Texas Driving Safety Course Tip - Brakes

Texas Driving Safety Course Tip - Brake Maintenance

On every vehicle, brakes must operate on each wheel except for special mobile equipment. “Special mobile equipment” is defined by Texas law as a vehicle that is not designed or used primarily to transport persons or property and is only incidentally operated on a highway, which includes most construction equipment and excludes vehicles that simply have construction equipment attached to it such as dump trucks.

As there are with almost every law, there are a few exceptions. If the combination of the towing and towed vehicles comply with the performance requirements of the Texas Transportation Code then a vehicle that is towed as a commodity when at least one set of the towed vehicle's wheels is on the roadway is not required to have functional brakes on each of its wheels.

Also exempted from this law are trailers, semitrailers, and pole trailers with a gross weight heavier than 4,500 pounds, but not heavier than 15,000 pounds, drawn at a speed of more than 30 miles per hour, if the brakes operate on both wheels of the rear axle.

A truck or truck-tractor that has at least three axles is not required to have brakes on the front wheels, but must have brakes that operate on the wheels of one steerable axle if the vehicle is equipped with at least two steerable axles and comply with the performance requirements of the Texas Transportation Code.

A trailer or semitrailer that has a gross weight of 15,000 pounds or less may use a surge or inertia brake systems to satisfy the requirements of the Texas Transportation Code. Who needs good brakes when you have physics to slow you down and stop you?

If you get a ticket for not having your lights on, you can always take our Texas Defensive Driving Course.