Brake issue with Workhorse

[georgem37303]

I recently had new tires and shocks inalled on my 2004 Dolphin LX. While installing the rear tires, the mechanic called me out to look at the brake rotor. What I saw almost made my heart stop. There are several large cracks going from the top of the rotor down to the center of the hub. The man advised me it would not be advisable to drive the coach until the rotor has been replaced. Also, the other three rotors have cracks in them and glazing on the surfaces from the brake pads dragging against them.

I immediately contacted a Workhorse service center in Knoxville, TN, and told them what I had. They advised me that I needed to bring the coach to them and they had to take the wheels off and take pictures of the damage and email them to Workhorse. If Workhorse felt the damage was from the recall they would replace the calipers at not charge. But the rotors were not covered. The man said Workhorse will claim the rotors were damaged from riding the brakes. How do they know that?

To replace all the calipers and rotors and service manager told me it would cost $1,200. I think all of us that have this type of damage need to band together and file one legal action against Workhorse.

[Richard S.]

Look on the Workhorse chassis forum, all kinds of info.for you.

[abarkl]

I've had that exact same problem twice in the last 3 years and each time the Workhorse regional rep said I didn't know how to drive my RV. Each time the repair was over $1000 to replace the rotors.

[rickandcheryl]

Same thing happened to me and Workhorse WILL NOT reimburse you.

[DriVer]

Quote:

Originally Posted by georgem37303 The man said Workhorse will claim the rotors were damaged from riding the brakes. How do they know that?

George, Who is "the man" that you are referencing in your post? If you have the work done at the Workhorse Service Center they will be looking for issues with your brakes that are defined here.

Safety Recall 50901-C Interim Repair Procedure

If you need assistance finding a service center please let me know. There have been a number of iRV2 members that have been reimbursed for their brake issues which included cracked rotors in conjunction with the failed or seized caliper. Your service situation is unique to your vehicle and it will depend on what they find when they pull the wheels.

[jdsr]

Quote:

Originally Posted by georgem37303 I recently had new tires and shocks inalled on my 2004 Dolphin LX. While installing the rear tires, the mechanic called me out to look at the brake rotor. What I saw almost made my heart stop. There are several large cracks going from the top of the rotor down to the center of the hub. The man advised me it would not be advisable to drive the coach until the rotor has been replaced. Also, the other three rotors have cracks in them and glazing on the surfaces from the brake pads dragging against them. I immediately contacted a Workhorse service center in Knoxville, TN, and told them what I had. They advised me that I needed to bring the coach to them and they had to take the wheels off and take pictures of the damage and email them to Workhorse. If Workhorse felt the damage was from the recall they would replace the calipers at not charge. But the rotors were not covered. The man said Workhorse will claim the rotors were damaged from riding the brakes. How do they know that? To replace all the calipers and rotors and service manager told me it would cost $1,200. I think all of us that have this type of damage need to band together and file one legal action against Workhorse.

Riding the brakes is just the latest bs workhorse is throwing at its cust. A class action would be great but it looks like small claims court might be the way to go. You can go to your states web site to get workhorse/nav agent of service. Its very sad the way wh is handling its cust or ex cust. Your not alone in the way your are being treated by them. Good luck

[-Gramps-]

George, how many miles do you have on those rotors? just curious.

[Duner]

Quote:

Originally Posted by georgem37303 ..... There are several large cracks going from the top of the rotor down to the center of the hub. .... Also, the other three rotors have cracks in them and glazing on the surfaces from the brake pads dragging against them. ..... The man said Workhorse will claim the rotors were damaged from riding the brakes. How do they know that?

If you only have one rotor cracked, that would tell me that it could prossibly be a sticky piston in the caliper. If you were riding the brakes, both wheels on that axle would show the same symptoms.... or all 4 wheels.

Riding the brakes...."How do they know that?" The ECM will set a code and counts how many times the brakes are ON for 2 minutes and the coach is MOVING the whole time. I'm not sure what year WH added that code function to the ECM.

[georgem37303]

Quote:

Originally Posted by -Gramps- George, how many miles do you have on those rotors? just curious.

I have 33,000 miles on the coach. I wonder how hard it is to file an action in small claims court?

[DriVer]

Quote:

Originally Posted by georgem37303 I have 33,000 miles on the coach. I wonder how hard it is to file an action in small claims court?

George, I believe it would be a lot easier to wait for the campaign to launch. By the time a case like you are proposing gets into the legal system, I would expect that the campaign would have been completed on your vehicle.

[roadwalt]

The Recall does nothing to help those of us ripped off by WorkHorse. Two more snow birds came in this week to the campground that were refused payment. (Smoking wheels, one with a fire to be put out)
This BS about applying brakes for over two minutes, is a crock. My brake arm had to be completely disassembled when chassis only 6 months old, to keep the motor from running when the engine was shut off. The computer was never checked by the Work Horse Repair Center and that was six years ago, and I was refused because of a code 80.
I am going to check in to a small claims proceedure, mainly because of the inconsistent payments from Work Horse, and there refusal to believe a Work Horse Center diagnosis. If they won't believe the Centers doing the work, what good are pictures? ABS sensors don't have to be melted to prove caliper dragging. It is the final result of a catastrophe that didn't happen.

[EngineerMike]

I believe the code set is in the ABS computer, not the ECM. Could be mistaken on that. However if that is true, then even if DTCs were cleared from the engine's computer, the codes in the ABS system would remain.

There are many DIY Small Claims Court Instruction books available. Your case would be heard by a judge, the proceeding is fairly informal. IIRC there is no discovery (no power of subpoena to demand evidence from the opposing party), so you bring what you have. This could include recall notices and you can usually submit any formal govt info such as you may obtain from NHTSA. Rules of evidence are somewhat but not entirely relaxed; i.e. the judge doesn't care what you read on iRV2 as that is hearsay (you heard someone say... and therefore you cannot claim factual knowledge of what was overheard). Judge will probably enforce rule of relevance fairly closely, i.e. that your fellow Workhorse buddy had a problem and wasn't paid doesn't mean anything to the judge, as she is concerned with what you might or might not be owed. If you press a suit, and the judge finds WH owes you nothing, you are done. Your matter has been heard and ruled on and you have no right of appeal or subsequent suit (at least this is true last time I checked in CA; I have had to collect some bills over the last 25 years and small claims is good for that on occasion). WH might have reasons to escalate the case to Superior Court (which they can do using a variety of tactics), tho this opens them to discovery, aggregation of the case to class status, etc., which they might want or not want. You can pretty much bet that out of 49,000 coach owners and their spouses, that WH's legal team has a strategy in place for when this trigger gets pulled. Unfortunately the probability that nobody will start this snowball rolling is effectively zero given WH's attitude as noted by members here.

[jdsr]

Quote:

Originally Posted by georgem37303 I have 33,000 miles on the coach. I wonder how hard it is to file an action in small claims court?

You will need agent of service. There is a recent post here that gives it to you if you live in cal. If not go to your states web site and get it there. If everyone who is turned down files in small claims it might wake up workhorse, allthough I doubt it. With all the cust they have lost by doing what thay have done so far its obvious they dont care. Also you can file with www.ftc.gov.

[RickNB]

I have read many posts of brake failures in the past months and have never seen one yet by somebody that has burned their rotors from excessive braking. Then are we to assume that the possibility does not exist that rotors and brake failures can happen from riding the brakes? WH has built into their system a process of measuring the number of times the brakes have been applied for more than 2 minutes while the vehicle is in motion. This would mean that if you are travelling 50 MPH with the brakes applied you would have traveled 8800 feet or 1.66 miles with the brake shoes in contact with the rotors thats a long time and a long distance and I am sure that the rotors will reach some very high temperatures and cause damage. Now we all know that everybody on here does not ride the brakes(tongue in cheek) but WH does not know that so they build in a system to measure how many times that happens so they don't have to replace brake parts for those that ride the brakes and prematurely wear out their brakes. Yes we all know that computers make mistakes(again tongue in cheek) but after 25 years in that business(computer programing) I have seen that most mistakes are made by the interface between the chair and the keyboard. The computer only does what it is told to do in this case a very simply line of code to record the amount of time the vehicle is moving with the brake pedal actuated. I have no problem understanding why WH is looking at the braking codes and pictures of the rotors etc. before authorizing replacement. I am sure that someone out there out of 51000 WH drivers has burnt a set of rotors by riding the brakes and are not going to come on here and post that they did so.

Before the flames start I want to say that is is a proven fact that WH has a brake problem and has told us so and they are working on fixing that and someday they will all be fixed. I am sure that many of the posters on here have had problems caused by the caliper sticking and are good drivers and do not ride the brakes. I am sure that most of us are a lot more aware of what braking problems we can have and how to prevent them by reading many of the posts on this forum. One problem that wont be fixed by the recall and replacement of the calipers is that a set of brakes can be still burnt up by excessive braking for long periods of time (2min). Something that anybody can try is put their parking brake on in their car not hard enough to prevent movement and drive it for 2 minutes at 40 to 50 MPH and then check their rear brakes.
Ready for the flames......

Rick