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Thanks for the call Jon
I had the street side tag axel brake drag on me moving between locations here in Maine. A quick call to Jon convinced me it was not an R-12 value as I was thinking since only the street side was dragging. He walked me thru a couple of suggestions and I have taken that brake out of service.
Jon, I pulled the pin on the yoke so the chamber is no longer connected on that side. I also backed off the slack adjuster so the slack adjuster arm can’t contact the yoke on the chamber push rod. The slack adjuster was still putting pressure on the pads when I first turned the 9/16 screw. It popped as I backed it off maybe 1/4 turn. I have confidence it was the slack adjuster causing the issue. Time for a replacement I guess.
I will not be back on the road until Thursday but I expect I’m good to go.
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5 Replies
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Great to hear. It might be as simple as lubing the slack adjuster shaft and then working the arm back and forth until it rotates freely, but if it turns out the slack adjuster itself is bad they are usually an over the counter part at most truck parts houses. I think on your coach the big snap ring allows you to pull the slack adjuster so you can bring it to the parts house.
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Joe, how did you know it was dragging? Noise?
Thanks,
Mark -
Jon, I just lubed before leaving on this trip, even though I had also lubed in late Feb when I changed the oil and tranny fluid. Since I had it up on the ramps anyway I decided to lube it again. It seems to move freely once I backed off the adjustment but something caused it to lock with the pads against the drum.
I assume I should do both sides of the axel when it gets replaced? I have the manual adjustment – Rockwell I think. Should I consider anything other than a direct replacement?
Thanks again for taking the call. Saved me a service call as I was thinking the relay valve not letting the air pressure off. Not sure I would have changed that here in the campground. But I could handle backing off the slackadjuster and pulling the yoke pin.
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Mark,
Yes noise and smell. In good weather like here in Maine I don’t hermitically seal the coach when driving. We often open the fantastic fan domes and the toll booth windows to let in the breeze.
We had come upon some construction that backed up traffic to a dead stop down a hill and around a curve of course. I hit the brakes fairly hard but nothing like an emergency situation. The next small town was a couple of miles and when we stopped at a traffic light I heard a brake like squeak as we were pulling upto and away from the light. Another couple of miles and I smelled the brakes and pulled over.
The street tag was smoking and smelled like hot brakes smell. That tire was about 50F higher than the others but it was only 165F and the hottest part was the aluminum rim not the rubber sidewall. I let it cool and drove a few hundred yards, did not hear the brake squeak, checked it again. I drove it slowly the last 15 miles to the campground stopping and checking it several times. But it locked up again as I was backing into the campsite.
I called the PC rescue line and Jon was at home instead of on the road like he should have been.
Had I not been doing some of my own work on the coach I think it would have been difficult to understand Jon’s instructions. But I knew exactly what to look for and where it was. I needed his perspective that it was not a relay valve. I expect no problems on Thursday when we start the trip home. I expect you guys will learn a lot at the seminar, wish I could attend but I have to be a grandparrent that weekend.
Had I not had the toll window open, I could have driven on and really heated things up. I’ll take the road noise.
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I don’t think you need to change the opposite side slack adjuster. From your description above it sounds like your slack adjuster has an internal issue that is causing it to hang.
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