weak electric brakes

[mweiman]

I recently went through the brakes/wiring on a flat bed trailer with 10,000 lb dexter axles. They seemed to work good when I got done but quickly got weak. Electrical seems to be OK, so I pulled a wheel back off. Found very slight oil seepage onto the magnet area, and I mean very slight. Is that probably enough to weaken them? The drum area where the magnet rides is pretty shiny, can they become too slick to grab enough? I had replaced 2 magnets and the remaining 2 seemed just as strong.

Thanks for any help,

Matt

 

[NIsaacs]

Shinny is okay, a small amount of oil is not. I had trouble with my 10,000 Dexters with the oil bath hubs. I finally just packed the bearings in grease and that fixed them.



Make sure your controller is getting full power to the axles also. Ground is real important and can cause intermittent brakes. Turn your lights on and have someone watch them while operating the brake on max power and see if they dim.



Nick

 

[jelag]

The only way to be certain that the controller and wiring is doing its job is to test it... . you need to open the connection at each wheel and while someone is manually applying the brakes test the voltage at each wheel... as the brake lever is applied the voltage should rise to battery voltage when the lever is applied.

In almost all cases I've looked at its a connection someplace either on the towing vehicle or the trailer... Of course oil on the backing plate and magnet will change the way it brakes...

The second most common error is that the brakes aren't adjusted up correctly or enough... Most of the time trailer brakes have self adjusting brakes. . 2 things to check, when you put the new backing plates on the axles could you have them on the wrong side... if you mount them on the wrong side, the brakes will self adjust loose. . in addition you need to manually adjust the brake up to the point they just start to drag. We've found that if the self adjuster is not up tight you won't get enough brake when needed...

Hope this helps...