Operating a van vs a car

[James AKA Lynx]

We hardly ever saw Overdrives until the price of gas went up. If you are loaded down you may not want to use it at all. Up and down hills and in traffic, cut it off. <br><br>I do not have one on my 97 Dodge.<br><br>James AKA Lynx

 

[MK7]

&nbsp; <br>Not clue if what I do is 'correct', but I do pretty much what Les H does.&nbsp; Except on downhills that go for a while, instead of using the brakes all the time, I just let my foot off the gas, and let the engine slow me down.&nbsp; because I'm lazy and I get tired of my foot on the brake, so I make the engine do the work, and not use my brakes so much.<br><br>Again, not a clue if that's 'good' or 'bad' or whatever for the engine,&nbsp;

<br><br>This is exactly how you should be driving down a hill. If you didn't let the motor do the braking and would have had to stay on the brakes down a hill to the point of fatigue, then this is really dangerous. Such braking strains the entire brake system, boils the brake fluid, etc. You'll start getting a spongy feeling on them. Most of these vans have crappy rear drum brakes and the conversion models are extremely heavy, making it worse...then there's all the stuff of a vandweller inside. <br><br>That's why they have those "runaway truck ramps" on mountain roads (because they just lost their brakes), pretty scary.

 

[MK7]

when I am sitting at the red arrow/ light, I use my parking brake as the rear drums are not as susceptible to the pad deposits/ warping as the front rotors.&nbsp;

<br><br>You're may be saving the front rotors a little, but you are also straining a lot more, the E-Brake cable that's held in place by a little star wheel inside the drum brakes. It's a pain in the butt to replace this cable.