On a recent trip towing our fifth wheel we pulled into a rest stop and I went around and felt the brake drums on our trailer.....3 of the 4 were so hot I could barely touch them. I took it into the dealer and he tells me the "cool" drum had a broken spring and the brakes were inoperative on that wheel. The other 3 being that hot is normal.

Does this sound right?......Thanks in advance.

 

If you use your trailer brakes to stop they will get hot!.....I will turn my controller down and stop with the truck brakes then check my bearings and see if I have a dragging shoe....... I never thought of using the trailer brakes to stop and seeing if one isn't working properly.

 

Naturally the longer and harder you apply the brakes the hotter they will get. One thing I have done to see just how hot the drums get when the brakes are not applied is to turn the brake controller all the way down and coast into a rest stop. At slow speeds the truck brakes can stop you no problem. Once stopped check them again. If they are very warm to the touch the brakes are dragging and need adjustment. Check the temp of the bearing hubs too. That will give you and idea if you have a bearing problem.

If one or more brakes are not working, that causes the other to work that much harder to stop the trailer.

 

How much drag should they have? I turn them "up" until I can't turn the wheel by hand, then back off a few clicks. I can still hear a little scrape scrape scrape when I turn the wheel with it lifted off the ground.

 

Kampnnut......The trailer has a Mag type wheel so I could feel down around the hub as well as the outside of the drum where the shoes make contact on the inside. All 4 were cool at the hub.

Thanks for the response.

 

Thats how I do it.....then I do a test drive and coast to a stop with no trailer brakes and check for a hot one....

 

I adjust my electric and hydraulic brakes per what Champion Trailers say. Never had a problem stopping; no brakes locking up early; plenty of shoe life.

HTH

Tony

 

Both Al-Ko and Dexter have great free, downloadable manuals that outline proper adjustment, but I think the gist of it is turn the adjuster out until the tire/wheel is very difficult to turn, then back off about 3/4 of a rotation.

You will still hear the magnet skiff along the armature.

After only one normal stop on level ground from freeway speed, my drums will normally be luke warm. The ones I've seen that were dragging quickly get up to 'burn your hand' temps.

 

I agree with the suggestions given, but there's another item. If you have your trailer brake controller set real high [on some brands] it causes the trailer brakes to engage harder relative to the tow vehicle. That is, the trailer brakes may be adjusted to do a greater percentage of the braking force. A slight bias in this way is okay as it helps 'stretch' the load should swaying occur, and saves some on tow vehicle brake wear. However too much bias of trailer brakes over tow vehicle brakes can put excessive wear on trailer brakes, cause heat buildup as described, and also gives unbalanced braking.

 

Thanks for the input everyone.