Brakes, who needs them?

rasbury

Well, seems I have spent more time on the road without brakes than with......last time we took the boat out the reverse lock out was not working so I had to pull the brake line to be able to move the boat. I purchased a new one and spent Thursday installing it and getting the brakes bled....did a test around the neighbor hood and thought everything was working ok...we put the boat in the water no problem but it did seem like I was "pushing" the trailer in reverse a bit.  When we returned to the ramp this weekend and I went to back the trailer in the water....I could again feel like the brakes were trying to grab- not locking them up but felt like it was trying to...and then when I tried to pull the boat out, as soon as I got enough out of the water to put some strain on the truck, it was spinning the rear wheels. I have launched from this ramp the last 5 or so times I took the boat out and while it is steep, was always able to pull it out with no more that a little slip and slide action. I have replaced the master cylinder and it was crap when I bought the boat, now the reverse sensor, all the pads are new, one of the calipers are new and I cleaned up the other three and thought everything was working ok. I noticed at the ramp, and I'm not sure what you call it, but the "emergency brake" which I had used to pump and bleed the brakes was hard stuck all the way down and I could not move it which also let me to think the brakes were locked or nearly...not much experience workin on brakes but this should always move freely, should it not? I am going to start with my volt meter and starting working backwards from the truck and try to figure out what is going on but if anyone wants to chime in with past experience, I will take any info I can!

212rowboat

the rams (stanchions) the caliper slides on when applying brakes like to get grabby, especially when being introduced to salt water... a little bit of rust, or debris in general, and they will pull themselves out of alignment and cause a locking situation. if you're of mind, and you identify that this is happening, a little bit of marine grease (and I mean a little, so as not to sluff off and infiltrate the pads/rotor) on those stanchions/rams, and you'll likely not experience that issue near as much.

rasbury

Well, to follow up, when I cleaned up the pins, I really coated the pins with a break grease but am concerned everything is working freely or not- I did take apart 100%, cleaned everything in brake fluid, replaced one caliper, all the pads, the master cylinder and just recently in the last week, the reverse lockout seloinide. Wish we had spell check. Anyway, all of this done in the last couple of months since I bought the boat. What I found when I went out to look at it yesterday, the ground wire had been pulled off. Bummer, no nothing was working, lights or the reverse lockout.  In addition, when I used a wrench at the ramp to remove the back up selonoid, I broke it between the reducer and the valve. Bummer, brand new. If I had slowed down at the ramp and noticed the wire off, might have averted all of this. While I am waiting for the new part I'm going to lubricate the roller in the actuator. Does the sliding tubing really have only the one roller on the top and metal to metal on the bottom slide?