Relay Valve - Service Brake Relay Valve

Service Brake Relay Valve

With a service brake relay valve installed, the hose that connects to the primary delivery-port output of the foot-valve becomes a control-line (i.e., The air from the foot-valve “dead ends” at the relay valve's control-port.). Only low-volume air-signals are required to travel back and forth between the foot-valve's delivery port and the relay valve's control port; therefore, the air-volume supplied by the delivery port is now only a tiny-fraction of what otherwise would have been required had the relay valve not been installed. This reduces the delay between the application of the front and rear brakes to only a fraction of a second. When the driver depresses the brake pedal, a small amount of air momentarily opens the relay valve's supply port, which then directs air from the remote air-supply directly to the rear service brake chambers, and quickly applies the rear service brakes. The pressure delivered to the service brake chambers in this manner will equal the control-pressure delivered by the foot-valve to the relay valve. When the driver partially or fully releases the brake pedal, the control-pressure delivered by the foot-valve decreases; this causes the relay valve's supply port to close, and its exhaust port to momentarily open, thus preventing a pneumatic short-circuit from occurring while the air exhausts from all rear service brake chambers. The air exhausts until the pressure within the service brake chambers once again equals the control-port pressure, which partially or fully releases the rear service brakes.

In order to control the trailer service brakes, the merged outputs (i.e., merged via 2 two-way check valves connected in-series to give three inputs) of the foot-valve and trailer-hand-valve (if applicable) are directed through the tractor-protection valve, and onward towards the trailer relay valve via the blue service line. In tractors that are not equipped with a trailer hand valve, only the merged outputs of the foot-valve (i.e., via a single two-way check valve) are directed towards the trailer relay valve; however, the fact that the foot-valve's delivery-port outputs are still merged enables the trailer's service brakes to still be controlled even if there is failure within one braking circuit of the tractor.