Patriot Brake Unit in 364TS

[RVnut]

We are using a patriot brake unit for our Jeep Liberty. How do you get that unit to apply brake to the jeep when you are not in a panic braking situation.

[JLud]

Position it as you would set it up normally, supply power to the unit via the adapter cable. We bought a battery pack to power it as our tow vehicle receptacle shuts off after a while. Adjust gain on the wireless remote that you put with you in the dash.

Every time you brake your or slow the unit sends signal and applies brake. How does the transmitter know I'm braking? Not sure on that...just does.

[rkulbok]

I believe that the Blue Ox has an inertia sensor (pendulum) that detects deceleration and applies the brake proportionally. You can adjust the 'gain' on the remote to make the unit more sensitive as well. On your next trip try adjusting the 'gain' until you find the setting where you are comfortable.

On my unit I keep the 'gain' at 5. At this setting it takes a fairly hard braking action to also have the brakes applied to the TOAD.

[RamblerGuy]

The Blue Ox Patriot brake system gain adjustment on the unit and on the remote adjusts the braking force, not the sensitivity.

This is explained in the Patriot installation manual.

I sometimes set it to zero when I approach a rough railroad crossing so it doesn't apply the brakes.

[rkulbok]

RamblerGuy, thanks for the correction on the gain adjustment. I am looking for the manual now so I can reread it.

[RVnut]

We can get it to work but I really have to stand on the brake to see the activation light come on.. If this is the only time it will come on than It seems kind of useless.. I thought it would come on like trailer brakes and then you adjust how hard the brakes are applied with the gain knob..

[tkarper14]

I have not tried this, but I was reading elswhere that if you have the back end of box too high, the brake will be too sensitive. If this is true, It stands to reason, if the back end is too low it won't be sensitive enough. I would try adjusting the feet to get the back end a little higher.

It sort of makes sense and may be worth a shot.

[RVnut]

Originally Posted by tkarper14

I have not tried this, but I was reading elswhere that if you have the back end of box too high, the brake will be too sensitive. If this is true, It stands to reason, if the back end is too low it won't be sensitive enough. I would try adjusting the feet to get the back end a little higher.

It sort of makes sense and may be worth a shot.

I will try adjusting the back higher this weekend.. Its worth a shot

[Jim_bob]

I'm towing a 2015 Honda fit with the patriot. But maybe I have done something that might help or give someone an idea. The first time out I set the patriot in the car, hooked everything up, made a couple adjustments it all looked good. The brakes were working and we took off, Florida to Ohio. Coming back I did the same thing. It was all ok but not great.
So I started looking at it. I set the patriot in the car just like I was going to tow it. I could see the carpet on the floor and the seat was letting the patriot move around. I cut out a piece of 3/4" plywood to the contour of the floor. I cut a piece of 1/4" plywood to just fit between the patriot and the seat. I cut it so that it locks on the handle that moves the seat so it always goes in the same place. I was thinking about fastening the legs to the plywood but never did.
I took my time and adjusted the legs on the Patriot until the actuator arm was pushing the brake pedal close to 90 deg.
I also put a lock nut on each leg. When it was not at 90 deg The whole unit was moving around, going up and down.
Now the only thing that moves is the actuator arm and the brake pedal. I have watched it many times.
Now there is no adjustment, I hook it to the peddle and plug it in.
I was nervous about when the brake was applied if and when the Honda brake was braking. I was not sure if I had the control set just right. So I spliced into the Honda brake lights and set a LED light on the dash now I know exactly when the brake on the Honda is activated.

[JLud]

Agree on building a sort of box around it. It can push the seat of our f150 up in the front and move around. If have a fixed or more solid support would do much better

[RamblerGuy]

Raising the back end of the Patriot does nothing to change the sensitivity. When you power it up and run setup, it senses the position and sets that as the level and no decleration position.

If the vehicle is not close to level front-to-back when you run setup that will make it too sensitive if the vehicle is nose high or not sensitive enough if nose low. I've had it apply the brakes when just going downhill and then had to find a level spot to rerun setup.

I usually don't apply the coach brakes hard and the Patriot doesn't apply at all. I let the coach do all the braking most of the time. If I brake hard or brake when going downhill it applies. It seems to be okay to drive it that way. I checked the coach brakes at about 45,000 miles and it looks like they'll last to 100,000 miles.

[tennlady]

We had the Blue Ox Alpha hitch installed on our 2011 Jeep Liberty and told the RV place we also wanted the Patriot Brake System, but when we picked up the Jeep from them we noticed that the Patriot Brake would ride up the side of the floor when it tried to put the brakes on so we got a refund on the Patriot and went with the SMI Play and Stay Brake System and love it. Nothing to haul around and mess with.

[devildog0311]

Question about towing your jeep ...
After arriving to Key West from Michigan, I noticed my Jeep register every mile in the odometer even though it was in Neutral - I was told to disconnect the battery to turn off the wheel sensor that registers the mikes but then no Patriot braking system - any clue? Thx

[JLud]

Buy a 12 volt battery pack like a jump start deal and plug Blue ox into that. Can find for 60-100 bucks and then keep miles off.