This is how you go down the Cabbage!

Hurst, I think you nailed the "right way" with your answer.

I've taken many descents on the Grapevine, Vail, and Cajon. As you noted, each time is different. If I'm loaded light then 45-55 mph can feel safe (except for those times when there is a truck speed limit), and I'll select a gear and jake setting that will comfortably control my descent at that speed. Other times I may be loaded heavy, and 45-55 mph isn't safe at all. Then I may drop it down to a gear and jake setting that will get my speed in the 35-45 mph range. Add a little snow and ice or heavy traffic and other even slower trucks on the descent and I'll need to adjust for as low as 20-35 mph.

Whatever option I select will allow me to apply light brake pressure to slow to a controlled stop if the fecal matter hits the spinning blades somewhere out in front of me. My brakes will be cool and fresh and I'll have a full tank of air, so there isn't any panic involved with smoking brakes and alarm bells going off in the cab.

 

Sorry to hear that striker. Condolences to the family...........

 

I highly suggest studying how air brakes work, before you actually go flying down a mountain.

Quick lesson if your service brakes are weak, so is your parking brake. They are one in the same, applied with a different method.

 

Hope that guy is no longer 'training'.
Remember, you can go down thousands of times too slow but, too fast, only once. There are old truckers and bold truckers but not so many old, bold truckers.
I learned my lesson there many years ago by being too bold. Fortunately the end result was a serious lesson learned the hard way. Those small cars lost and confused in the fog tend to come out of nowhere real fast. I did prepare to sacrifice myself instead of those little kids that were looking out the back window.
I think I saw another post where you said the 'trainer' had to smoke a few cigs at the bottom of the hill. Maybe he learned his lesson too.
I agree with PackRat. Always better to be prepared. People have become dependent on the engine brakes and take more chances. Back in the day I had engine brakes that either did not respond when activated, or even take a break half way down the hill. Gets interesting when that happens and you're unprepared.

 

True that.

I was codriving with my brother last year, coming down Cajon Pass, when he suddenly lost the jakes. I jumped out of the bunk, opened the fuse panel in the glove compartment and started to remove the fuse for the jake, jiggling it solved the problem and the jakes came back on.

My brother was "busy" during all this excitement.

After that we removed all the fuses and cleaned the fuse receptors and fuses. Dust build up made for some iffy connections.

 

Hahaha

I hope he is still traing and ya wanna know why ?

If I had been scared and went down slow , someone else could have hit me and pushed me off the mountain .

You people and your gudgemental ######## against everyone else really gives me the ##### !!!!

Mind your P's and q's !!!!!

Yea the situation could have been that I came up on a slow driver , and we talked about that . Simple GO AROUND..

If you think going down a hill at a snails pace is good , fine !!!

Oh and he did smoke three cigs because he was nervous I couldnt handle it , but guess what ? I did !!!!!

 

I really find it interesting reading comments from people with limited exp. about how to drive in the mtn's, it comes down to this. I've lost my brakes on Vail, it wasn't a fun exp., it was a downright scary exp., I lucked out and didn't have to use the ramp (the fines, tow bill etc., are not nice), thus, I keep it in control. One of the reasons I'm glad my CB no longer works, listening to the Billy Big Riggers trying to tell me how to drive down a mtn. Someone once asked on here how to descend a mtn., the simplest advice several of us gave him, A. turn the CB off, B. stay at or below the speed limit, C. Know your truck D. don't smoke your brakes. Food for thought, you smoke your brakes, that's because they got too hot, know what happens when the cool off, they get glazed, know what happens to glazed brakes, they increase your stopping distance, decrease your stopping ability, and makes you look like a rank amateur who should be flipping burgers at McD's.

Know your truck, know your skill, know your load, and be prepared for anything. You never know when that 4 wheeler will drop his cig. and suddenly swerve out of control, or when Momma Moose will decide to take Jr. for a stroll across the highway. If Momma or Jr. ends up in the cab with you because you couldn't stop, we'll be reading about you in the obits.

 

Lol, touchy much?
I'm curious about the 'foggy as hell, and 'I was scared' part. Could you have even seen a slow four wheeler at 50 mph? Is that why you were scared? Or maybe it really wasn't 'foggy as hell'. In my neck of the woods it gets quite thick and sometimes it's hard to see tail lights at very close distance while traveling slow. It's just not worth it to run over someone from behind and go straight to jail.
In my case, I didn't have time to think about the jailhouse rock. All I could think about was those four little eyes looking straight at me. They had no clue about the danger that their dad had put them in but it was my job to see that they did not die that day. And I did. Never forgot them though, and that was 1986.