today. Tent and bedrack need to come off.

 

I know how bout it. Fisher/bobcat trapping season is in so that will be my wheeling every morning for a few weeks.

 

That sounds fun. I prefer chasing the deer with the smokepole though.

 

I hit up Linn Run state park this morning for a hike. There ended up being lots of multiuse trails where I was cruising with snow machines. No snow machine needed for me. Heat and comfy seats is how I cruised.

 

ohhhh boy...comical how you post this as im flying down 80. due to the weather coming tomorrow and nothing to do we decided to head north to pick up on my loop where we got a flat in the 4runner...
we also went to grices gun shop since it was kinda on the way...what a mess that place was...and every other gun store. anyway. up north they have WAY more snow than us. prob close to 18" tried picking up on the route on the last road we left off on and well...


i dont know if snow chains would have helped or not....


ended up having to turn around and come back down the loop. most of the forest roads only had sled traffic on them. im going to venture to say up north for wheeling is prob closed till spring ...

 

I can see the frame drag marks! That’ll make a long day!

 

Cool. You were up in my area. When you come back up, let me know.

 

roughly where are you located?

 

I’ve been at the hill.