The Down Range Forum
Member Section => Down Range Cafe => Topic started by: Big Frank on March 24, 2025, 10:25:47 PM
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When I was in the army some of us in support units had hard-top jeeps, while most combat arms units had soft-top jeeps. They had a Wire Cutter bolted to the front bumper that has been used at least since WWII when the Germans strung wire up to decapitate men in jeeps with the windshields folded down. Here's a picture from Operation Urgent Fury in Grenada 1983, and a PM Magazine article from 1984. There was no standard way to make these, but they were usually made of 90 degree angle iron, with one side flat against the bumper, and one side perpendicular like the second pic. Sometimes the corner angle was facing forward like the first pic. There was almost always a bend near the top or a second piece welded to it. And most of them had cutting notches ground into them, not cutters welded onto them. Notches cut into the corner of the angle iron looked a lot different from notches cut into one edge, but either kind should work. Sometimes there were notches only on the top bar, or only the main bar, and sometimes both. Some didn't even have a cutting notch, just the angled piece on top. I've never seen one like in the 3rd pic, which may have been something they added to WWII jeeps. I just remember a bunch like in the magazine article. A fence T-post would also work well instead of angle iron. I saw one that someone made but didn't have the notch angled right.
There were no longer Nazis trying to decapitate Americans as far as I know when I was in the army. But there was commo wire for field telephones strung everywhere in the field. And it crossed several dirt roads and trails. Sometimes it stayed on the ground, and other times a vehicle's tire could catch it and fling it into the air. If you were in the next jeep after a wire flipped up off the ground, you could have a very bad day. The wire has several strands of copper wire, plus a few strands of steel wire to make it harder to break or cut. I caught a piece of fishing line or something across the neck while riding my bike down a city street and I'm glad the @$$hole that put it there didn't use a piece of wire. One time I thought about welding a wire cutter to the front bumper of my ATV. Even if it never caught a piece of wire, it might keep me from being swatted in the face with a branch.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YmcnN_n3cA4
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They need something like that for snowmobiles. Back when I was working, the owner of the company I worked for had a son in law who was decapitated driving one at night.
He was going across a farmers field at high speed, and hit a barb wire fence. It took his head clean off at the neck, with it still in his helmet. From what I hear, these type of accidents are not rare.
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My dad used to wear a helmet that looked like a red fake leather cap with black fake fur ear flaps. The chin strap had snaps to adjust it but he almost never fastened the chin strap. He just put it on like a hat and took off. One day he did fasten his chin strap and it's a good thing he did. He went through a barb wire fence and the top strand caught him right on the chin strap. The snowmobile kept going and he got slingshotted backward. I almost lost the old man that day. Less than a half inch up or down and the barb wire would have missed his chin strap. I heard a lot of snowmobilers got decapitated by guy wires on telephone poles too. There wouldn't be any give at all if you hit one.
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I don't know why, but I don't remember M561 Gama Goats having wire cutters on them like jeeps did. The 2-piece windshield was removed and placed in a pocket for it inside the top of the hood. It's a 6x6 amphibious 1 1/4 ton truck. It couldn't haul any more than a 5/4 ton pickup truck, but could go more places. The 4-wheel steering made it look like it wasn't turning sharp enough to make corners it went around. I remember one time at Fort Polk a Goat pulled in to the motor pool and some guy standing there asked me why they were always pulling those little trailers. He didn't know it was the back half of the truck. I saw a mechanic driving the front half of one around the motor pool and the rear end of it was sticking way up since there was no weight on it. That was really funny looking. If the suspension was adjusted to level it out, I think it would be a capable 4 wheel drive vehicle.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gama_Goat