Morning all Merc sprinter rear brakes on a camper van

[m_c]

You need to put more pressure on the spring to increase the brake effort.

Brakes on those era of Sprinters were not the best, and will take noticeably more effort than a modern car.
If it's a 3.5t van, I think I might even still have one of the plastic drop links for the brake compensator in the shed, along with the pivot bolt and bushes, although I may have thrown them out.

 

[mike 109444]

Well the talk was of "modifying" the lever that operates the valve which I would expect to be visually obvious to the MOT person.

 

[Pete.]

MOT won't care if it's been 'modified' so long as the brake effort is in spec and it's not leaking.

 

[Alan Reynolds]

It’s common for these valves to seize up completely and not work at all if the van has ever been run with no load in it. It doesn’t sit in the best environment on the back axle.

 

[Pete.]

My mate is half way through putting bigger discs and Tesla calipers on his Sprinter because the brakes are so poor.

 

[indy4x]

Not a chance wife loves the thing LOL.

I have the same problem, SWMBO loves her camper, personally I hate it

 

[lotus 30]

You need to put more pressure on the spring to increase the brake effort.

Brakes on those era of Sprinters were not the best, and will take noticeably more effort than a modern car.
If it's a 3.5t van, I think I might even still have one of the plastic drop links for the brake compensator in the shed, along with the pivot bolt and bushes, although I may have thrown them out.

Thank you yep 3.5 ton and as its a camper pretty well on max load especially when the water tank has a few gals in although I tend to fill when arriving on a site. but it does have a thirsty fuel tank and that all adds up. Some essentials red wine real ale also heavy. Ok so increasing the spring pressure limits the valve travel to allow more rear braking. so I will wind the adjuster up a few turns. let all the air out of the air bag assist and test. Thank you. Andy

 

[lotus 30]

Just to finish the thread brakes are much improved thank you all
Andy

 

[Robinson@123]

Seems to be an old post but this may help someone, my boxer m/h has had historically poor brakes, rebuilt callipers etc but still no improvement. Finally, I solved the issue. Having fitted rear air bags a couple of years ago, I was not aware of the bias valve operation and how fitting the air bags would affect the braking system. When inflating the air suspension it raises the van body 2 cm higher than “ stock” and by doing so weakens the bias valve spring in turn further reducing the pressure/ flow of brake fluid to the rear brakes rendering them basically useless. I simply made a support bracket lifting the spring connecting bolt up by two centimetres and hey presto, I had brakes again. I also decided to further adjust the spring tension to allow additional pressure into the rear brakes as basically my motorhome is always heavy laden when driven, like most m/h I would guess. This works mint and I can now stop on a sixpence.