Electric Trailer Brake Question
I am new to RVs and recently took possession of a new Montana 3790RD fifth wheel RV. The 3790RD is rated at 13K pounds dry and the CAT scales gave me a trailer axle weight of just under 11,000 pounds....
Forum Discussion
Wow, I've got to say Boshog, you've done your homework. I will say that based on my experience to date, the brakes don't work over 30mph either as the incident that got my attention happened to when I tried to do a panic stop at approximately 50mph and had virtually no trailer brakes. Although and emergency stop, I should have had room to bring it to a stop in the distance I had available. As it was I had to maneuver around an idiot who had slid through a stop sign, which isn't at all fun with 14k or so behind a truck that doesn't handle particularly well empty. It's set up for hauling not handling.
As to the questions of brake current draw, the dealer used a tester at the trailer connector that applies 12vdc to the brake circuit while measuring current flow. According to dexter, the coils on these brakes should draw approximately 3amps each. If you have wiring issues, an open coil or whatnot the current draw will be less. As part of the discussion I had with a dexter rep they also indicated that the brakes aren't designed to lock up with a loaded trailer. Given that Ram has evidently chosen to reduce the braking even further we now have a situation that is seriously unsafe.
For the record, the 5er has been towed behind a ford with a factory controller and the brakes worked great. Doing this was a pain since I had to pull the Anderson hitch adapter off first.
Unfortunately, I've only had the 5er a couple months and the truck approximately 3 so I'm just getting the feel for things, and when it wasn't right initially I didn't suspect serious design flaws so I just started looking into the issue through the dealers. I don't have room to store the 5er at the house, and getting at it now with all the snow is difficult. Took me almost 30 minutes to park it last night when returning from the dealer because I couldn't get traction in the 7 or 8 inches of snow in the storage lot. Almost had to resort to chains.
Now that I have some background I'll insist the truck dealer contacts Chrysler if things "check out". I'll wait to see what they're going to do to fix the problem prior to figuring out what the next course of action should be.
Finally, if and when I try and do further testing, my initial thoughts are that all I will have to is figure out how to put an ammeter/data logger in the circuit to measure total current flow, while at the same time capturing the pulse width/voltage on a scope. I'm not sure what that would prove though as it appears from reading everything Boshog has done so far there isn't much else to learn. It appears to be a serious design flaw from the factory, with the only thing left resolved is what they're going to do about it before someone gets killed.
As to the questions of brake current draw, the dealer used a tester at the trailer connector that applies 12vdc to the brake circuit while measuring current flow. According to dexter, the coils on these brakes should draw approximately 3amps each. If you have wiring issues, an open coil or whatnot the current draw will be less. As part of the discussion I had with a dexter rep they also indicated that the brakes aren't designed to lock up with a loaded trailer. Given that Ram has evidently chosen to reduce the braking even further we now have a situation that is seriously unsafe.
For the record, the 5er has been towed behind a ford with a factory controller and the brakes worked great. Doing this was a pain since I had to pull the Anderson hitch adapter off first.
Unfortunately, I've only had the 5er a couple months and the truck approximately 3 so I'm just getting the feel for things, and when it wasn't right initially I didn't suspect serious design flaws so I just started looking into the issue through the dealers. I don't have room to store the 5er at the house, and getting at it now with all the snow is difficult. Took me almost 30 minutes to park it last night when returning from the dealer because I couldn't get traction in the 7 or 8 inches of snow in the storage lot. Almost had to resort to chains.
Now that I have some background I'll insist the truck dealer contacts Chrysler if things "check out". I'll wait to see what they're going to do to fix the problem prior to figuring out what the next course of action should be.
Finally, if and when I try and do further testing, my initial thoughts are that all I will have to is figure out how to put an ammeter/data logger in the circuit to measure total current flow, while at the same time capturing the pulse width/voltage on a scope. I'm not sure what that would prove though as it appears from reading everything Boshog has done so far there isn't much else to learn. It appears to be a serious design flaw from the factory, with the only thing left resolved is what they're going to do about it before someone gets killed.
