Brakes, what's too hot?

[Flying kurbmaster]

If you put new pads on lately it is possible that the brakes are sticking they may not have set properly, this happened to me once when a transaxle was replaced they sorted themselves out after a few miles. Brakes in my opinion should never get hot like you are explaining if you go around to your rims and touch them and they feel hot something is not right, unless you have just come down the steepest, longest hill in the Rocky Mountains. On my Kurbmaster I had an issue with one brake getting hot, everything looked ok when checking it, eventually after a lot of frustration, I found out that the flexible hose had an internal issue not noticeable from looking at, it had a flap bit of rubber that was holding the fluid in the caliper so brake was not realeasing completely. Unless you are riding the brakes I doubt you are the problem, especially if this all of a sudden just happened. If you were it is likely the front brakes would get hot before the rear, if you jack up the rear of your rig apply the brakes, realease, then spin your wheel and it is not spinning freely something is not right it is sticking and this will cause it to overheat, go down a straight stretch of road with no hills, stop and check the temperature of your rims with your hand if one is hotter then the rest something is wrong, brake is staying on. Your brakes should not overheat under normal driving.

[MN C Van]

LoL- Yes, his engine will explode.
stay away from the scary lever

All I'm saying is, downshift at a reasonable speed, and let compression braking keep the vehicle speed under control on the descent.

And yes, some modern electronically controlled transmissions will not downshift until the engine RPM is compatible. But I don't know if that is what he has.

He probably does not want to force a downshift to 2nd at 50+ mph just to find out.

Better not risk- You toucha dat 2, engine gonna go boom!
See it many time.

[sternwake]

 Engine braking on my gasser considerable in third.
Assume a diesel would be more so.

Turbo charged diesels do not have much, if any, inherent compression braking. 

The air intake does not 'close off' when you release the throttle, so air is free to flow thru the cylinders and out the exhaust. 

I did not know this, thanks for the enlightenment.

Normally aspirated diesels, how does their engine braking compare to a gasser, in general.

As an Aside, When was the last time a NON turbo diesel was available for on road use.  I can only think of some early to mid 80's Volvos mercedes and one absoolutely hideous Oldsmobile My old man had.  Though in a similar period mom had a VW rabbitt diesel. Incredibly slow, both of them.  Well before I got my license.

[RoamingKat]

I come down those mountains from the Eisenhower Tunnel...I down shift to 2nd gear.
I wait till I have the rig down to about 50 mph, then shift down. Let the gears keep my speed down, after all..I really like still having breaks when I get into Denver.

Mechanic tells me that is the right way coming down steep drops.

[tx2sturgis]

Normally aspirated diesels, how does their engine braking compare to a gasser, in general.

As an Aside, When was the last time a NON turbo diesel was available for on road use.  I can only think of some early to mid 80's Volvos mercedes and one absoolutely hideous Oldsmobile My old man had.  Though in a similar period mom had a VW rabbitt diesel. Incredibly slow, both of them.  Well before I got my license.

Yeah, NA diesels which have no turbo but often have an air 'blower' (and some of those are smoky 2-strokes) are what we used to call 'gut-less wonders'...for on-road use I think they have gone the way of the dodo. The only non-turbo diesels I drove were in the early days of my career driving truck...In the smaller straight trucks they were just barely adequate. But for a class 8 truck grossing near 80,000...they were SHIT. 

There are still some stationary, industrial, marine, and third-world non-turbo diesels out there. I only mention it because I know that if I didn't, it's likely that someone might mention it...you know how forums are. 

Here is a wiki article that explains the lack of diesel engine braking better than I can:


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Engine_braking