I recently had an issue involving a Blue OX Patriot Brake. This is an inertia sensing proportional braking system. We purchased the unit in 2014 and the manual at that time said normal vehicles should be towed with the sensing level at 5, hybrids at 3. This was fine for our HHR. This spring we acquired a Fiat 500 Pop. The Fiat is roughly 800 pounds lighter than the HHR. What a huge difference 800 pounds makes in terms of required braking power. Instinctively I felt that the sensitivity should be lessened so I lowered it to 3. I should have perhaps lowered it to 1 or 0 (break away only). While traveling in some very mountainous areas of Southeastern KY we completely destroyed the front brakes on a new car. Both front hubcaps were melted luckily the left side center section blew out lessening the damage. On the right side besides brakes we also had to replace the wheel bearing, wheel nut, right axle, and lower control arm. All of this damage occurred over a distance of less than 20 miles. The break away was not an issue, the device just applied too much brake. Picture a 2,000 pound car trying to slow a 22,000 pound RV on a steep downgrade.
In 2015 Blue Ox changed their manual to suggest settings that take into consideration the relative weights of both vehicles. The suggested setting for our weight of car and motor home was 3. In mountainous terrain as I stated before consider 1 or 0.
I am hoping that Blue Ox will share some responsibility for the $1300 dollar repair bill.
