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Road Debris – ALL THREAD In All The Wrong Places
I have a possible problem from road debris. First the story and a few pictures and then the question.
We only had about 50 miles to travel Monday from Saraland, Alabama to Foley, Alabama. We arrived and had a big surprise when we went outside to unhook the car.
Can you see the tail dragging from the Green Machine? It is a 1/4″ x 12′ piece of all thread. Evidently we ran over it and it poked through the bumper of the car and we dragged it along behind us.
I am not so worried about the damage to the car. A little duct tape will have that ready to go in no time. (Grin) What do I worry about is all the air lines, coolant lines, electric lines and only heaven knows what else that an object like that could damage under the bus. Not even mentioning the bus tires!
As far as I could see from a cursory examination Monday, the only obvious casualty was the mud flap behind the tag axle on the driver’s side. I thought it was completely gone but then we noticed is was only partially ripped loose and was tucked up by the muffler. It may have saved the muffler from being badly damaged.
Yesterday evening I started viewing the dash cam footage as I was pulling out of the church at Saraland and watched it all. On Old Spanish Fort Trail/Hwy 98 just before we crossed the bay and joined I-10, I spotted a possibility. ??
It definitely looks like an object laying in the road. When you zoom it up real close you can kind of see a shadow under it.
There is one problem with that being the point where we picked up the debris. That point is 35 miles from where we discovered it attached to the car. I have difficulty believing we carried the rod dragging from the car bumper for 35 miles for two reasons.
Number one, I do not think the bumper would have hung on that long. We were going 65 MPH for several miles on the interstate and that rod would have been bouncing all over the road. Dragging it 35 miles with several miles of fast driving is too much. The bumper was barely hanging on anyway.
Secondly, if the rod was dragging 12 feet behind the bumper for 35 miles, some one surely would have let us know! Once we exited the interstate, we were in stop and go traffic with red lights and even policemen passing us. I have got to believe some one would have honked or something. I remember cars pulling up behind us in the back up camera and they would have had to be on top of the rod if it was hanging from the bumper.
Here is a possibility. We know it ripped the rear mud flap on the driver’s side nearly off the bus. Maybe it was hanging from the mud flap or something else back there for most of the ride to Foley. If it was, then most of the rod would have been under the bus and not visible to passing cars. At some point, maybe on our only 90 degree turn about 5 miles from the church, it came loose, went under the car and punctured the bumper of the car.
I know that is grasping at straws but it is all I have for the moment.
I cranked the bus today and raised it as far as it would go with the airbags. All the bags came up and I searched with a flashlight and used my phone on a selfie stick and I can SEE nothing amiss. I had nothing to block it up so I did NOT get under the bus. There may be a chunk of insulation missing from the front that was not missing before but that is all besides the mud flap I mentioned before.
I can hear no air leaks and the air pressure holds steady when I hold and press the brakes.
However, when I fan the brakes to lower the pressure, it seems to go down a little quicker than normal and seems to take a little longer to recover. I timed it twice and when I fan the brakes to 50-70, it takes 3+ minutes for it to raise up to 120 and the air dryer purges.
Am I imagining things? Any thoughts? Any suggestions? Any thing else you think I should look for?
Davy
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3 Replies
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Davy,
The brake system air lines come from a central position directly beneath the floor of the bus in the wheel wells at the relay valves and go to the brake chambers which are all located at a little over axle height. They are inside between the wheels on each axle. You will hear no air escape when you do a walk around because those air lines are not pressurized.
The only way to determine if they were damaged is to bring the coach air pressures up to their max of around 120, and turn off the coach engine. Release the parking brake (make sure the coach cannot roll) and see if the pressure drops beyond the initial pressure drop. Wait about a minute. If the pressures have remained steady, apply the service brake and again look for a pressure drop after the initial one. Again wait about a minute or so.
If you have no pressure loss beyond the initial ones your brake system is intact.
Just monitor your air system as you normally would. If the coach leans and it did not previously you migfht have a damaged air bag or air line to the suspension. I doubt anything more than the air bag would be damaged because all the air lines are somewhat protected and enter the air bags from above. There are no exposed air lines between the wheel wells.
Hope this helps.
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Just a thought on how long the allthread was draged. it should be “ground down” worn off from draging.
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Thanks for the tips, Jon. Everything checks out so far. I drive 55 miles today with no problems.
That is a great idea, Jim. I looked it over and by the looks of things, I probably dragged it a while. It was ground down some on most of the length and one 2′ spot was nearly half way through. A 1′ section was ground over half way through it. My guess it was stuck in the mud flap and then got caught in the bumper of the car.
Davy
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