Couldn’t you just put the truck in neutral and use the regular brakes?
In: 16
Regular brakes work for a car pretty well, pinching the rotor can slow you down pretty quick.
But from the perspective of sheer mass, trying to rely on that for big trucks is simply so much more force. Divide up the forces, say 4 brakes for 4 wheels on a 4 thousand pound car(a bit heavy for an average sedan) is 1000 lbs per wheel. Now take an 18 wheeler, which typically only has 5 axles and so 10 brakes. That may be hauling 60,000 pounds on 10 brakes, it’s 6 times the force per brake. That’s A LOT more force you need to overcome and A LOT more heat being generated when you do so.
Combine the added stress on the brakes with the fact that so much more mass gains way more momentum when on a slope and you’ve got a recipe for overusing and overloading your brakes.
Enter the Jake break, where you can introduce a brake function into the engine itself to kill some of your momentum without touching the brake pedal. This is huge in areas with significant slopes but also just convenient because it allows an operator to save wear and tear on their truck brakes.
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