Brakes went on dual carriageway

optimus_primera

I am under the impression that it diagonally split front and rear, so you lessen the chances of rear end break away if you only had front end braking.

I had a brake pipe burst on my old escort ... brown trouser time indeed!

Lum

If it's a stuck calliper on a long journey, could it maybe boil the brake fluid and thus reduce the effectiveness of all of them?

jackthenipper

You still have a handbrae though!...

You could use this to aid you to slow down whilst changing down the gears but dont pull iton to hard... Eeeeek

2eZero

Indeed. You could have used your gears to slow down, the engine would have over-reved a bit but it would have helped you to slow down, and then used the handbrake gently to slow you to a stop.

The brakes shouldn't fail totally but have some sort of safety circuit to assist you.

As for pulling in front of a truck and slowing down sharply, if the truck had been unable to stop in time (as they are usually pulling a lot of weight) then you would have been in a worse situation.

From what you said, you must have had some sort of footbrake available to have slowed down in the situation you stated.

I know it can be stressful in such situations but you need to be aware of other road users in such emergencies so you don't cause other problems for them too... Perhaps someone like the IAM can offer advice on such situations?

Lum

It's very easy to sit in front of your PC and say "oh but you could do ____ in the event of ____ failure in your car". It's a lot harder to actually remember and apply that when it suddenly goes wrong on a 70mph dual carriageway.

This applies as much to this thread as it does to the Toyota sticky accelerator issue or any others. I'd wager that 90% of people wouldn't get it right immediately if put in that situation with no prior warning.

In a controlled situation, such as a lesson or simulator it's a lot easier. Hell I've driven a car with no brakes to get it to the garage when I was younger and stupider. I used the handbrake and had my mate's dad's Lada Riva in front for me to crash into if things got out of control, even then you still instinctively go for the brake pedal, not the handbrake/gears at first.

Oldfatgrumpy

Lum wrote: »

If it's a stuck calliper on a long journey, could it maybe boil the brake fluid and thus reduce the effectiveness of all of them?

Precisely what happened to my daughter. She pulled over and called the AA when her brakes became almost totally ineffective. During the hour it took AA to get to her, everything cooled down and the brakes worked perfectly. Still needed attention of course for (slightly, not enough for her to notice) stuck caliper.

2eZero

Lum wrote: »

It's very easy to sit in front of your PC and say "oh but you could do ____ in the event of ____ failure in your car". It's a lot harder to actually remember and apply that when it suddenly goes wrong on a 70mph dual carriageway.

Indeed. Many years ago I was trundling down the M1 just before LFE Southbound. It was night, I was shattered and was returning back to base in a 7t truck when the car in front braked and swerved hard into the right hand lane, causing that vehicle to brake hard. The left hand lane was empty at the time but when he moved across I found the reason he had moved. An entire wheel and wheel hub was in the lane ahead, the stub of the axle pointing up. The caravan ahead on the hard shoulder missing one of it's wheels (as I found out later) half a mile down the road.

I hit it at about 50mph, having already started to brake hard myself. It collided underneath, missed the oil sump but removed the air tanks on the truck. Luckily due to the previous work this vehicle has undertaken, plant work and the light and because the revs were over 1500rpm the air brakes didn't come on immediately and I was able to get to the hard shoulder. AFAIK when a truck loses the air the brakes come on hard. It was a stressful experience at the time. I managed to get to the hard shoulder with the hazards on and the vehicles behind then reacted to the hazards, ie slowing down and taking it more carefully.

The caravan driver didn't speak any English so I waited until the Police arrived and got to the services to await recovery, but it took me quite a while to stop shaking from that. If it had been something larger then it could have potentially have been much worse.

I have been in the passenger seat of a car that pulled onto the grass verge to miss a speed car coming towards us. It was only at the last second we found the grass verge actually had a ditch hidden there... My driver was a professional driver who remembered to do things in the right order at the time but later admitted it was a bit hairy there for the time. I've since had other RTAs when I have been in the passenger seat and the best thing to say is nothing if the driver is concentrating on the road, but pulling up sharply in front of another much larger vehicle is never a good plan, don't you agree?

aliasojo

2eZero wrote: »

As for pulling in front of a truck and slowing down sharply, if the truck had been unable to stop in time (as they are usually pulling a lot of weight) then you would have been in a worse situation.

From what you said, you must have had some sort of footbrake available to have slowed down in the situation you stated.

I know it can be stressful in such situations but you need to be aware of other road users in such emergencies so you don't cause other problems for them too... Perhaps someone like the IAM can offer advice on such situations?

Thanks for your words of wisdom. Do you think I don't know any of that? Classic case of someone who wasn't there and somehow sees the whole situation clearly from a few words in an opening post.

And not even all that clearly come to that.....where did I say I slowed down sharply? I had no brakes so how do you think I could slow down sharply?

For what it's worth, my OH drives a petrol tanker, I'm well aware of the issues surrounding large vehicles. My choice was hit the car in front who was braking himself or veer back over to the left and into the lay-by and onto the grass verge which eventually stopped us.

You'd have to be pretty bloody stupid to not realise this was dicey, and I understand the lorry driver's issues, but there was nothing behind me in the overtaking lane, so the lorry was able to move over away from me, he had somewhere to go if he needed to take avoiding action (which he didn't btw, he simply braked himself). I made what I felt (and still feel) was the right choice. Thankfully my OH agreed with me and since he was there and you weren't, then his opinion counts for more.

If you were somehow able to view the situation in person, then feel free to tell me how I should have acted. Until then, your words are largely irelevant (and damned annoying if I'm honest).

asbokid

Oldfatgrumpy wrote: »

Precisely what happened to my daughter. She pulled over and called the AA when her brakes became almost totally ineffective. During the hour it took AA to get to her, everything cooled down and the brakes worked perfectly. Still needed attention of course for (slightly, not enough for her to notice) stuck caliper.

It's useful to note that excessive heat around a roadwheel is a strong indication that the brakes are binding and require attention.

asbokid

Take no notice of them! They are trying to be chivalrous. They regret not being the bloke who came to your aid on the hard shoulder. No harm done. Thank God the brakes didn't blow out on a 25% hill.

aliasojo wrote: »

For what it's worth, my OH drives a petrol tanker

He might know my mate who delivers LPG gas!