I need to move a nearly new Honda Civic from Vegas to Eastern PA. It’s on a lease so I’d rather not have someone drive it, and I can’t afford the time to drive it myself. There are scores of broker companies out there who take the job and then pass the moving task on to independent drivers with the required rig. I’m just looking for any cautionary words, as I’ve never done this. Thanks, Tony O
DAS – http://www.dasautoshippers.com/
I’ve used them in the past to ship a MB from LA to Denver. Good service at a reasonable price.
Twotone
Thanks two-tone. DAS is on my short list, mainly because they have a drop-off site in Vegas, which simplifies logistics somewhat (though it’s basically a tow operator’s lot in a pretty rough part of town). Did you get door-to-door? Open or closed carrier?
Thanks, TonyO
Actually hauling a mattress car-top, cross country…Your last caller today…
The rigging is relatively simple, particularly if you have a Car-Top Rack such as a Yakima…Have at least 75’ of decent rope; have 100’+, and if you do it right, you won’t even have to cut it; can be hanked for re-use. Cinch your lashing well at each connection. Best to have two people, at least one just to hold rope taut prior to running to next connection.
At rope mid-point, start your transverse tie-down at the front of the rack;cross the rope up over on the mattress to do the rear rack tie-down, then cross-run up over the mattress towards the front of the car, crossing the rope at towards the front of the mattress, and loop the ropes down around the front bumper supports. cinch well, and the mattress, which if placed properly will even be an auxiliary sunshade…run ropes back up towards the apex of the ropes that are now running over the hood of the car, and wrap a few tight turns downwards, closing the triangle of ropes, which will act kinda like a turnbuckle, providing important security cinching. Can Tie-off now, or:
Two additional options:
1: If you want a “rear spoiler”, after your rear transverse tie-downs, run the pair of rope ends up over the back of your sentimental mattress, towards the corners of the mattress, before running up towards the front bumper. Cinch well, do it near the transverse 1/3 points of mattress, and the back corners of mattress will rise up to even provide rear-end lateral stability while traveling at speed in cross-winds. Helps the yaw that you’ve added to your car.
2. If traveling through extended inclement weather, which is coming, and one wants to keep said sentimental mattress dry, you may choose to tarp her prior to rigging…regardless of your tarp material of choice, keep in mind that it will be lifting and flapping wildly and loudly in the airflow. Particularly in longitudinal direction…
I’ll leave it to you to figger out where the non-laminar, turbulent airflow areas of tarping will be; there is no amount of duct-tape reinforcing that will be too much.
Hear or feel anything funny ?? Stop safely and check your lashings. Definitely check at every fuel stop.
Willybee
Editor: Please forward this to your last caller today.
There is no editor, Tom & Ray seldom come to this site, and the radio show is scripted. The “callers” are script writers. This is show biz…
When I relocated to the right coast, I shipped two cars through DAS. I chose closed carrier to avoid road debris damage and dirt. They managed to put a huge scratch in my custom paint job that cannot be patched, the panel would have to have been repainted and that was no small feat. None of the local shops would touch it and the shop that originally painted it wanted $2000 plus ship them the car. DAS would pay out only for standard, single color paint jobs (clear over color) and basically said tough when I pointed out the obvious. The other car showed up with one of the retractable headlamps stuck open with the motor burned out. Other than that, it went just great! {sarcasm off} When you move anything, you take a risk.