ise wrote:I probably shouldn't have left my car outside the chalet without moving it for a month :D It's been buried in snow 5 or 10 times and it's melted back to reveal the car.
By this morning the plan for digging it out, i.e. wait until enough melts then drive, looked fairly good. Initially it seemed quite good, the engine roared into life on the first go with no obvious sign it had been stood there so long. Then I tried to reverse out and promptly stalled as the car wouldn't move.
Turns out the tyres had frozen into ruts on the track and the car wouldn't move. First I tried to clear some of the snow and ice from around the wheels but that didn't seem to work. Next, I decided to chuck hot water at the wheels, it might re-freeze but not so solid. That seemed to work quite well, at least the tyres reappeared out of the snow but still no joy actually moving.
Finally, I hit on the idea of jacking each wheel up in turn to break them free, that worked a treat, the jack has a huge mechanical advantage so it can lift the wheel just fine. Obviously it's not a great idea to leave a normal car so long in those temperatures but if you do, jacking the wheels works a treat :D
BTW, In case anyone doesn't know, the one thing you should never, ever do is leave the hand-brake on as it can freeze on.
that is a really great idea!! I wish I would have thought about that when the Midwest of the US got hammered by 3 feet of snow
