It's those damn disc brake calipers again

Salmon Fisher":3l66mbk4 said:
Colby,

I would call Etrailer and ask if those Kodiak calipers cross reference with yours. Or you can look it up on that website, there are lots of questions for each product and Etrailer publishes both questions and answers.

Patrick
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I sent them a message today. Will be interesting to see their reply. A quick google search leads me to believe they are not interchangeable. I've got 8 more of the rubber boots I carry with me, along with two spare calipers (and one at home), and several brake pad sets. Until I run out of those spare parts, or it gets to be a bigger hassle, I'll probably just continue routine greasing of the slider pins before long trips. The disc brakes are superior to drum brakes, but the maintenance on the electric drums was sure a lot easier and less expensive! Colby
 
Just a thought about the deteriorating sliding pin cover boots.If the boot stays on,all well and good,I think the boot is there to resist the caliper pin from rusting and gumming up while the pads are wearing and restricting the inward motion of the moving part of the caliper.It is disconcerting to find the boots deteriorating before the pins have reached their maximum inward travel at which time you would have to replace the pads.I think your idea of heat is part of the problem but I would consider not replacing the boots after 500 /1000 miles,only lightly oil the exposed pin heads each time you service the trailer.
By that time the bronze/brass pin bushings would have worn enough to allow a dirty pin to slide without binding.P.S.I suspect the trailer brakes are not as long lived as auto brakes and can be expected to wear out much sooner,In Florida with salt water that is about every two years.
 
KevinMc":1nop10h9 said:
Just a thought about the deteriorating sliding pin cover boots.If the boot stays on,all well and good,I think the boot is there to resist the caliper pin from rusting and gumming up while the pads are wearing and restricting the inward motion of the moving part of the caliper.It is disconcerting to find the boots deteriorating before the pins have reached their maximum inward travel at which time you would have to replace the pads.I think your idea of heat is part of the problem but I would consider not replacing the boots after 500 /1000 miles,only lightly oil the exposed pin heads each time you service the trailer.
By that time the bronze/brass pin bushings would have worn enough to allow a dirty pin to slide without binding.P.S.I suspect the trailer brakes are not as long lived as auto brakes and can be expected to wear out much sooner,In Florida with salt water that is about every two years.
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As mentioned earlier, I have been pulling the pins at the end of the year, and then before any long trip, and regreasing them with a good quality caliper grease that is compatible with rubber. Perhaps it would be easier for me to remove the boot caps and then "oil" the top of the pin, assuming the oil would work it's way into the main part of the boot. In this case, I could oil the pins much more frequently. I might try this with some spray silicone, as it would be very simple to do each time the boat is off the trailer. Colby
 
Wow Colby, it’s sad to hear all of your effort that you go through annually/whenever to keep your calipers and boot pins happy. I’m still stuck on why there’s so much heat and/or vibration on those right side brakes. I don’t know what a normal running temperature would be. L

So with new SS(?) calipers on that side, I believe we can rule out stuck disc pistons, right? And your brake system is bled properly (you can check the pad wear on the street side vs the curb side perhaps to make sure they are all wearing about the same. What about wheel/axle alignment, tire wear, bearings heating up; something to figure out where all this heat is coming from.
 
Colby, I agree with Steve (Dora-Jean) that you probably need to find out why the brakes are heating up. I carry a lazar heat detector in my truck all the time. When I'm towing the 5th wheel or boat I will pull over at a rest stop after 10 or 20 miles and check my tires and hubs for their temperature. By doing this you'll be able to see the differences between all the wheels and identify any particular wheel that is heating up and concentrate your efforts on why that wheel is heating up. I'm not certain of the purpose of the rubber bushing you mentioned, but to me it looks like a dust cap. I'm not familiar with that arrangement as to weather that cap provides any shock absorbtion qualities or not. I wouldn't think so, but again I'm not familiar with this set up. Steve brought up some good points about tire wear and wheel alignment. It is very possible that there is an issue there. With some help you can take some preliminary measurements and get an idea if there is something drastically out of spec. You may want to take the trailer down to a frame shop and get that alignment checked.
If you have a wheel heating up there is a reason for it and if those bushing are coming out it is because there is something forcing them out.
Why did you change brakes to start with? Just curious.
 
Thanks Steve and Dave, Donald and others. I no longer think it matters which side of the trailer. This time it was on the back axle on both sides. If I remember, this time the passenger side had both slider boots on the rear caliper completely missing, and the two boots on the drivers side were partially disentigrated. Looking closely at them, they appear to have overheated. (The rubber looks burned.) Disc brakes are going to get hot. Any brake gets hot, but discs run hotter. (Thus why not a good idea to back a boat trailer into the water without giving the brakes time to cool...) My old grease hubs ran around 135 degrees F. The oil bath hubs I run now days are usually around 90 F. Of course they'll be hotter in prolonged use. When I seem to have problems now days, it's after traveling long distance, with mountain passes involved. There are several different braking methods used by semi drivers. (I use to drive semi). Some say to hold steady pressure on the brakes all the way down. (These are likely the drivers whose brakes you smell coming down the mountain...) The other camp, the one I am in, is gear down, slow down, then when the truck picks up a little extra speed, brake back to slow, until you need to repeat again. So I don't feel I am over using brakes. But between the truck and trailer, I have 8 brakes working on 7 tons. So I expect those calipers get hot and in turn start to burn thru rubber boots. I did find one link that said the DB-35 brake calipers are more for utility trailers. The other calipers, like those that Patrick, or others use, are more specifically for marine. So perhaps the other issue is the water in launching is also washing the grease out off the pins. None the less, if the boots are burning up, it doesn't much matter rather one greases the pins or not. (Thus not even sure it's helping that I pull the pins and regrease them, and maybe why the new calipers don't appear to come with the pins greased.) Once the boot is gone, the pin has a lot of open space around it, allowing the caliper to rattle or move around 1/2". I should also note that the springs that come in the calipers, I believe to keep them somewhat stable, do not stay put either. I lose those soon after installing them, and have just given up using them. This is not just one or two calipers. All the calipers have the issue losing the springs. Along with the original calipers, I've replaced three with brand new ones, and they continue to have the same issue. I don't believe the brakes are dragging either, as I think that would be noticeable. So I really believe it's just a matter of distance and time. That and a rubber material that does not hold up to heat. Several others with these calipers have had the same kind of issues with them, that do a lot of towing. In the end, I probably need to switch to a caliper that uses metal bushing or boots. Unfortunately for the cost to replace four calipers, I can revert to fully electric, but would have to go to drum hubs and brake shoes. Colby
 
I'm not certain of the purpose of the rubber bushing you mentioned, but to me it looks like a dust cap.
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Dave,
I believe the rubber bushing or "boot" is there for the slider pin to travel back and forth in. There is a cap on the end of it, and it's likely to keep dirt off the slider pin. Some of the other calipers I have seen do not use rubber, but rather have some type of metal boot or bushing, that the slider pin works through. If you go back to the first page of this thread, you can see a couple photos of the brake caliper. One with the bushing present, the other with it missing. I call it a bushing, the part number calls it a boot... The thicker part of the boot fits into a hole in the caliper and has a lip on both sides of that hole. The rest of the boot then is a little thinner and probably more of just protective of the slider pin. It's a fairly tight fit then for the pin to slide thru that thicker part of the boot, which acts almost like a wiper seal. I would think if the brakes were hanging up, the hubs would run a lot hotter. As mentioned, my hubs tend to show around 85-95 degrees with my infrared thermo gun. MY TPMS runs anywhere from 75 degrees to 105 degrees, depending upon outside temperature. (And all 4 tires are with in a couple degrees of each other.) Colby
 
Yes, my trailer has surge brakes. I like the idea of the electric over hydraulic as it gives one the ability to control the braking of the trailer in adverse conditions which may come up unexpectedly when traveling thru mountainous regions or winter conditions. Just curious, if you contacted the mfr and if they got back to you. Also I will say that you mentioned that your greased hubs ran at about 135 F, to me that seems high as with my trailer (greased hubs) the highest I've ever seen it was at 125 and that is when i bought it in NM and pulling it home. It has sat in a lot for a couple years before I drove off with it so there may have been light corrosion in there. As I drove a 100 miles or so the temp went down to 85-90 and stayed there. One thing to note is that I have a diesel and used the exhaust brake quite a bit so the trailer brakes don't really get engaged unless I have to really slow down quicker than what the exhaust brakes require.
 
Hi Dave,
That last post/question was from somebody else. But to answer your question, I still have not heard anything back from Dexter. The 135 I'm just going from memory and was way back on a much earlier trailer. Could have been 125. But I do know the oil bath run much cooler. I've been running oil bath now for some time. Those that have problems with Oil Bath, is usually due to the wrong size seal or corrosion on the spindle. I did pull the wheels to put metal valve stems on them (I had one rubber valve stem start leaking due to wear around where it sits in the wheel, likely from the TPMS transmitters. They are suppose to be fine with the rubber valve stems, but that didn't appear to work out so well....) and while the wheels were off I checked the anti-rattle springs. Actually, only one was missing. So they are pretty much staying put. I think I'm just going to stick with the caliper slider pin rubber boot issue is due to heat over time. In which case, I don't think it matters much if the pin is greased frequently or not. However, silicone spray isn't too expensive, and easy to spray on the slider pins without removing them, so will try that before and after any long trips. Colby
 
More thoughts on the brake issue ,from reading the prior comments I have this to offer.
My concern with hot brakes would be the drake fluid boiling and blowing out the caliper piston 'O' ring resulting in brake failure; so solving this problem would be imperative.
Using a brake controller in the tow vehicle rather than relying on engine braking might relieve the constant braking and give the discs time to cool.I am surprised to read that the brake pad return springs are failing and have gone missing,probably due to annealing and subsequent corrosion.
I don't know what brand of electric over hydraulic system you have but I suspect this might be your problem.

Or, completely replace the braking system in its entirety."just throw money at it" That always seems to work.
Just say -in.
 
Interesting thread. I just had some problems with my brake calipers on the right side of my trailer. I do a six tire rotation annually incorporating my 2 spare tires, as well as a check of the grease in the hubs and a brake check before each trip. I take my boat across the Rockies from Alberta to the west coast annually. Just before I left on my recent trip to Kitimat, BC, I discovered that one of my right brake pads was really worn, also the slide pins on both calipers on the right side were missing. On inspection both right side calipers were frozen and all four slide pins were missing. I am very careful with rinsing and keeping the brakes flushed and cleaning after launching the boat. I also like to do a fresh flush of the boat and the trailer in a freshwater lake when possible. I did order a new set of calipers for the right wheels and new brake pads all around and installed these before I left. I'm home now having pulled the trailer about 3500 kms, but have not checked the brakes or wheels yet and will report once I pull the wheels off to check the brakes. I carry a thermometer to check my wheels at least twice most towing days. Normally my hubs run between 25C and 35C while towing. I had noted that the wheel where the brakes were badly worn was always running a few degrees hotter. A sign that I will check closer in the future. I have a theory about the right side of the trailer brakes having more problems. I often travel on secondary highways with no shoulders on them. I have noted riding my bicycle that the right side of the road is rougher than it is on the centre and this may cause more vibrations and wear on the wheels and brakes. I also had my second flat tire, thankfully I have a dual axle trailer, again on the right side. I noted on my bicycle that there is more debris on the outside of the road, nails and such, that drifts off to the ditch, thus more flats on the right side.
 
Just to reiterate a couple of points. First, regarding the rattle springs. I did have a situation in the past where all four had disappeared over time. However, after making the statement with the more recent issue, checking the brakes in the past week with the wheels pulled, I found only one spring missing. The other three brakes still had theirs. Regarding the heat issue. I'm not talking about an overheat situation. But brakes do get hot when used. I've never seen my brakes smoking or smelled them after stopping. Nor have I taken a temperature reading right after descending the Rockies or other steep mountain range. I don't believe I have any brakes dragging either. I suspect Peter may have experienced the same situation that I am. A few years back, I had two brake calipers, both on the passenger side I believe, that had come free from the backing frame, and were only held on by the wheel rim that they were rubbing on. Three of the four pins were broken off, and one pin was completely missing. I suspect that the rubber boot had disintegrated, and then with the calipers vibrating or having much more free play with out the rubber boot surrounding the slider pin, broke the pins off. I suspect anyone with the Dexter calipers that use rubber boots around the slider pins, will eventually have the same issue if you tow far and long enough, especially over mountain passes where you are using the brakes more frequently. Those that have the calipers that have the steel or brass boots the slider pins go through don't seem to have any problem. But they are more expensive. Colby P.s. to help folks out with Peter's numbers, in case you weren't sure. 3500 kms = 2174 miles. 25c-35c = 77F-95F.
 
P.s. to help folks out with Peter's numbers, in case you weren't sure. 3500 kms = 2174 miles. 25c-35c = 77F-95F.
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Thanks for the metric conversion Colby. Being Canadian I use metric, not only because the rest of the world does, except the USA, but because Canada went metric because the USA was going that way. Since our economies are so intertwined it only made sense and we beat the USA in that race converting to metric first. Then you elected a guy named Reagan and he stopped the whole metric conversion process, except for the US military. I'm old enough to be amibidextrous in both metric and imperial measurements. :D :D :D
 
Peter and Judy. Yes......very funny! I remember 1974 where half of New England had gone through the expense of having speed limit and distance signs duplicated mph/ kph; they stayed up for years.I think Maine still has them,Eh.I still prefer am/pm to 24 hrs though.
 
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