Brake Shoes worn out in 6K Miles

**dryfly** · 03-09-2023, 05:31 PM

Originally Posted by JM0397

Just had service done on brakes & wheels. The cost for bearing inspection, repack, & brake check was a very reasonable $350 at the local dealer.
2 years old and about 8000 miles on the rig, one brake drum was trashed - shoes came loose and chewed up the inner assembly. A couple of the others needed new shoes already. The service tech said it's not unheard of, as heavy as the big rigs are, running on old tech drum brakes. After all the stories here on the forum, I knew I had to get everything inspected.
I'm gonna call Lippert and see how they feel about warrantying some 2-year old brakes!

I had a brake assembly go south and trash the drum one year out of warranty. Grand Design stepped up and as a courtesy sent parts. I must have just caught the customer service rep on a good day.

I doubt I would ask them about the brake shoes as those are consumables. Good luck.

**Riverbug** · 03-09-2023, 06:19 PM

That's a good reminder for me to check the brake adjustment before we head to the mountains with the new trailer this summer...

**Hoopy Frood** · 03-09-2023, 06:27 PM

Originally Posted by JM0397

Yep, 1st time rookie mistake. I knew I should have brought it in for service after a few months, but rolled the dice instead. However, could have been far worse on the road so alls we’ll that ends well, even if I’m out $900 for the time being.

Well, you don't know what you don't know. Chalk it up to experience.

**Tony_in_AZ** · 03-09-2023, 07:24 PM

We bought our Solitude 3540gk 2021 as used.. It had 2 bad brake assemblies too. I discovered a loose wheel bearing at the beginning of our trip in summer 2022. I adjusted it, checked the other wheel bearings and kept an eye on them.

After the trip I pulled the left front hub off. The tech that had repacked the bearings, the garter spring on the new seal had popped off and was wedged in between the inner bearing and spindle. As the garter spring crushed , the bearing became loose. I repacked all 4 bearings, new seals in january 2023.

I also found 2 bad brake assemblies. One with worn shoes with the auto adjust brake arm had the center of the pivot hole was loose, center insert popped out. 2nd bad brake assembly the magnet wires were near rubbed thru, grease in the shoes. I replaced 2 full assemblies since the other 2 look great. I bought a set of 4 complete brake assemblies. I can rob the unused assemblies for parts or whatever

The 12x2 inch brakes are used on 4k to 7 k axles. I think the 7k axles should have 12x2.5 inch brakes on them to avoid the high wear rate. That would require different wider drum assembly and shoes, so that wider brake would never happen because of $$. 3k weight increase on the same size brake shoes seems wrong , but I am not an engineer. But I spent 5 decades as a mechanic and have worked on thousands of vehicles small to large and seen a lot of under engineered items.

Photo shows the brake arm pivot point where the arm is very loose.

There may be a disc brake conversion in my Solitude's future? Not sure yet.