Operating a semi-truck is serious business. Taking a proactive approach to truck trailer maintenance can help keep you safely rolling at work. Here are some truck trailer maintenance tips for keeping your brakes and suspension optimized.
Brakes
Maintaining your truck trailer brakes is one of your most important safety measures. Although maintaining your truck trailer brakes will vary based on the demands of your job, there are some easy maintenance tips you can routinely perform to keep them fully operational.
- Hose them down: grit, grime, and mineral deposits can become fused to your truck trailer brake pads when they are engaged. If left unchecked, these deposits can accelerate the corrosion of your brake pads and rotors. Possibly the easiest truck trailer maintenance habit you institute is hosing off your tires, rims, rotors, and brake pads at the end of each shift. To get this job done efficiently, you'll want to invest in a high-pressure hose wand. When rinsing, take a top to bottom approach to rinse away any detritus that might drip down into your wheel hubs. Continue rinsing until the rinsed water washes away cleanly and clearly.
- Lube your calipers: your brake calipers are responsible for adjusting your brake pad pressure. When your calipers lose lubrication, they can become less responsive and cause your brake pads and rotors to degrade more rapidly. One of the reasons why regularly lubricating your brake calipers should become a habit is because it's so easy. Simply squirt truck trailer lubricant into your brake calipers at the end of each workweek.
Suspension
The air suspension on today's truck trailers is more sophisticated than ever before. Making small adjustments and creating a few maintenance habits can help you keep your truck trailer suspension fine-tuned.
- Align your axels: weight in a truck trailer should be distributed directly beneath each chassis and axel. However, as your truck trailer bumps along the highway, your chassis and axels may become slightly out of alignment. To maintain your suspension system and to ensure that you can safely navigate your load, you should regularly schedule an axel realignment every time your truck trailer is serviced. Although this is likely to add to the cost of your truck trailer servicing, it can extend the life of your truck trailer suspension system.
- Secure your load: tightly securing your cargo load can decrease the pressure exerted on your suspension system. Before every trip, spend few extra minutes cranking your tie-down straps just a little tighter.
To get help with truck trailer maintenance, contact a company like A 24-7 Repair Services.