ABS (Anti-Lock Braking System) - By: Mykalanne Gutierrez

Anti-Lock Braking System. Super easy, right? It’s also known as a CAB (Controller Anti-Lock Brake). They’re installed on your vehicle so you’re wheels don’t lock up while you brake really hard. The whole idea of ABS is to offer a better handle on your car and to reduce the stopping distance when you’re on dry or slippery surfaces.

These systems not only come on cars, but around the 1920s-1950s, they came on planes! It’s kind of confusing to explain, so I’m just going to give you the basics... kind of: There’s something with the drum and the flywheel and those two things would spin at the same time; and then there was less brake fluid so there was less pressure on the cylinder so it can release the brakes at ease. It’s still used on planes today, but a more “improved” and up to date version.

By the end of the 1950s, they did an experiment on motorcycles and decided that this ABS would be a great benefit to all motorcycle riders. Hence, the stopping distance for these vehicles had cut in half, especially on slippery surfaces. Since is was still considered to be “new technology”, a lot of people said it was too expensive, fickle, and obviously something that they didn’t really need on their car.

Chrysler pretty much looked at the situation and said, “We want to improve this and include it on our cars”; so that’s exactly what they did. In 1971, they incorporated the ABS into the Chrysler Imperial and called it “Sure Brake”. That same year, General Motors manufactured an ABS for rear-wheels only called the “Trackmaster” that was included on all Cadillac’s that had Rear-Wheel Drive. Then in 1975, someone took over some company and released the very first Electronic Four-Wheel Multi-Channel ABS that would be available on trucks and Mercedes S Class Wheels . This system was considered to be “Modern” because it applied brake pressure to all four individual wheels .

You’re probably thinking, “Enough about the history; how does it work?!” Well don’t worry, I’m about to get to that. An average ABS has an Electronic Control Unit-one for each wheel-and 2 hydraulic valves that are located in the brake hydraulics. The job of the ECU is to pretty much keep track of the rotation speed for each wheel; when it “realizes” that one wheel is rotating crucially slower than the rest of the wheels, it lets the valves know that the hydraulic pressure needs to be decreased so the braking force won’t be as harsh on that specific wheel. When the wheel is moving faster than the rest of them, the brake hydraulic pressure is then intensified so the braking force is harder and the wheel slows down to the speed of the three other wheels (unless your car has more than 4 wheels).

Now-a-days, there’s something called the Electronic Stability Control that is the “next generation” of the ABS. With this system, there’s a steering wheel angle sensor and a gyroscopic sensor. The way it works is quite simple: When the gyroscopic sensor sees that something is not normal when the car is moving, the ESC will then apply brakes on the wheels that need it at the time; so then, the vehicle is driven the way the driver wants to drive it.

So I guess you can say that they’re pretty important since they are built to assist your wheels and your wheels are the things that make your car move so you can get to wherever you have to go... right? Feel free to visit us at OriginalWheels.com for all of your wheel needs (:

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