I received a recall notice last week from Cummins on the brake calipers. After reading Lindsay's response I got on their website and checked out the recall. Unfortunately, I am leaving Oct 13th for Myrtle Beach, SC (about 800 miles) and NO ONE around here (upstate NY) can do the work!! They don't have the parts or there is a long waiting list! Has anyone else had a problem with their brakes? I probably will have to drive to MB and hopefully get it serviced down there. I have 14,000 miles on the coach so I am keeping my fingers crossed that I can get there without any trouble! I don't know what else to do. Any advice would be greatly appreciated! Marie
Of course every coach is different but I have 50,000 miles on mine, with no problems, and am not in a hurry to have my calipers changed out with a new, untried product. We will leave in a few weeks to head out to the western mountains AGAIN, and do not expect any problems during the trip. Every year we usually head out on a 7-8000 mile trip through the West and we have had no trouble at all with the brakes. It is difficult to say whether you will have problems or not but I certainly would not delay a planned trip because none of the local service centers cannot fit you in their schedule.
The recall is Workhorse rather than Cummings. We had 43,000 plus miles on ours and had driven in around 44 states including some pretty grades in the Rockies. After that, we had two total brake failures in 800 miles. The second total brake failure was on the Blue Ridge Parkway in North Carolina and could have easily resulted in my families death. The symptom is the brakes go all the way to the floor and do not work at all. Sensors and pins heat up, melt and the fluid leaks out. This isn’t a simple recall like on a wiper blade, this is something that caused me to be trembling an hour after it happened. Had I not pulled into a fortunate overlook, we would have been killed for sure. My wife is still very uncomfortable riding in the motor home. The new calipers are not really untested, they just have the pins made out of a nonmeltable material. Bosh makes millions of other brakes. The reason they didn’t work well on a RV is that if you don’t use it for an extended period of time the rotors develop rust and that causes heat buildup when you use it. The “extended time” for rust is determined by moisture and environmental factors. The actual repair takes a couple of hours and if you can’t get them fixed before you leave, strongly consider getting them fixed along the way. If I were you I would avoid any mountains and drive very defensively. If your brake in a car go out, you can use the emergency brake. In most RV’s , the emergency brake is a drive shaft griper. If your 24,000 pounds starts going down hill with no brakes, you are in deep trouble. If you have an accident and the attorney for the deceased folks brings up the repaired brakes were available, by you chose to not put them on right away, your position is going to be very bad. Use the link below to find a dealer by zip code. http://www.workhorse.com/Default.aspx?tabid=81 Workhorse did not do the recall until they had 200,000 calipers available. That’s 50,000 motor homes., Myrtle Beach is the home base of one of the moderators at IR2 Workhorse forum and he had his repaired there. Be Safe
