Q What is your opinion as to the advis
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ability of fitting an exhaust brake where this is available as an optional extra? One is given to understand that they can be conducive to rapid bore wear.
AThere are many reasons why you should or should not do this. In its favour is a considerable saving in brake-lining life if your vehicle is engaged on substantial mileage in very hilly country. Against the fitting of such a unit you are correct in noting that bore wear could be increased. But this would not be sufficient to deter one from fitting an exhaust brake if one were of the mind to do so as the rate of wear is not increased substantially. It is true, however, that the effectiveness of an exhaust brake as a retarder depends entirely on the driver being in the correct gear at all times when the gear is applied. When engaged in operations covering long distances over reasonably flat roads the advantages of such a unit are so small as to be hardly worth while.
Your aim in fitting extra braking equipment may be to increase the useful life of brake linings or alternatively to assure that should the service brakes be required in an emergency they are in fact not already overheated and so rendered partially ineffective by continuous service application. If so, it is suggested that you consider a transmission-mounted electric retarder which is effective irrespective of the gear in which the vehicle is running and at all —except very low--speeds.