I rear ended a minivan...

[ExploreHudson]

Welp.. just got home. No injuries to anyone, most important thing. Cars were both able to drive away.

How does the damage look? Ill have to get a better look in the day light. Damn.. my brakes just locked up!

I was thinking, because the fender is close to the tire now, of pulling the whole damn front end with a come along. Radiator was unaffected, havent checked the AC because Texas froze over early this year.
All the lights appear to be working and uncracked miraculously.

Any thoughts? Come along next to a tree and just yank or perhaps drive a short distance in reverse to yank it out?

Thanks yall..

 

[410Fortune]

Minimal
Yes you can pull that out
Or you can just buy aftermarket bumper for like $100

I came in here expecting a joke
So A gen I explorer ran into the back of a mini van....and 9 months later out popped a Bronco II!!

 

[Roont]

I almost ran into my own minivan in the snow last night haha. Glad you're ok and that you only seemed to have minimal damage. But if a Bronco is the result, maybe I shouldn't have tried to avoid the crash haha

 

[kmack]

I was thinking, because the fender is close to the tire now, of pulling the whole damn front end with a come along.
Any thoughts? Come along next to a tree and just yank or perhaps drive a short distance in reverse to yank it out?

That's not too bad. But if your fender is close to the tire, then there could be some minor frame damage. Just pulling with a come-along from a tree will not do anything unless you have the other end of the Explorer anchored somewhere else. By that, I mean one come-along off the front tied to a tree, and another come-along off the back tied to a tree (or other anchoring point). Then you can slowly ratchet things out. That's how the old-school frame bars worked. My Dad had one back in the day.

If you only have the one come-along and only one tree within reach of the Explorer (can't find a 2nd anchor point close by), then you can tie it up and use Reverse to help yank it out. But be careful. This is very jarring and could potentially damage other things. Especially if you get a small running start and yank too hard. You could also rip stuff off.

I did the above back in '91 with an old VW Scirocco I had when a girl at school (college) decided to run a stop sign in a parking lot and take out the front end. It still drove, no leaks, but I only had Reverse, 2nd, & 4th gears. The frame was bent enough to screw up the shift linkages to take out 1st, 3rd, & 5th.

I stopped by my girlfriends house on my way home since she was close (within 5 miles of school) and I had another 45 miles to get home. I wrapped a chain around a tree and hooked it into the front bumper bracket. Since I had Reverse, I started yanking on it. HARD, too! After about 10 times banging around inside the car from the jolts, I finally had all my gears back. But you could see where the unibody frame rails were starting to tear from me pulling on them.

Insurance ended up totaling the car anyway...