Josolo,
Here is something I wrote when I was commenting to KeithB. It may help you with the problem regarding turning the exhaust brake switch ON and OFF in traffic. Floor pedals are available for both Jake brakes and PAC brakes.
JerryF
DISCUSSION ON EXHAUST BRAKES: JAKE BRAKE/PAC BRAKE
First, if you have a floor pedal on the left side of the floor it works just like your service brake pedal, e.g., when you press it the Jake/PAC brake is on and when you release it the Jake/PAC brake is off. Usually when you have a pedal on the floor there is no On/Off switch to turn on or turn off the exhaust brake. The floor pedal does it all.
On the other hand, with a Jake brake, if do NOT have a floor pedal then you have an On/Off switch PLUS a Hi/Lo switch. PAC brakes do not have an Hi/Lo switch, they only have an On/Off switch when they do NOT have a floor pedal. In this case when the On/Off switch is ON, every time you let your foot off the accelerator pedal the Jake/PAC brake is turned on and the engine is slowing the coach. This means if you do not want to slow down as fast as the Jake/PAC brake is slowing the coach, you must again press the accelerator pedal to turn off the Jake/PAC brake or you must turn the Jake/PAC brake off using the On/Off switch which requires constantly looking (eyes off road) and locating the On/Off switch so you can switch it between ON and OFF. We did not like to turn the switch ON and OFF especially in traffic and on down hill runs. We felt that a few seconds of looking at our side console to ensure we had the correct switch was too dangerous, especially on a downhill curve or in traffic. By the way, if your Jake brake is slowing you more than you want you can, with a Jake brake, click the Hi/Lo switch to LO but this too requires that you look for (eyes off the road) the switch which we did not like to do..
We have had both an On/Off switch and a floor pedal. We settled on a floor pedal so now we just leave our Jake brake on the HI position. We never have to look for a Hi/Lo or an On/Off switch so we can keep our eyes on the road. Because we now have a floor pedal (no On/Off switch) here is what we do. When we are driving and want to stop accelerating, slow, or stop the coach we let off the accelerator pedal. This lets the diesel engine slow up the coach a VERY LITTLE bit (almost like coasting in a car). If we want to slow faster we press the Jake brake floor switch to slow the coach at a faster rate. And last, we press the service brake to stop or slow down at a much faster rate.
If you have never used a Jake or Pac Brake pedal it DOES NOT require foot pressure like the service brake pedal. It is a small flat box (Jake) or circular pedal (PAC) that is hinged at the top (upper portion) of the pedal. By doing it this way you really do not have to press the pedal. You just set the ball of your foot on the lower portion of the pedal and the Jake/PAC brake goes on. It DOES NOT require a pushing pressure like a service brake pedal does. It is almost like setting the weight of your foot on the pedal.
Going down mountains it's great because at the top of a hill we press the floor switch. Then when there are less steep or flat spots on the long downhill run and the Jake brake is slowing you too much we just let off the pedal and again press the pedal when the incline gets steeper. When we did not have a floor pedal we had to look over, find, and press the off switch or the Hi/Lo switch and when the hill got steeper again we had to look for and press the ON switch or Hi/Lo switch again (imagine doing that in bumper to bumper traffic). Or, on the other hand, instead of turning the Jake/ brake OFF/ON we could have pressed the accelerator pedal to turn the Jake brake OFF but that meant if we pressed it a little too much the engine started increasing the coaches speed which went against our instincts on a long downhill run where our objective was to control the downhill speed of the coach. We weigh 44,000 lbs with our tow car and we do have tow car brakes in the tow car.
Also, in stop and go city traffic we disliked the fact that every time we took our foot off the accelerator the Jake brake started slowing us. In traffic we prefer the ability to coast (no power on), press the pedal to use the Jake brake (Pac is the same), or use the service brake like we do in our car. For example, in our car we press the gas pedal to go, let off the gas pedal to coast, sometimes downshift the transmission to slow the car at a faster rate (this is similar to the Jake/PAC brake in a motorhome), and press the brake pedal to stop.
Our Jake brake is set to automatically downshift all the way down to 2nd gear. We like this because approximately 25% of the time we do not press the service brake pedal until the coach is going only 15 MPH. 15 MPH is the magic number because that is were the Jake brake turns off, that is, if it's set to downshift all the way down to second gear before you feel that slight pulse where the exhaust brake release and you're coasting. Targeting the transmission for 2nd gear works the same for a PAC brake too.
Another example is, if you're exiting a freeway or slowing for an intersection it's nice to let the Jake brake slow you as long as possible before using your service brakes and if you're not impeding traffic let it slow you to 15 MPH, which it will do if it's targeted for 2nd gear, before you must use your service brake. This saves your brakes.
Because my transmission is targeted to downshift all the way down to 2nd gear, when I press the floor pedal, my Jake brake (same with my previous coach that had a PAC brake) downshifts at the following speeds: at 65 MPH it downshifts into 5th gear, at 55 it downshifts into 4th, at 45 it downshifts into 3rd, at 35 it downshifts into 2nd, and at stays in 2nd gear until it finally releases itself (it quits) at 15 MPH.
Another reason we like to have our transmission targeted to 2nd gear is that it's great in slow stop and go trafic where you may be downshifted to second gear by 35 MPH or less so it saves on the use of the service brakes. By the way, our motto on long downhill runs is "keep 'em cool."
