Why I Pre-trip. From UNDER The Trailer.

Driver in the dock next to mine had to get a Sunday mobile service call to replace two brake chambers on a pool trailer someone else had dropped.

I'm not a mobile mechanic, but im guessing this cost his outfit well over a grand. Two hours for the job, at limely 350 or so per hour. The service tech let me take pics. Sad thing? Someone put an fhwa inspection sticker on this in February. This year.

Never trust your CDL to someone else's inspection. I've had other drivers, long in the tooth and short on moxy, tell me that if a trailet was federal inspected in the past three or four months they dont bother crawling around underneath it.

The fifteen minutes you save may represent the last fifteen minutes of someone's life. Maybe even your own.

That extent of corrosion is amazing. Schneider does a great job of trailer maintenance so I've never seen anything like that, even though I do look anyway. Great pictures and great lesson.

Question, do drivers use trailers that don't belong to the company? If they do, who covers the repair cost?

Yikes ! That spring is under a LOT of pressure in that top half ! It can take your head off if it was to come free When I worked on semi's and we changed em, they went into a 1/4 inch plate steel box, and got torched apart releasing them from the can before going in the scrap pile.

This old mechanic @ work, said he seen a newbie mechanic remove the clamp on 1 (didn't lock it down with the cage bolt first), the spring exploded out,and took half his face with it !! I never forgot that story!

Yikes ! That spring is under a LOT of pressure in that top half ! It can take your head off if it was to come free When I worked on semi's and we changed em, they went into a 1/4 inch plate steel box, and got torched apart releasing them from the can before going in the scrap pile.

This old mechanic @ work, said he seen a newbie mechanic remove the clamp on 1 (didn't lock it down with the cage bolt first), the spring exploded out,and took half his face with it !! I never forgot that story!

That's a break chamber not a spring. That amount of corrosion to a long time to happen. Air leaks and poor break performance were missed many, many times.

Those canisters have been bad for years!

Yikes ! That spring is under a LOT of pressure in that top half ! It can take your head off if it was to come free When I worked on semi's and we changed em, they went into a 1/4 inch plate steel box, and got torched apart releasing them from the can before going in the scrap pile.

This old mechanic @ work, said he seen a newbie mechanic remove the clamp on 1 (didn't lock it down with the cage bolt first), the spring exploded out,and took half his face with it !! I never forgot that story!

That's a break chamber not a spring. That amount of corrosion to a long time to happen. Air leaks and poor break performance were missed many, many times.

See the compressed coil spring in there, through the hole in the outer casing? There is a spring in that BRAKE chamber for sure. Anyhow, Holy Cow! That didn't just happen overnight.

Serious negligence and/or laziness on the part many, many drivers.

I was trying to add video, the really bad can had a hole on the other side as well, but cannot get it to load. My brother wrenched for upwards of 25 years before starting to drive. He says there is upwards of 3000# of compressive force in that coil spring - think 18" of automotive coil spring tucked into that itty bitty living space. This was a company trailer, gotta suspect the mechanic that put the fhwa sticker on there is looking for a new line of work, or at least a new outfit to be lazy no-account at. And y'all are correct - many, many opportunities for someone to find that and get it repaired. Leads one to wonder how infrequently people actually DO those steps they make you memorize for the DOT Examiner once they get out onto the road. I know, or at least hope, that anyone that seriously follows this site, and is considering this as a career will take the inspection steps seriously, and pre-trip, post-trip, every trip.

Mr. C'don wrote...

Leads one to wonder how infrequently people actually DO those steps they make you memorize for the DOT Examiner once they get out onto the road.

No wonder at all about that...only wonder how long before they either get caught or cause a serious event. I see this glossed over every single day. Good thing most Wally Wagons are in tip-top shape. Beware.