Road hazard in the form of 18 wheeler tire carcas

[D_B Travelers]

We are planning a trip for 2015 from Ft. Worth to Yellowstone, then southern Oregon for a 6 day stay then home via California, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico and home. Figuring 25 days +\- now that we shortened the days to avoid night running. Also adding some driving lights just in case it becomes necessary. I don't pull so slow that we hold up traffic, but we aren't speeding either. I try to be aware that I have 8,000 following me and never make quick moves

[wmtire]

Some other forums where drivers share their road gator damages (including oil & transmission pans):

Hit a freaking tire alligator on the freeway today doing 75 mph - Camaro5 Chevy Camaro Forum / Camaro ZL1, SS and V6 Forums - Camaro5.com

Transmission oil pan? - JeepForum.com

The OP stated that dodging the road gator wasn't an option in this particular circumstance due to the objects on both sides of the exit ramp blocking him......so he had to make a split second decision to either straddle it or go over it with his tires.

I'm not sure there is ever going to be a hard and fast rule on which way to try to avoid the most damage from a road gator....if you do have to hit it. It's all going to depend on the size and position of the gator...as well as the clearance on the vehicle and/or RV you may be pulling/driving.

It's probably going to be a danged if you do, danged if you don't deal.

I have a tire story to tell myself (imagine that). I was pulling a trailer load of tires on I-20 in Shreveport one time, on that horrible stretch of holes held together with patches of concrete that Weezer refers to in many of her posts. I hit a dip/hole/canyon in the road so hard that the trailers spare tire/rim that I was carrying in the bed of my truck actually bounced up over the tailgate and landed between my rear bumper and the trailer........ where I promptly ran over it with the trailer and it wedged/impaled itself under the angle iron at the rear of the trailer. You talk about sparks and burnt rubber by the time I finally got stopped from it skidding on the road. I was thinking I had broke an axle or something. Didn't even realize what had happened till I got stopped and saw it.

I thank my lucky stars that it stayed under the trailer, and a vehicle behind me didn't hit it....possibly causing a wreck/death.

First thing I did after finally getting the tire/rim out from under the trailer (it was hard), was find a Wal-mart and buy some new underwear. I didn't soil them, but this particular pair was shredded from all the muscle clenching. I was sore for days.

[dean178]

all I can do is share what happen to us, we had just got 36' TT and we had just got off I35 onto some other freeway down by the Twin Cities I was following a big truck in lots of traffic and he must have straddled the gator and then all I know it was there right in front of me at 50 mph and no place to go but to just go right over the top of it pulling 8,000 lbs and then it set the trailer brakes full lock and no place to go and when I did get it pulled over the brake-away pin was gone baby gone, I had to cut one of the wires to get the trailer brakes to release & at the time my wife was calling our dealer up in Duluth, MN. so they could find us a near by dealer so we could get the parts we needed so we could continue on.

The trailer brakes were not the same after that (I was on #13 on the in cab adjuster)I took it in and had then adjusted but still not the same, so I took one of the wheels off to see for myself and I found that the brakes are self adjusting. I called the factory that made them and they said that they might have got to stressed and that I should try to adjust them by hand and I did but when I got to the last wheel the self adjuster was gone. I pulled that wheel & drum off to find out that the self adjusting part of the trailer brake had come apart. lucky me it only made a small mark on the inside of the drum. I got rid of all the self adjusting brakes and got the old trusty adjust it yourself kind & repacked the wheel bearings.

When it comes to hitting these gators there is no this is a better way, it's maybe a 50/50 stuff is going to get broken or it isn't but you just won't know till it's over. Oh and it happen to me in the daytime, so no when we head down to FL. in a few weeks no way do I want to be driving at night. Dean.

[D_B Travelers]

Dean, sorry you also have had a tangle with road gators. Of course driving around or slowing way down is the best thing you can do; but those options may not be on the list for you to choose at night or following a large profile vehicle. Quick swerving didn't seem a option for me with construction barricades close on both sides of the exit ramp either. Damaging the brakes wasn't one of the things that came to me before I hit the road gator, but damaging the torsion axles was. Lots of warnings in the axle book about the hollow tube being bent, and with the fully lined underbelly on TT and 5ers today, I didn't want the gator to tear out that part either. Also in that split second of decision I thought I might be able to knock the gator off the road with the TV before it would hit the TT.