Being the single most important part on our trucks I thought I would toss some thoughts out there for your opinions. To start I have had other 3/4ton trucks though none with a heavy diesel motor and they seem to perform well with stock brake my rotors will last about a 100k and the pads 50-60k on the two gassers I have that are driveable. Now my diesel ram chewed up my rotors and pads in 30k miles is this normal? The pads where ebc greenstuff 600 for the 8800gvwr not the 7500gvwr almost biffed that this go round and stock rotors at 225,800 miles the front brakes where completly overhauled new lines, calipers, cleaned and wire brushed the caliper mounts, rotors and pads it just had that done again minus the calipers one rotor was 10thousands under min and the other was 20thousands above min and only one side wiskers were squeaking. My thoughts/questions are is this normal or is this problem being caused by that 530 dollar p.o.s valve in the rear that proporsions brake pressure according to weight my bar that connects the two keeps falling off of which I have found some simple repairs (assuming you didnt do what I did which is try to take the lever off you will turn the valve and have a nightmare on your hands) So your choices are replace it with either a staight piece of brake line, put a new valve in or if your lucky and only have my original problem grind off the nub on the lever that the bar connects to and then drill a hole in the center of where the nub exsisted about 3/16 will do. Now you can turn your attention to the bar pull it out and drill out the socket where the the nub went to hold it on same drill. Then put the bar back in and sandwhich a nylon washer between the bar and the bolt head then one between the lever and the bar and the final one between the lever and the nut and there you go your off to the races. So I now have a line and no valve because of my mistakes the last question I had was when I rebuild my rear brakes should I install the one tone wheel cylinders or will that increase chances of wheel lockup while unloaded Mike I believe you have done this and have wright up about it so I am eager to hear back I dont want to make dropping 700 dollars a common ocurence for a set of brakes Thanks as always the help is greatly appreichiated

Well... Hmmm...

I'm at 165K miles still running the stock brake pads from the Factory... I never done a brake job yet since the day I bought the truck brand new with only 20 miles on the odometer... I've got enough brake pad left to go all the way to 200K miles. But i know by the time I get there I'll need new rotors too.

My solution is Exhaust brake. I do 90% of all my slowing and stopping with it. The only time I put my foot on the service brake is to stop or for a panic stop. Other than that I just use the exhaust brake and my throttle foot for slowing down. I've been knowing to load up with about 3 cords of firewood and come down from 7,500-8,000 feet elevation and never touch my brakes for over 30 miles of forestry roads at grades of 6-10%... Do it every year...

Yes that's a 8x8x3 trailer...

http://forum.mopar1973man.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=199

Here is what my pads and rotors look like at 120K miles... (rears) My fronts loked just the same...

http://forum.mopar1973man.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=893

http://forum.mopar1973man.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=892

There reason at this point I had debris built up inside the calper and jammed the piston causing shoe drag. So I disassembled the calipers and clean them out and never looked back. Still going with stock parts...

---------- Post added at 08:15 AM ---------- Previous post was at 07:59 AM ----------

Mike I believe you have done this and have wright up about it so I am eager to hear back I dont want to make dropping 700 dollars a common ocurence for a set of brakes

Thanks as always the help is greatly appreichiated

Actually the only thing I done is rebuilt my calipers back at 120K miles thats about it... The calipers were failing from the debris built up under the weather seal and inside the black sludge wasn't helping. So after giving them a bath and replacing a few wore parts (Cost all of $40 bucks from the dealer) like a few new seals and 1 piston I blew up!

give me a bit I need t ofix a link issues I have my brake page back up...

Thanks for the quick response Mike, kinda confused though, was this your write up http://mopar.mopar1973man.com/cummins/2ndgen24v/drum-upgrade/drum-upgrade.htm ? and from this quote I take it you have four wheel disc brakes slightly confused lol sry Im still new to forums I realized after the fact the right way to add quotes "Here is what my pads and rotors look like at 120K miles... (rears) My fronts loked just the same..." I have drum rears which at 253k ish are original and almost spent but by this I would say my back brakes need to do more stopping power if you follow. Let me know, Thoughts on the exhaust brake are yea there pretty awesome like you I am a volunteer firefighter for our community and all our fire rigs are equiped with that nifty device, though our new fire chief does not like the use of theese due to his belief that they damage engines and woul always say "its cheaper to change brakes than an engine" My question to you is do they actually damage your engine I believe it is a form of using the exhaust compression to slow the engine feel free to correct me I have never tinkered with one yet Thanks and always appreichiated

i cannot see the pics