Anyone had to use a runaway truck ramp?

When going downhill you want the light steady pressure. 10psi or less and you can ride the brakes ALL DAY and they won't over heat. You check the brake like other said make sure no oil and brake stroke is with in the correct range. Look at the drums Make sure they are not cracked or missing. Make sure the brakes shoes are not cracked and not to think.

I'm amazed nobody takes about the 10psi of applied brake pressure. You can go down any hill with any load with that way and never over heat the drums. You can even tell if the drum are getting to hot because you are needed more brake pressure to hold the truck and load at the same speed. Over 10psi of applied brake pressure you are making more heat then the drum can dissipate. That's why 10psi or less is the magic number

 

Ramps are last resort. They are there to protect life. Maybe your own, maybe many others. (The recent failure of a young trucker to use a ramp in Denver had 4 people killed and many hurt. 36 felony counts and 4 misdemeanors against him on a runaway truck.)

I never used a ramp, I have several times considered it against what is at the bottom. There are hills in which signs tell you that if you are above a specific speed, you need to take it because you will not be able to remain on the pavement past it at the next curve. (Or survive it)

Hot brakes certainly. You have to be really bad managing that truck very poorly on the downgrade to get em. The goal is to have the truck in one gear, with the jake on full all the way down with cold brakes that are not used. Or used one of two methods very carefully.

As far as brake checks up top you go around the rig and see if you can find hot brakes because in some cases you would have for example crossed the smokies before you reached say Black Mountain or Sandstone etc. Brake check areas are good to use every time. You never know what might be wrong with your truck hiding somewhere waiting to rear it's ugly head downgrade.

If you ever think you no longer in control of a falling 18 wheeler you take the ramp. Aim it dead center and hold the wheel straight because it's usually deep gravel or a variation of. It will stop you. Some ramps that are vertical might not and if not, they will recover your body well enough.

If you did not have a ramp anywhere there are other ways to "Capture" your truck with another truck, but it's more of a movie thing than real life because neither one can be expected to realistically get away with that kind of crap. It's possible. There is also the possibility of using the mountain itself to get stopped. You probably will tear the truck up a little bit and get fired etc. But you will walk away from it.

I can go on but every mountain is its own problem. Some are so steep that if your rig fails upgrade you probably will need to steer it backwards into the ditch right there before it takes you on a death ride taking out everyone in the way below. Usually in the excess of 15 to 20% If your brakes are in any way flawed or out of adjustment those parking brakes will NOT hold that semi on such a grade regardless of what you are taught.

 

What does that accomplish tho? I can apply that much braking power by being in the right gear and toggling the jake break,.. Ur idea may not heat the breaks to the point of burning per say but they still get hot and if u run into a situation on the way down the mountain and need to stop then its going to be difficult because im going to assume that if u need 10psi of break power going down a mountain im going to guess ur in to high of a gear and the jakes are going to not work as good and if u need to stop its going to take u much much longer to stop than somebody who is toggling their jakes between low and mid all the way down and have cold breaks when they hit the bottom... It aint 1950 no more.. All new trucks have jakes on em now and they all work very good i like to use the tools thats given to me

 

I agree with the post that it's not 1950 anymore. Thermal braking to control speed by a steady application is one of two available braking methods. In any truck with a good jacobs there is no need to use the brakes at all. If I had a choice I rather not use the brakes at all. They are there if need be.

 

Speed. Starting out down the hill at too high of a speed can set you up for disaster.
I went through the BC mountains for five years pulling 53' dry vans, never a problem.
Then I switched to a carrier that hauled tri-axle trailers loaded up to 103,000 lbs. Boy what a difference that makes.
Brake check well before Kamloops, I headed down the hill at my old usual 40 mph. Wrong choice. Within a mile I already smoked the brakes and still had two miles to go down. There were no run off ramps on that stretch of road. But I was familiar with the road. So I got off the brakes and just rode it out.
Too speed hit 85 mph. The road levelled out and brakes cooled back down so I was able to get it back down before the last brake check at the scale. Smelled a bit bad, but all was good.

 

You start out going downhill with 10psi or less and low engine RPMs because if it's snowing or ice or if engine brake go out you can still get down the hill

You use the 10psi or less. Then if you want to go FASTER ! You add the engine brake and go downhill faster using 10psi and engine brake ! You can always stop because the brakes are not over heating. The guy just relying on engine brake will be in trouble when the road is snow covered or icy or running chains.

 

never in my life have i had to use a run-a-way ramp

when i pulled into a brake check area, i checked to see if all my brake hoses were intact.

i checked to see that all my brake shoes were in good contion and not missing any chunks

i checked to make sure all my brake drums were still on the trauck/trailer and not missing from cracking and breaking off.

i checked the brake adjustments (back then we had no automatic slack adjusters)

i checked to make sure i had a good solid connection from the tractor to the trailer via the glad hands

i checked to make sure ALL my lights were working, especially of course, the brake lights.

then i'd check my a/c, to make sure i was gonna be as cold as possible going down them mountains, as all the trucks i drove back in the day, did not have jake brakes.

 

I ran where there were several brake checks. I have always heard that BC wants you to draw a line at every brake check. My routine was to generally get out and walk around the truck, and check the load and if I didn't smell any gear oil, I knew I had no leaking seals, same as I do anytime I stop for any reason.
I already knew when I pulled in if my brakes were working or not. I can tell by the gauge if they are out of adjustment or not, and I already know the shape my shoes and drums are in. I know by the time I stop if my hoses or anything else is leaking.
In winter I have generally already ask how slick it is, and always look to see if the tracks leaving there are chained up or not.
Basically I treat it like any stop of any kind, draw my line and proceed.
I will say that most drivers that drive these roads every day do not even get out of the truck, by my observation.

 

I have not mentioned bad weather as snow and ice mountain grades.

Now that the subject is up, I consider snow and ice a asset to be assisting in cooling the brakes. Generally trolley first to stretch the entire unit against the 5th wheel saving tractor brakes. Then switch to occasionall applications and finally thermal.

If the traction situation allows for it on old ice etc I'll throw in a little jake Maybe underdrive the RPMs a little bit.

If it's skating rink ice that is really slippery, I'll depend on certain trucks to tip toe off that mountain in granny low, traffic be darned. Not that we are supposed to be out there at all in those kinds of really dangerous winter weather. Its not worth it.

That's why I valued US 322 in PA so much the seven mountains grade, that's about 8% for 5 or so miles if not more, twisty and turny all the way down. Ive done it in trucks with no jakes in all weather forms. The worst of them is the deep light powder snow. Locks into a 200 RPM range coming up or underdriving in low range coming down.

 

Going too slow on grades when the road is slick, will get you killed, It is hard to get that through some folks heads but You have to run fast enough to keep everything rolling. Another reason you USE your brakes and jakes, retarder too if you have one.