How To Use Recovery Boards - A Complete Guide

(Image Source)

Got your vehicle stuck on the beach? It is a common experience most of us have had. You need not panic if you have recovery boards with you.

With the help of recovery gear like traction boards, you will be able to get your car unstuck easily. Here are the steps you need to follow:

1. Know when you are stuck

Seems fairly simple, doesn't it? Still, most people forget that they need to get out of their car and use their recovery boards the moment they get stuck. It is a very common reaction of people to simply press harder on the accelerator hoping that the vehicle somehow gets unstuck and moves forward.

If you are stuck on sand, this will lead to your wheels sinking even deeper. When this happens, you will have to put in much more effort in order to get out than simply getting out of the car the moment it gets stuck and uses a traction board.

Now that your vehicle is stuck and you have decided on using the recovery boards you have; you need to do the following:

2. Stay Calm

First things first, your car is stuck on unfamiliar terrain and you, along with the people traveling with you, are worried about how you can get it out. Often, this situation can cause people to panic and make irrational decisions that would make it even more difficult to get their vehicle out.

Before you set to do anything, you need to take a few deep breaths and calm down. It is the only way you will be able to effectively use a recovery board and get your vehicle out from where it’s stuck.

3. Assess the problem

Now that you have calmed down, you should get down and see what exactly the problem is. You need to see why your vehicle is stuck and what is preventing it to move forward. If you don’t do this, you might end up in a situation where you don’t understand how to use the recovery board to get out of the spot.

4. You need to dig a trench

You can’t simply place a recovery board in front of the wheels and step on the gas hoping it would get you unstuck. You will need to put in some effort by digging a trench with a shovel. A number of recovery boards come with an in-built shovel to help you during these times.

Clear out a path in from of the wheel that is stuck and build a very gentle ramp in front of it. The difficulty of digging a trench depends on the terrain you are stuck in- if you are on a beach, it will be very easy to dig into the sand, on some other surface, it might take you some extra effort.

5. Put the recovery boards in place

Once you are done digging a trench under all the tires that are stuck, you should clear the path of any obstruction like twigs. After that, it won’t take much longer for your car to get out of the spot it’s stuck in. Simply place a recovery board in front of the tires, on the ramps you have just built.

Recovery boards spread the load of the tires and the vehicles over a larger area by using the gaps between the tread blocks to make it easier for your vehicle to move forward. Once you have installed the boards, you just need to get back in the driver’s seat and press on the accelerators. If you have done everything right until this point, your vehicle should move forward smoothly.

6. Freeing the vehicle

Before you begin driving, you need to keep in mind that the lugs on the recovery boards are made very thin in order to avoid them from tearing into the tires. This means that you need to move forward with as little wheelspin as possible to avoid tearing the lugs prematurely and making recovery more difficult.

If your vehicle is unable to move forward immediately, it might be because you dug the trenches too steep or the boards are not under the tires by an appropriate amount.

Try to see which one of these two things is causing the problem and rectify it before you try to move out again. You should be able to smoothly move forward after this.

Whenever your vehicle gets stuck somewhere, refer to this guide for using recovery boards. Also, make it a point to keep a couple of recovery boards in the trunk of your car at all times.