Stump pulling on a Sunday afternoon...

[icman95]

Well, I finally got to do the proverbial stump pulling today. A storm took down a neighbor's tree last week. A buddy and I cut it up and took it away today, but what to do with the stump that broke off at the roots? Still in the ground a bit, so my buddy used his mid '80s Chevy gasser to break it free from the hole (mine was hooked up to a trailer filled with wood, so we were trying to avoid unhooking it). Took some doing, but not too bad. He didn't want to use it to tow the stump up to the street, though, so I unhooked from my trailer and had at it. The Cummins torque machine and 4wd low made it effortless. Didn't even need to give it much fuel. Just gave it some clutch and that was it. Pulled the thing up his driveway and onto the street. We had planned to push it down the embankment and into the woods, but even with some leverage we couldn't do it by hand. Went the 1/2 mile home, got my Jeep with snow plow on it and bulldozed the thing with the plow over the embankment. The Jeep did as good a job bulldozing as my Dodge did pulling. What great fun!!! Loaded up the truck with more wood, hooked the trailer and took it to my buddy's house. Truck hauled it all without a stumble. Long live the Cummins Turbo Diesel!!

 

[MRaynor]

Cool

 

[JayStraight]

Where's the picture of the Jeep with the snowplow?!?!?!?!:-laf

 

[icman95]

Thought of it too late after the deed was done. I feel as if I let the Jeep down by not taking a pic of it working hard for me just like the truck. I'll have to make it up to it somehow... .

 

[icman95]

There! I've redeemed myself in the eyes of my beloved Jeep! Although it's not an action shot, there she is. 1992 Cherokee with 205K on it and I'm the 3rd owner. Been plowing with it for 5 1/2 years now, but it's time to retire her due to rust. She makes a great bulldozer, though.

 

[Skydiver]

That is sweet iceman. Nice looking truck. Sounds like y'all may have just a tad of Redneck blood in your veins. Only thing missing is somebody riding on top of the stump. LOL

 

[icman95]

Thanks, and my wife couldn't agree with you more!

 

[HBarlow]

Your photos remind me of the enjoyable years I spent living in the small towns of Connecticut in the '60s and '70s. I always enjoyed driving the meandering black top roads through the countryside, the very old houses, rock fences, and the cemeteries dating back to the late 1700s.

Thanks for the memories. Very pleasant experiences.

 

[icman95]

Thanks for the kind words. You've just described pretty much my whole town. Our neighborhood has plenty of stone walls and a few old houses. Oldest one on the block is circa 1850 but most of the rest are 30 to 40 years old. We love driving the meandering roads, too.

 

[JayStraight]

There! I've redeemed myself in the eyes of my beloved Jeep! Although it's not an action shot, there she is. 1992 Cherokee with 205K on it and I'm the 3rd owner. Been plowing with it for 5 1/2 years now, but it's time to retire her due to rust. She makes a great bulldozer, though.

Wow! Small world..... I'm an XJ owner AND Dodge diesel owner too.

I've got a 1998 Cherokee myself.

 

[jgillott]

Wow! Small world..... I'm an XJ owner AND Dodge diesel owner too.

I've got a 1998 Cherokee myself.

We currently have 2 of them... . a 2000 and a 2001 both purchased new. Great simple old 4x4's. My favorite was a 1995 that we had before the '01.

 

[icman95]

I love my Jeep just about as much as my truck. It's the 2nd one I've had to use for plowing. My first one I bought quite a few years ago with the plow setup on it for $1900. It was an 89 and had been extremely abused, but I was able to patch it up and make it last for 2 years more as a snowplow. When it was time to put that one out of its misery, I found this red '92 and put the plow on that. Been using it to plow driveways ever since. It's never failed me and has probably done things that would make a Jeep commercial on TV jealous. I once even blew a brake line at around 2am while plowing. I thought I was done for the night, but on the way home, I realized that I could make do with just using the hand brake. There was no one on the road at that hour, so I finished my plowing route, then parked it and waited for the auto shop to open to fix it. It's served me well, but there's not much left of the underside due to rot, road salt, etc. I want to replace it with a Wrangler so I can use it as a convertible in the summer, but they're hard to find at a reasonable price. That's why I went with the Cherokees in the first place. If I can't find a Wrangler, I'm sure I can find another Cherokee. I'm sad to see this one go, but it doesn't owe me a penny.

 

[jgillott]

The 2000 we have was purchased by my sister new and it only has around 85K on it. The paint is bad, I don't think she washed it more than a half dozen times over the years, but the body is completely rust free. It's been sitting since she purchased a Commander last year. It needs a good cleaning and some attention to some of the wiring, but I plan on making it a utility vehicle to use around our farm. I had found a complete plow setup on Craigslist for sale a few month back that had come off of a Cherokee, but it literally sold before I could get there. I'm sure I'll come up with something for it.



The '01 has about 115K on it and is in really nice shape for a Cherokee. I gave it to my parents to use as a second vehicle a few years ago and it is serving them well. I need to take care of some rust starting on the drivers side door, but other than that, it has been great. With the amount of miles they drive in a year, it will probably last them the rest of their days driving.

 

[PToombs]

Good sized stump! I wonder what people driving past thought of that? I have a 96 Grand Cherokee for the wife, it's leaving soon. Too many problems, rust being one of the main ones. Been a good vehicle. I've never seen a plow on one before, that would have been nice. I don't think the wife would be too impressed with plowing the driveway though! :-laf

 

[icman95]

Actually my street isn't too busy, so I figured we wouldn't run into too many cars while hog tying the stump. Sure enough, just as soon as we got it to the spot where I took the pic and then unhooked it from the truck, a car came down the street only to see a 4 foot high tree stump with dirt, rocks, and some roots left lying in the road. we had to wave it around the stump, but the driver didn't stop to say anything. If it had been me, I probably would have been fairly speechless. After all, that was just about the last thing I would have expected to see in the middle of the road. The other two guys I was working with stood guard while I ran home to get the Jeepdozer. I'm not sure if any other cars came by, but they didn't mention anything to me when I got back. It took a few minutes to, umm-finesse-the thing into the ditch with the Jeep. No cars came by while we were doing that. Got lucky, I guess.



The Jeep makes a great driveway plow vehicle. It's obviously too small to do parking lots, etc. but that's what makes it so great for driveways. It fits into small places where my truck could never go. It turns much tighter than my truck and pound for pound does as much work as any other vehicle could. It's much quieter, too. When I pull into someone's driveway in the middle of the night to plow it, it's nice not to have to worry about waking them with the diesel motor. I actually had two different plow customers that I got just because my Jeep was the only plow vehicle that would fit into their driveways. All the other plow guys they contacted said their pickup mounted plows wouldn't fit. One was a driveway that was only 7 feet wide with two houses on either side. The plow blade is 6 1/2 feet, so I just made it. Tell your wife that she could clear the driveway whenever she wanted, in complete comfort and warmth, without having to wait for anyone else to do it. I'm sure she'd jump at the chance!

 

[d6c]

I do not want to sound like a cry-baby, but I question whose property this little morsel was dumped on? Probably harmless but somebody may not appreciate.

 

[icman95]

Not cry baby at all. Dumped on the homeowner's property. It was his stump and his idea to put it where we put it. Still on his property, but in an out of the way spot. I would have never put it on someone else's land. Good point you bring up,though.

 

[JGaspar]

I drove by the house the other day and I can still see your tire marks on their lawn where you pulled their stump out. I will have to look for the stump in the ditch. I guess you hid it pretty well! OTH, I see that it's on his property so I will just wave on my way by.

 

[icman95]

About 30-40 feet to the left of the driveway. Just look over the edge of the road. Can't miss it.