Van Disc Brake Locks Up Near Barstow CA.

Monday February 28, 2022 Barstow, CA.

Night travel

I left on Sunday night about 7 as I wanted to get through 580 that goes through the city’s while traffic wasn’t too bad. It wasn’t too bad but one has to really stay on one’s toes for all the highway changes which I did  fortunately.

I stayed at a rest stop last night that wasn’t too bad.

Today I continued on.

Noisy road or flat tire

I was going up a grade today when I heard a lot of road noise. But what was it. Just a noisy road or a flat tire. It eventually stopped so I thought noisy road.

But later as I was getting close to Barstow on highway 58 it started again and then stopped. I still wasn’t certain what it was as it always stopped. Not long after that I pulled off at the highway 58 and highway 395 junction for gas and checked all the wheels to see if any were warm or hot. HOT!

Trouble

I found the drivers front side was pretty hot and when I tried to leave the gas station I could feel the brake was dragging and it was hard to go.

So I needed to check it out so I pulled into the desert just behind a Pilot truck stop and started to get my tools out to pull the wheel so I I could check out the disc brakes.

No jack

I looked all through the van but could  not find my jack. I looked twice and still couldn’t find it so I must have forgotten to put it back in the van or just don’t remember where it is.

Option 2

I have AAA so I called them on my cell phone. I’m not too good with the cell phone as it doesn’t work at my house with the hills and big trees. First they screwed up and transferred me down to southern California AAA which was right but when I got them they said wrong place and transferred me back and then the north guys transferred me back again which was the right place as I was in the south. I realized something was wrong and called them on it, so at least I was talking with the right office.

Once at the right place they set me up but I couldn’t give them an address not being able to use my cell phone very good but I did tell her exactly where I was at the 58, 395 junction and behind the Pilot truck stop.

Wrong place

I waited an hour and no one showed so I called back. They found the truck was sent to the wrong place so we tried again and this time I told her to give the truck driver my cell phone number so he could call and he’d be about an hour.

Wrong place again, darn

After two hours he called and said he was about ten minutes away so I gave him directions again. He still could not find me even through I was watching the intersection  for him so I told him how and what roads I was traveling and where I pulled off and it was going south on 395.

He finally realized he was sent to the wrong place again and sent in the wrong direction. It was almost 5 and I was concerned about staying in my van at the Midas brake place so I told him about that. If they’d got me the first time I could of got this fixed and be on my way and the Midas place was likely going to close as late as it was in the day by the time we got there. He was two  hours east of me so it would be a long time to get here.

Cancel

So I told him to cancel and I’d start over tomorrow morning. He did know where I was now at least. And I’m in the desert just outside of town so this is a good spot for the night.

I did some more testing as I thought I might be able to move as once this cooled down it freed up the brake. So  I moved the van around a bit and found that when I used the brakes it locked up again, so I’ll need that tow truck tomorrow.

Trains

The one bad thing about this spot just went by. Real noisy trains going by. Very noisy but I’m live.

So Tuesday morning I’ll be setting up another tow truck and I hope things go better. :O)

From what I can tell, it appears the disc  brake piston is sticking, likely from lack of use.

Nice day other than that. :O)