etrailer Trailer Brakes AKEBRK-7R-D Review
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Review of etrailer Trailer Brakes AKEBRK-7R-D
Today we're going to take a look at the 12 inch right hand electric brake assembly for a 7000 pound axle. This assembly has the Vacomat finish. These are electric brakes which are easier to install, and they offer more user control than hydraulic brakes. Electric brakes only require an electric brake controller which we do sell separately on our website. There is no actuator or hydraulic lines necessary. This assembly has the nice Vacomat coating, which is used a lot in marine applications, and they do that because it provides superior corrosion resistance for freshwater or saltwater use. The size of this brake assembly is 12 inch by 2 inch, and it's a right hand passenger side brake assembly.
When they say the size 12 inch by 2 inch, the measurement they're talking about, 12 inch is the diameter of the brake assembly so if we measure edge of shoe to edge of shoe, 12 inches. The 2 inch would be the width of the pad itself, the lining, 2 inches. 12 inch by 2 inch. Again, this is a right hand passenger side. A little note on that is, on new assemblies you'll have a sticker on here that'll say right hand or left hand to show the assembler what side it goes on. If by chance you have an assembly and there's no sticker on it, the easiest way to tell is to look at the size of the tab on the shoe.
If you look at this one right here, you can see the shoe goes from here to here, and on this one it goes from here all the way to here. This is a larger and longer shoe, this is the shorter shoe. The shorter shoe is the primary shoe, and that will always face the front of the trailer. If the front of the trailer is that way, here's your shorter shoe, that would go on that side and that'll determine that this is a right hand passenger side assembly. These brake shoes are lined with a nice automotive grade friction material. This friction material's fully bonded to the shoe, it's not riveted so it gives you a lot longer life, more braking torque.
The lining itself has tapered edges, and they do a circular grinding to the lining to help prevent cracking and crumbling that can lead to mechanical lock up. These are manually adjusted brakes, so it does require periodic manual adjustment. Nice thing on the gear on this, it's a fine toothed gear so it gives you more precise setting when you're adjusting it. There's no break in period needed when you're adjusting these. When you do adjust them, what you do is go to the back and at the very bottom you'll see there's an adjusting hole there. This assembly is nice because it includes the adjuster plug.
You always want to have a plug in that hole to keep dirt from getting into your brake assembly and causing problems. You just pop this plug out, put your tool through there, access the gear, turn that gear in or out, whichever way you need to adjust it. Again, this comes with the plug. A lot of brake assemblies will just leave that hole open, you don't want to do that. The other nice thing you'll notice, this is designed to fit on a five bolt brake mounting flange so you'll make sure the nine flange on your axle is the five bolt brake mounting flange. Now, the mounting bolts, the nuts and the lock washers to install this, they are sold separately. We do sell them on our website, and they are listed on this product page as a related product. Now, this assembly is certified by US Standards and CSA which is the Canadian standards. Again, the size on it is 12 inches by 2 inches. The axle it's designed for is a 7000 pound axle, and it does use 12 inch brake drums. Also one last thing is these are electric brakes, you'll notice the two black wires right here coming out the back. Electric brakes require power to the magnet, so basically when you connect these you'll connect one wire to the brake feed to power the magnet and one to a ground. They're both black wires, so either wire can be used for either function, it doesn't matter which one is which. That should do it for the review of the 12 inch right hand electric brake assembly for 7000 pound axle with the Vacomat finish.
Info for this part was:
Installed by:
Jeff D
Installed by:
Jacob H
Video Edited:
Jacob T
Video by:
Chris R
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