Downhill Grades With A Bus

[Headache]

Thanks Mark, I'm pretty ignorant to the actual mechanics. The best I can do most of the time is knowing that I can flip a button on the shifter and get another set of gears for doing so.

[Bob]

I have also found it very handy to follow behind the largest truck you can find..such as a diesel dump truck. Tried and proven method of stopping!

[Jones'n4chrome]

I have also found it very handy to follow behind the largest truck you can find..such as a diesel dump truck. Tried and proven method of stopping!

Yeah, but your bike and bike rack don't care much for that method

[Bob]

True...and neither did my awesome bike that I got from Rudy.

[graydawg]

Hey Rudy, just slow it down, use the hittim and release method it works, don't let your speed build up to that point and you will never need a jake brake to start with use common sense not common bucks to go fast down hill stay in control of the situation, if your brakes are smokkin you are not in control, don't get overconfident and think you own a hill. thats when you better be ready for a lifetime ride. use the brakecheck areas you are not far from one on Mt Eagle. I have been passed a many time going down hill, with jake breaks bellowing. I just don't trust an exhaust break enough to let it take me for that final ride, or maybe I am a control freak, and want the ultimate control over what I am driving and stopping. Now I haven't been down grapevine yet, but I just don't think it could be any worse than the mountains over in Turkey, and none of the military trucks had jakes on them, and I couldn't read the few highway signs they did have. If you do have a jake or other exhaust brake they do break and malfunction, can you still stop your vehicle. I also think the fine for using a exhaust break in a residential areas and truck stop's are the worst places, should be around $10,000.oo personally, but that's just my opinion. By the way Rudy just get a dragster parachute for between them stacks, it would look good above the wheelie bars. James in da GRAYDAWG
PS just slow down you are not going anywhere in a hurry anyway just leave a hour earlier.

[Dennis The Bus Dweller]

Hey Rudy, just slow it down, use the hittim and release method it works, don't let your speed build up to that point and you will never need a jake brake to start with use common sense not common bucks

This pretty much says it all

[Mark R. Obtinario]

What graydawg had to say about leaving an hour earlier says about all there is to say.

Recently I have been picking up a few bus runs for a small locally owned charter bus company.

They have three motorcoaches. One has an 8V-71, one has a 6V-92T, and one has an 8V-92T. The difference in time it took to get up the mountain to the ski area was within the margin of error--less than five minutes. And as far as going down the hill is concerned, they all went down at about the same speed.

When the Katrina mess occurred I spent 40-days down in LA and AR doing moves in a motorcoach.

One move was from Lake Charles, LA to Fort Smith, AR. The next day I was talking to one of the other drivers who had commented about how hard it was driving through the mountains.

At first I thought she was kidding. The mountains in AR I went through would be considered small hills around here. But to her, it was a tough drive. Come to find out she was from FL. I don't think there are many mountains where she lives.

What it all comes down to is how familiar you are with the vehicle and with the road.