Fording

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DRM

Guru
Location
West Yorks
icowden said:
What really boggles is the occasional driver who watches a car go through, get stuck, break down, get towed etc but then goes...

"I'll have a go at that. What could go wrong?"

Also the people who can't apparently see the stick saying the water is 3 feet deep.

Be interesting to see some electric cars go through. In theory they shouldn't have a problem.

UPDATE:


View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cGjQR3C_ODk


No problem other than losing the licence plate.
Click to expand...

In theory will be ok, in reality if you get water inside the the traction motor it may not be apparent until later, damage to the sensor bearing will mean it’s going to drive slowly and the car will drive like every nut and bolt and gear has gone into self destruct mode, it will be an expensive mistake
 
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ebikeerwidnes

Guru
Location
Z’ha’dum
OK - time for an admission

Many many years ago I was living in Bangor, North Wales and I needed to get to work in Sunderland
As per company policy I had a hire car delivered
I took the opportunity to take my daughter - who was probably only about 12 months old - to nursery that day as I didn;t need to leave until later than normal
I got her to nursery and discovered the little minx had managed to get rid of her shoes AND SOCKS before I put her in the car and I hadn;t noticed
So I shot back home and took them in
Then I had a dilema - I had taken extra time to take her to nursey - plus even more time to go back and take the socks and shoes back
And the fastest way to get to the main road was through the ford - FAR quicker than the normal roads
but it had rained a lot recently so I would normally avoid the ford

I decided to risk it - at least as far as going to look at the ford and make judgement

when I got there I decided - possibly partly due to it being a hire car and not mine - that it looked marginal but OK
so I went for it

dead slow - lots of revs - slipping the clutch all the way through

way scared ***less in the middle when I actually got a bow wave OVER the bonnet

but I made it through

probably only just - but all was OK


got to Sunderland on time

very exciting - probably stupid
 
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Profpointy

Legendary Member
There used to be a ford a few miles south of Aberystwyth which cut the corner off (very very slightly) part of my route down to south wales. Naturally I went through the ford despite it saving essentially no time, unless you hooned along and managed to pass someone slower going the sensible way. Anyhow, I'd pushed my luck a bit on one occasion and I could feel the back wheels crabbing downstream in the current and the car almost floating - the engine started to missfire and I only just got it out by reving hard and slipping the clutch to keep it running on one cylinder. It conked out the other side, but at least I got through and no harm done once it dried out.

On another occasion I reckoned it too wet but saw someone turn down the "short cut" so assuming he was a knowledgable local went to follow. He conked out mid ford. Feeling slightly responsible as he'd likely judged me following as indicating it was OK I went round the long way to tow him out. He was pretty useless as he didn't initially want to step into the water to tie my rope one. Hey, I'll give you a tow but you're the one stuck so you can get your feet wet. His equally dozy wife was shouting "the water's coming in" which wasn't helping and there wasn't anything to be done about it.

Some while later I needed to remove the gearbox (unrelated reason, maybe new clutch) and when I drained the oil it was mostly full of water. I surmised that each time I'd done the ford it had sucked in some water which had displaced the oil, eventually leaving mostly water. It had seemingly been like this for some time as I'd not done the ford for months. Gearbox was fine
 
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DRM

Guru
Location
West Yorks
Profpointy said:
There used to be a ford a few miles south of Aberystwyth which cut the corner off (very very slightly) part of my route down to south wales. Naturally I went through the ford despite it saving essentially no time, unless you hooned along and managed to pass someone slower going the sensible way. Anyhow, I'd pushed my luck a bit on one occasion and I could feel the back wheels crabbing downstream in the current and the car almost floating - the engine started to missfire and I only just got it out by reving hard and slipping the clutch to keep it running on one cylinder. It conked out the other side, but at least I got through and no harm done once it dried out.

On another occasion I reckoned it too wet but saw someone turn down the "short cut" so assuming he was a knowledgable local went to follow. He conked out mid ford. Feeling slightly responsible as he'd likely judged me following as indicating it was OK I went round the long way to tow him out. He was pretty useless as he didn't initially want to step into the water to tie my rope one. Hey, I'll give you a tow but you're the one stuck so you can get your feet wet. His equally dozy wife was shouting "the water's coming in" which wasn't helping and there wasn't anything to be done about it.

Some while later I needed to remove the gearbox (unrelated reason, maybe new clutch) and when I drained the oil it was mostly full of water. I surmised that each time I'd done the ford it had sucked in some water which had displaced the oil, eventually leaving mostly water. It had seemingly been like this for some time as I'd not done the ford for months. Gearbox was fine
Click to expand...
That’s exactly what happens, hot gearbox meets cold water means it will suck water in through the breather, my old Disco had a snorkel fitted, and the breathers had pipes running up to the snorkel, the wading plugs were left in, it would have made short work of the Ford up thread that has the audience, but the things that most people don’t consider is what’s under the water, how deep is it and what about current, if any, they just plough through regardless
 
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Profpointy

Legendary Member
DRM said:
That’s exactly what happens, hot gearbox meets cold water means it will suck water in through the breather, my old Disco had a snorkel fitted, and the breathers had pipes running up to the snorkel, the wading plugs were left in, it would have made short work of the Ford up thread that has the audience, but the things that most people don’t consider is what’s under the water, how deep is it and what about current, if any, they just plough through regardless
Click to expand...

My ex-Mrs' landy had extended breather pipes which vented from the various diffs and gearboxes and were routed to higher up points on the chassis to avoid this very problem. On a car they just have a vent in the gearbox or diff itself. However on the Landy the pipes had got blocked, till I fettled it, and seemingly caused the rear diff seal to blow and a previous owner had then run it with little oil in so it very noisy. It still ran for years and I think the diff was still OK when she got rid of it.
 
Cycleops

Cycleops

Legendary Member
Location
Accra, Ghana
……..and heres a bit from it:

Ben Gregory, 19, of Melton Mowbray, Leicestershire, said he often spends up to 13 hours filming at the ford for his YouTube channel, which has racked up about 40 million views in the past year.
"I've seen cars floating in here before. Vans floating. You just think: 'Why? Why would you do it?" he said.

He‘s got a point, why?
 
cougie uk

cougie uk

Guru
Because people are idiots ?
 
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Deleted member 26715

Guest
There's one video where somebody hasn't crossed the Ford but has driven down to the right which is the river itself,
 
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