For whatever reason, the brake caliper on the driver's side of the front axle on the bus was malfunctioning the last several miles to Moss Point, Mississippi last week. The inside of that rotor was eaten away and so was the brake pad. It was on the inside of the rotor and the outside was fine. The passenger side on the same axle was fine too.
I ordered rotors, calipers and brake shoes for both sides. The bus is like your automobile in this respect, whatever you replace on one side, you should replace on the other. That is where the similarities end.😀
Everything on the bus is Much bigger!
The caliper was no longer dragging on Friday at Forts Lake, but there was no way of knowing if it would seize and not turn loose the first time the brakes were applied. I asked Jeff Rowe if that side could be disconnected and he told me how.
The front brakes do not have emergency brakes on them so if the airline is removed, the brake will not activate. I removed the airline, capped it and started toward Tennessee. I still had all my rear brakes and brakes on one side of the front axle. It was imperative to avoid stomping on the brakes, but stopping would not have been a problem.
Driving at night in reduced traffic was a huge plus. I did not have to hit the brakes one time until I was at a red light about 10 miles from Jeff's shop in Vonore. That worked out perfectly.
Jeff Rowe pulled the BoggsMobile into the shop and the guys went to work. By 3:00 Monday afternoon, the work was completed, but we spent about two hours driving it and making sure everything was completed properly.
All was well and we hit the road a few minutes after 5:00. We drove 120 miles to the Welcome Center on I-59 in the northeast corner of Alabama. I probably could have easily driven a couple more hours, but overnight parking spaces were filling up fast. This rest area had two vacant parking spaces so I scooped one up.
I took a bunch of pictures while in the shop and I will have a few descriptions along the way.
This is the inside of the rotor on the driver's side. You can see it is destroyed. I do not think I took a picture of the brake pad, but it was gone.
Alan and Dan jumped right in and they had the driver's side wheel, rotor and caliper off in only a few minutes. This was not their first big job.
That is a caliper below.
The rotor is bolted to the hub with ten bolts and nuts. You can not get an impact driver on them. They mostly have to be removed about 1/2 turn at a time with a huge open-end wrench. It is labor intensive.
The spindle with everything removed.
The new caliper with the slack adjuster and brake chamber bracket bolted on.
The old caliper.
The new rotor painstakingly bolted to the hub.
Going back together.
These pictures are from the passenger side. It is a little more narrow on that side of the shop so I did not take as many pictures of this side.
I can not tell you how good I felt to pull into Jeff Rowe's place and I can not tell you how good I felt to leave knowing this big job was done absolutely right.
The calipers were 25 years old with over 372,000 miles of use. I suppose it was about time one of them glitched a bit. Hopefully, these will last another 25 years or 372,000 miles and someone else can change them at that time.
The tag axles have disc brakes of the same sort, so I guess I need to plan on changing them in the near future as well. For now, I am definitely breathing easier thanks to Jeff Rowe and his shop. May God bless my friend in everything he does. Will you join us in praying for Jeff? Pray for his family, for good health, good strength and lots of good profitable business!
Today we plan to roll on toward Sterlington, Lousiana. We are looking forward to seeing our friends as soon as possible!
Thank you for reading today.
Davy
