Hijack during off roading! need help

[zero4]

Hi,everyone

My mate and I went to Thompson track Tauranga side on 02/01/2011.

We came from the Te Aroha side then passed 2/3 track lots bogs rocks and stuck around the 40 mins walk to carpark sign.

I have a LC70 with winch and my mate have a 120 prado without too much mods,so most time I do pull him out from most bogs.

We have stuck there about 1 night then we ask for help because my winch cable broken off.


Two of local club guys came with 2 buggies for help and they ask $400 for rescue each truck,we agreed that,but the first attempt
was failed.

Then they said the recovery would cost around $1k and more each truck,we agreed that and bring some 10000kg straps and winch rope on 6th.



Finally our trucks got recovery on 7th and they ask $8000 for recovery!!!



I lived in Auckland and pull out lots trucks from Muriwai beach and I have never ask one buck for it.


What do you think about my story?





Below is where I got stuck and we have got out theses bogs on 6th:

[zero4]

Here is the email from the local 4x4 club leader:

Hi James & Jay,

Let's start with 7 guys @ say $50 per hour for 10 1/2 hours. Everyone who helped on the day, closed their business's for the day to do the recovery.

We needed 4 trucks to pull your heavy vehicles all the way out to the end of the track. Should there be a hourly charge for the vehicles fuel & wear & tear, not counting damage?

On the way we broke 8 straps due to the weight of your trucks & the depth of the bogs that we had to go through on the way back to the car park.

Pulling the 70 through I got stuck in a bog with the mud & water over my bonnet & that killer my starter motor. Also as you know I broke my plasma rope & fried my alternator on the first attempt to recover you.

We broke a steel PTO winch cable on the FJ40 which did a lot of the winching through the triple purchase pulley blocks.

The third truck killed his clutch helping to tow the Prado out.

The last trucks winch was killed whilst pulling your trucks out of a bog. We needed all three winches attached to get it out.

Labour $3675
Straps $720
Starter $450 not including labour to fit
Alternator $450 I fitted this myself
Plasma $400?
Cable $300?
Clutch $600 not including labour to fit
Winch $800? is the cheapest you can buy. This truck also did a couple of fan belts & an idler pulley but he said that was his expense, as they could be sourced 2nd hand.
Fuel etc $400 this includes the vehicles to tow the bush trucks

Total almost $8000....


In total I have spent about four days trying to, fixing, checking & finally recovering your vehicles.

Lets consider your alternative? Fact: we know of a patrol recovered backwards (on his way up to long bog) from the bog closest to the car park (the very steep one) which was charged $8500+GST for a digger to walk in (say 5-600m) & extract him back up that small climb. What would it cost to go all the way to long bog & pull your trucks all the way out from there. Perhaps $20k+ easily..

I tried my hardest to first of all do it myself, with the help of one other. I totally over estimated the magnitude of your predicament & had to call in some experts to help out.

I have also tried my hardest to keep you informed of how hard this would be & that it will be a reasonable expense for your mistake & suggested that you contact your insurance companies to help you with this expense.

We are not holding you to a ransom to get your vehicles back, but feel it only fair that you remunerate us for the extremely hard work that we have done to recover your vehicles safely off Thompsons Track.

I took this job on in good faith that there would be no issue with payment once the job had been completed, I only hope that this is still the case.

We were totally amazed to find the vehicle still intact & not vandalized or stripped the day we walked up, if we had not helped would this be the case??

I would like to hear what you think, but please do not try to negotiate with us as that would be an insult to the huge efforts we have put in to recover your vehicles.

[Sadam_Husain]

dunno mate maybe it would have been smarter to go out and get a new winch cable and continue self recovering yourself?


general rule of thumb as a "minimun" you reimburse for breakages involved in extracting your trucks?

[Ralfie]

general rule of thumb as a "minimun" you reimburse for breakages involved in extracting your trucks?

Under normal circumstances I would agree with you.
BUT this time round they entered into a contract to recover for $400 and failed.
They renegotiated, with better knowledge of situation at $1,000 each. That was a contract for a fixed price and a commercial arrangement, not volunteering to assist a mate.
Only the agreed fee of $1,000 per vehicle (total $2,000) is payable.

[monstr]

dunno mate maybe it would have been smarter to go out and get a new winch cable and continue self recovering yourself?


general rule of thumb as a "minimun" you reimburse for breakages involved in extracting your trucks?

Agreed" but if you read the other thread on this and see what they broke then they either had pooly maintained gear ,were doing it wrong or were a bunch of cowboys or all of the above.I know that track very well and know where they were stuck ,have recovered many trucks from the same spot and been recovered myself and if you have a couple of well set up trucks with GOOD GEAR who know what they are doing there is no reason what so ever to break the gear they did...

[Jerry]

the other thread is here http://www.offroadexpress.co.nz/Forums/ ... 87&start=0