When I hear people trying to jump into moving vehicles, all I can think of is the trauma patients that I have cared for trying to do the same thing. Many of them died after the vehicle ran them over, those that didn't were critically injured, some disabled for life. Trying to stop a moving vehicle is a very dangerous thing. Letting it slide is a very dangerous thing. A bit of a catch 22 I suppose. Glad everyone is ok.
Quote: On trailers with breakaway switches, could one pull that pin, thereby locking up the trailer brakes/wheels?
I am a newbie, but I can only imagine this would make the situation worse and dangerous. If you are sliding (or begin to slid) on ice, brakes are your enemy. Once you start sliding, you would have no way to release the brakes (plug the pin back in) and try to gain control....only coming to a stop by slamming into something or worse.
I was talking about a situation like the O.P.'s, when he'd gotten out of the vehicle and left it parked.
There'd been a suggestion that perhaps the trailer not having the brakes engaged helped to "push" the truck...
" Not every mind that wanders is lost. " With apologies toJ.R.R. Tolkien
One of my wrecks happened after I parked in the Timberline Parking lot. I pulled into a sloped spot against the snow back. As I got out of my seat the front end broke loose, and we slid into the truck next to us. Luckily, when he tried to park, he couldn't stop and buried the nose into the snow bank. If he had not done that, I'm pretty sure I would have started a full domino reaction with the entire row of 20+ cars. But up until that point, the drive was completely uneventful.
Bryan
2000 Ford E350 DRW Wagon (14-pass all captains chairs)
V10 w/ Banks PowerPack, Diablo Predator, 4.56 LS, ~350,000 miles
New Desert Fox in the works!
JohnG4706 wrote: OK, I am a newbie and still learning... There has been quite a bit of discussion on Brake Controllers. I am thinking if this would happen to me in the future, say pulling in for dinner and the parking lot has plenty of slope. Naturally, setting the parking brake before getting out. Will that be enough? Would choice of a brake controller have helped the situation?
Once you take your foot off the brake, does this release the trailer brakes? Is there anything that you can do with the brake controller to keep the trailer brakes locked? Does turning off the truck ignition also turn off the brake controller, manual setting and/or trailer brakes also.
Is there anything you can do, short of chocking the wheels, to lock the brakes on the trailer?
Thanks in advance for another learning lesson.
On a hard surface your truck parking brake should be plenty. The trailer brakes are electric and cannot be used as a parking brake or they will overheat. Yes truck off or foot off the brake means the trailer brakes are properly disengaged.
Tip: Put the truck in neutral and make sure the parking brake is holding fine for a few seconds before you put it in park. When you leave be sure to move the selector out of park BEFORE you release the parking brake.
If it is extreme or you have any doubt use your wedge wheel chocks.
to let you know there was re ally a no win situation on that hill the day when I step out of the vehicle on the hillside the truck and trailer or going away from me not towards me but towards other people that were out of their vehicles in standing next to them so I got my only option was to get my vehicle away from them and there's and we've to the stopped traffic it is something definitely I will never try to repeat I have driven trailers and boats in lots of snow and never had anything like this happen but lesson definitely learned nobody got hurt so it was a very very cheap lesson .
I would like to point out what I believe to be important about trailer braking on a slick surface. There are two types of brake controls: inertia-activated and time activated. If you have the inertia type controller, pushing on the brake pedal may have little effect on applying trailer brakes unless the tow vehicle is actually decelerating. You may need to manually activate the lever on the Brake Controller for the trailer brakes to do their job adding four more wheels to help in stopping.
Give this some thought… Remember, to be forewarned is to be forearmed. Jack
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