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FedEx Freight | Ghost Braking

At YRC I was driving a truck through downtown Dallas TX when my mitigation device took over and locked me down in going home traffic.YIKES!!I learned to disengage the cruise control whenever your in close quarters with other vehicles..i.e.traffic and the such.This will inevitably catch some driver unaware in the winter time.the results could be terrible
 
FYI their are two levels of G/B. Tier 1 & Tier 2. Tier 1 lasts a few seconds which may have been caused by a obstacle (overpass or overhead sign)and a reprogramming may correct problem Tier 2 will bring you down to a crawl quite suddenly for no reason,this happened to me recently. Nice quiet drive at night alone on a straight interstate with no other vehicles in sight( thankfully) which was verified by onboard camera. With a tier 2 incident the tractor will be removed from service (if reported) and shipped off for investigation. Be Safe
 
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I was in downtown Dallas going out in rush hour traffic and the brakes started applying themselves and then sudden lock up.I was stuck for over 20 minutes.
 
Same bullshit at Saia. In my opinion, the forward sensor gets knocked out of alignment and starts tracking objects outside the centerline of the truck. Occasionally, my old Volvo will beep at overpass supports, trees, lot lizards, what can I say, old dogs and Volvos are set in their ways. However, beeping is all that it will do and so ghost braking is not an issue. Funny how its the enhanced "safety" suite of sensors and self braking programs, on these new trucks, that are a potential lawsuit waiting to happen and my old Volvo just cruises down the road. By the way, adding insult to injury, the hard braking also generates a coaching video. Ya'll be safe.
 
Dracula said:
Same :horseshit: at Saia. In my opinion, the forward sensor gets knocked out of alignment and starts tracking objects outside the centerline of the truck. Occasionally, my old Volvo will beep at overpass supports, trees, lot lizards, what can I say, old dogs and Volvos are set in their ways. However, beeping is all that it will do and so ghost braking is not an issue. Funny how its the enhanced "safety" suite of sensors and self braking programs, on these new trucks, that are a potential lawsuit waiting to happen and my old Volvo just cruises down the road. By the way, adding insult to injury, the hard braking also generates a coaching video. Ya'll be safe.
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As far as CLT, the only trucks that I know of that are have this problem are the Freightliner Cascadias...and they're pretty bad at doing it!! They get sent to the dealership where they're gone for a month or so only to return with the same problem.
 
New Peterbuilt did a ghost brake on me today. Doing 50 Mph on a two lane road with no objects around for it to detect. There were no cars coming at me or in front of me. It jammed the brakes on for a full second while beeping like mad and then just released. Had to be interviewed by shop manager for my braking event. They actually have a form they fill out for this issue.
 
groovydp said:
New Peterbuilt did a ghost brake on me today. Doing 50 Mph on a two lane road with no objects around for it to detect. There were no cars coming at me or in front of me. It jammed the brakes on for a full second while beeping like mad and then just released. Had to be interviewed by shop manager for my braking event. They actually have a form they fill out for this issue.
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I had a Saia truck do the same thing to me....I pulled some foam out of the drivers seat...
 
I'm glad we don't have that "safety equipment" on our trucks . just got good old 7 and 10 speeds cruise and anti brakes at least we can drive without the fear of the truck wanting to stop on its own . everybody stay safe
 
Maybe it's time for a truckingboards poll on this topic?

I have had this issue occur to me in multiple trucks from different manufacturers. The problem, in my opinion, has to be with the Bendix Wingman's programming.

Historically, trucks had a shutdown override switch, allowing us to get to a safe spot in case of engine trouple.

Unless these systems are 100 percent, we should have the ability to override the ridiculous ghost braking scenario, which will shut you down until powering down and restarting the engine.

Even without imagining the implications of this occurring in poor weather, think about those bridges, construction zones, rail crossings and intersections that this scenario can occur on creating potentially fatal outcomes.

This technology is in it's infancy, until it is perfect, we need the ability to override it when it fails.

Come on fleet maintenance - be our shop of choice!
 
Just yesterday we had a driver who made it back to the yard while his truck was "ghost braking". He managed to get it around to our shop and while keeping it running, he flagged a mechanic to come over and ask if they could hook up the laptop to see if they could find anything wrong while the "ghost braking" was still active. The mechanic told him, "sorry, there's nothing I can do"....really??!!!?? He tried to explain to the mechanic that if he powered down the truck, if any info was present it would be lost. The mechanic gave the usual response of, "if there's an active code it will still be in the ECM" which is true for most codes but NOT for the ghost braking.

Oh well, guess he can park the truck and when the mfg rep shows up in two weeks and says there's nothing wrong with it, they can send it off to la la land (the dealership) for a month only for them to say nothing is wrong.

The moral of the story is our shop wasted a golden opportunity to "try" and gather some type of data while the "ghost braking" was still active instead of the status quo of letting la la land deny that there's a problem!!
 
Had a visit from the regional safety rep last month about this. Told us that ghost braking has been confirmed to be a real issue, and that, if it happens to you, get it to the nearest yard, if possible, and turn it in immediately.
 
I had a ghost brake that damn near put me in the guard rail because it catches you off guard. Called regional Saftey guy, had me take it to our shop on my return trip, filled out a shop insident report. When it was all said and done said nothing wrong with the equipment , mind you it was on a newest of the Pete's at the time r18xxx and I was the first on the newest system and the end result it had to be something I did.
Till a lawsuit hits them it's business as usual here nothing to see, it's your fault.
 
Redracer3136 said:
Just yesterday we had a driver who made it back to the yard while his truck was "ghost braking". He managed to get it around to our shop and while keeping it running, he flagged a mechanic to come over and ask if they could hook up the laptop to see if they could find anything wrong while the "ghost braking" was still active. The mechanic told him, "sorry, there's nothing I can do"....really??!!!?? He tried to explain to the mechanic that if he powered down the truck, if any info was present it would be lost. The mechanic gave the usual response of, "if there's an active code it will still be in the ECM" which is true for most codes but NOT for the ghost braking.

Oh well, guess he can park the truck and when the mfg rep shows up in two weeks and says there's nothing wrong with it, they can send it off to la la land (the dealership) for a month only for them to say nothing is wrong.

The moral of the story is our shop wasted a golden opportunity to "try" and gather some type of data while the "ghost braking" was still active instead of the status quo of letting la la land deny that there's a problem!!
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You and that driver should educate yourselves on how diagnostics work on vehicles before you try and throw a professional under the bus, for something you all clearly don't understand or don't know about.
 
Crazy Trucker said:
You and that driver should educate yourselves on how diagnostics work on vehicles before you try and throw a professional under the bus, for something you all clearly don't understand or don't know about.
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Wow you just have to argue don't you? I'm with Red because I've had things like this and I've had mechanics both where I work and at dealerships tell me next time it does it don't shut it off just get it here so we can check it. Believe it or not there are things that act up but don't store a code in the history, my truck was doing it with the intake valve actuators. When you've been more than a steering wheel holder you'll understand.
 
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