What happens when you meet a large tractor etc. when towing?

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Patchworkpony

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What do you do if you are towing a horse trailer on a narrow lane and suddenly coming towards you is a huge tractor, itself towing a trailer or muck spreader? Do you panic, try to back perhaps half a mile or, do you hope the tractor driver will back up? Or do you have stalemate where for whatever reason neither of you can or will back up? It is certainly a problem where we live and I can't imagine what happens if you have huge lorry.
 
Patchworkpony said:
What do you do if you are towing a horse trailer on a narrow lane and suddenly coming towards you is a huge tractor, itself towing a trailer or muck spreader? Do you panic, try to back perhaps half a mile or, do you hope the tractor driver will back up? Or do you have stalemate where for whatever reason neither of you can or will back up? It is certainly a problem where we live and I can't imagine what happens if you have huge lorry.
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A huge lorry not so bad its one vehicle.

Depending on the circumstances and road. Most tractor drivers can back up a long trailer with ease. They have not got living animal in, but as said depends on the layout / passing places

our hay delivery backed out our yard - dog leg to the left up the drive dog leg to right then backed out left before driving forward he reversed as quick as i walked.


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yes tractor drivers are generally pretty handy with backing up, I live on a narrow lane & if I meet any agricultural vehicles they are always fine the same cannot be said of the mothers picking up the kids from the school tho, they normally stop dead and refuse to move !
 
If I'm driving along a narrow road I make a mental note of wider bits, passing spaces, gateways etc. so I know how far I've got to reverse if something comes the other way. A car with power steering and a tiddly horse trailer is much easier to reverse than a lot of farm machinery.

The other day I had to reverse a 54ft lorry and trailer down 3 residential roads lined with parked cars. The reversing was the easy bit, the hard part was convincing cars coming the other way that they really were capable of parallel parking so I could get past them!
 
Whatever we meet, we reverse. Even cars not towing. Especially posh cars, Mercedes, BMW, Lexus with young flashy male drivers. Pub was chaos with parking all over the road (our only way out from home) and cars wouldn't reverse back 3 cars lengths so we just reversed half a mile back to the pub. Twice. Am lucky as I usually have my daughter to walk behind and stop anything coming up behind when I do reverse, third time of going forward I sent her ahead because we were late before we set off and I could see us shunting backwards and forwards for an hour otherwise! Some of the impatient car drivers do realise after half a mile it might have been quicker for themselves to reverse 3 car lengths, but I do it as a point of inconvenience to them, it somewhat amuses me, esp as they know I can reverse quickly and efficiently far better over half a mile than they can over 3 car lengths.. (I am quite a speedy and accurate reverser when towing). Downside is daughter gets embarrassed when I wind my window down and ask brightly if they'd like reversing lessons (or similar)
 
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The first time I drove my lorry alone I had a reversing nightmare .
I was about half a mile from home and reached the ' hazard ' the road narrows becomes very bendy and goes up and down lots of small banks I was into the narrow part when I met a huge tractor towing two huge trailers stacked with round bales it was quite clear that I in my lorry was driving the more reservable vehicle so gulping I stuck it in reverse and put on the camera .
There was a car behind me so I slowly reserved he blew his horn I reversed a few feet more he kept his hand on the horn I was sweating by this time and not sure what to do .
Bearing in mind my teacher had told just to sit and let car get on with it if they expect you to say go onto a verge when you don't want to do I just stopped and kept it in gear so the reversing lights where on .
This stand off went on the tractor driver drove right up almost to my bumper ( I don't think he heard the horn until this point .
Now cars where building up behind me on to a awful junction and blind bend I thought my head was going to explode .
Eventually the cars behind the K*** h*** got the message and sorted them selves outreversing back and going round the other way which left kh the tractor and me and the car behind kh the driver of the second car reversed back and got out of his car and started walking down the road by this time I was feeling tearfull ,I thought he was going to come and shout at me but he went and opened the door of the car behind and started to have an argument with the kh who he evicted from his car
And reversed it out of the way .
I then negiolated the reserving first time yeh and got home in one piece , I was exhausted .
 
When driving a trailer and coming across a car that won't reverse, in my younger days I've been known to get out of my vehicle, walk over to the (usually male) driver of the other vehicle and ask sweetly if they'd like me to reverse it for them. There's something about a barely twenties girlie asking a fifty yo bloke if he'd like her to reverse his vehicle that really winds them up - and gets them backing up fast. On the other hand I have had people only too keen to get out of the car and let me reverse it to a safe place for them. Christ knows how they passed their driving test.

Where I am now is single track roads for several miles, normally whoever's got the smallest vehicle reverses unless the other one has just passed a passing place.
 
One or other of us dives into a handy field.Had to do it the other day towing the 'box(empty luckily) when a mahoosive truck came down the other way with his mirrors buried in the hedges.......
 
When I got my horse trailer (when I was young and showing in hand) my dad wouldn't let me out of the yard till I could reverse back down the yard, straight, around the side of both the left and right buildings and between both shippons without a lot of shuffling, his principle was if you want to drive and or tow you need to be able to reverse competently! I learnt to reverse the car by practising reversing down our lane negotiating corners etc on the way home. Today personally there are way to many people who can't reverse any vehicle.
I work on the priciple the easiest vehicle reverses, or the one that is closest to the obvious passing place.
 
Morag4 said:
I work on the priciple the easiest vehicle reverses, or the one that is closest to the obvious passing place.
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^^^ This. I grew up in rural Devon. Car learner drivers there get plenty of practice in sizing up passing places in all the single track lanes, and in reversing swiftly and safely if required (especially if the oncoming car is driven a bemused tourist!). Great training.

I can reverse the trailer pretty well too.
 
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