| Re: [GMCnet] The KISS Parking Brake [message #218843] |
Sun, 18 August 2013 00:00 |
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hnielsen2
Messages: 1434
Registered: February 2004
Location: Alpine CA
Karma: 0
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Senior Member |
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Way back a long, long time age we had the Milk Man.
Do some of you remember?
I was the milk man at age 17
I drove on Saturday for Dairy Mart Farms here in San Diego.
On the old Divco milk truck we had a brake device.
Worked like this hit the foot brake pedal flick the electric switch and the brakes where locked up.
To start up hit the foot brake pedal and you where good to go.
One of the routes I worked had a very steep grade ( Steve and Nance Ferguson ) old neighborhood.
That truck never moved until you disengage the brake lock.
The truck I drove was the larger of the Divco milk trucks
One of the side benefits was all the chocolate milk I could drink at I think .25 a qt.
Had not thought of this for years.
Why not use something like this on our GMC's?
KISS?
Howard
Alpine
74 Canyon Lands
All is well with my Lord
Never Give Up
On Aug 17, 2013, at 18:09, Kerry Pinkerton <Pinkertonk@MCHSI.com> wrote:
>
>
> Kiss = Keep It Simple Stupid. It would be hard to be simpler than this.
>
> When I had drum brakes the parking brake sucked. When I installed the Manny Brake System, they sucked worse and while good things are in the works, at the moment the parking brake situation is just about useless.
>
> I've been thinking about a mechanical brake holder downer thingie for some months after Ken Henderson explained his electric vacuum puller system.
>
> Anyway, here is the prototype I came up with. The first thing is the anchor point. After looking around, I discovered that the steering column bracket is bolted to the foot well with four 5/16 carriage bolts. I removed the lower inner (closest to the engine) and replaced it with a 5/16 eye bolt. ( I didn't have a 5/16 eye bolt so I welded a loop to a 5/16 nut. ) I had to pull the plastic foot well out of the way to get the carriage bolt out.
>
> http://www.gmcmhphotos.com/photos/data/6433/m_0181.jpg
>
>
>
> Then I had to prototype the hooks. Another eye bolt was cut so it a hook. Another hook was welded to a tube with a nut welded to each end. The two were screwed together and a handle bent from 1/4 rod and welded to the top hook.
>
> http://www.gmcmhphotos.com/photos/data/6433/m_0171.jpg
>
>
>
> That's pretty much it. When you want to engage it, simply hook the bottom into the floor eye bolt, depress the brake pedal and swing the top hook over the pedal arm. Pedal stays down. Brakes stay on. Coach doesn't move. Want more or less pedal just rotate the top hook to close the distance.
>
> With it pretty tight, the coach won't move under power...at least I didn't want to rev it any higher.
>
> Here are a couple shots of it in place:
>
> http://www.gmcmhphotos.com/photos/data/6433/m_0191.jpg
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>
>
> Other side view:
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> http://www.gmcmhphotos.com/photos/data/6433/m_0201.jpg
>
>
>
> The only other thing is to deal with the brake light being on whenever the brake pedal is down. The simple solution is to fine the brake wire and move it from an always on 12V to a line that is switched on by the ignition switch.
>
> The next version will have a knob on the shaft that will allow the adjustment of the top hook while on the pedal. That way you can just twist it a couple times to really set the pedal and back it off to remove. Although, I doubt that the last 1/4" of pedal travel will change how hard the coach is to move.
>
> It might make sense to paint the floor hook a bright red or something. A small flashlight handy to the drivers seat might be useful for nighttime work.
>
> I'd thought about doing something using a cable and the original hand brake lever to pull the pedal down but want to keep the rear cable linkage intact for the anticipated new parking brake.
>
> Even so, there might be times where having all six wheels locked and not depending on the parking pawl would be a very, very good thing.
>
>
> --
> Kerry Pinkerton
>
> North Alabama, near Huntsville,
>
> 77 Eleganza II, "The Lady", 403CI, also a 76 Eleganza being re-bodied as an Art Deco car hauler
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