Wheel Chokes

In many offroad situations, your vehicle needs to be stabilized.  Vehicle repairs, winching, even just parking on a hill and hoping your 4x4 doesn't pop out of gear because it's a ..long.. way down.  Most of us who are conscious of this do the typical search for a moderate sized rock or log to jam under the wheel and call it a parking break.  I can tell you from experience that the rock or log option is not always a good choice.  Not to mention there is not always a easy to find one.  In the garage I have several really good industrial sized wheel chokes made of heavy rubber.  I wouldn't even think about working on or under a vehicle without one or more of these under the wheels locking the vehicle into place.  On the trail though, these wheel choke would not be the the best choice to carry onboard mainly due to their size and weight, which is considerable.  In my Jeep, I have to pack light.  I already carry an array of tools and spare parts that add considerable laden weight to the Jeep.  If I was going to carry any extra equipment, it's going to have to be lightweight.  These well engineered wheel chokes are made of aluminum so they are definitely lightweight yet they are rated at 7,000 lbs per pair.

When I came across these wheel chokes (or wheel chocks as many people refer to them as), I remembered very vividly the recent incident where I broke my rear universal joint on a long tall hill on the way home from work one evening.  When the u-joint let go with a bang while moving up in traffic on this hill, I quickly realized my rear drum brakes needed adjustment as the emergency brake was totally ineffective.  I couldn't drop it into 4 wheel drive because the front Warn hubs were not engaged.  Lucky me.  My only option was to stand on the manual brakes with both feet as I called a friend to come lock my hubs in.  If I had these wheel chokes handy, I could have reached down and dropped one under the front tire.  Anyway, I digress...  I had a set delivered from a good company that I had done business with before, Offroad Trail Tools.  They carry an interesting selection of offroad related products, some that are unique, others that are just good deals on common products.

On the trail, there have been countless times when a pair would have been indispensable.   Winching for example.  A vehicle doing the pulling needs to be anchored.  Out in an open area or from a good winching location, sometimes it can be difficult to find an anchor point to strap the rear of the vehicle to. So the next option is to choke the wheels.  Again, rocks, logs... or an actual wheel choke meant for the purpose.  Another example is stopping on a hill.  Untold times, we have been heading up or down into a valley and someone in front gets stuck or has to clear some debris across the trail.  Everyone stops and gets out.  My old Jeep requires a little insurance under the tire to make sure a good day doesn't turn bad.  During trail repairs, choking the wheels is vital.  Any time that a jack is used to raise the vehicle, one or more wheel chokes should be used.  Safety is always the #1 priority over anything else.  Before crawling under a vehicle, the wheels must be choked before I'll even consider it.  Again, avoiding the good day turned bad situation.  There are so many circumstances and opportunities where a good set of wheel chokes make sense from safety to stabilization that having a good set of chokes is essential.