Braking Conundrum
God willing, my wife and I plan to purchase our first Class A next year. We've done tons of research and know what we want as far as size, layout, etc. We think we might prefer diesel over gas. The p...
Forum Discussion
Hi, I have commercial driver's license. The main difference between "juice" and "air" brakes in usage is brake feel. With hydraulic brakes you have brake feel because of how they work. With air brakes you have no feedback from the pedal how hard you are pressing the brakes. There are other differences that you won't notice when you are using them. For example the parking brake is spring applied and air released. This means that if you have a major air leak and the pressure drops below about 50 psi the parking brake will automatically set. The service brakes are air applied proportional to how far the brake pedal is pressed. There are other braking systems that exist on diesel rigs that do not on gas rigs. They are exhaust brakes and "Jake" brakes. Both provide excellent braking when going down hills. They help keep your speed down and save your service brakes.
