Hi Robbin, Surge brakes have their problems as well. (can't back up, etc.). It may get down to how much money you want to spend. The "best" usually costs more. The M23 is heavy enough that brakes are important, especially if navigating mountains. When we towed our M23 from Ontario, California to Golden, Colorado last October, Bob rigged the brakes so they would not engage. We towed the boat with a Toyota Tundra. The Toyota has manual shifting as well as automatic, so we used the gears quite a bit to slow us down when going down mountains. When we finish our M23, we'll more than likely just sail her locally and keep her slipped for the season, so we haven't decided whether or not to replace the brakes with a more controllable system. (We'll use out Sage 17 or M15 for traveling to distant sailing locations. Getting a little old to rig a M23 for a short sail). You can use the brakes on your truck, but it will shorten their life. The best system, in my opinion is to have a system that you can control the brakes on the trailer while driving. We have a switch in the cab that causes the brakes to engage on our other trailers so we can engage the brakes on the trailer without touching the brakes on the truck. This type of control is nice. Hope that helps. sal In a message dated 9/29/2011 6:40:13 A.M. Mountain Daylight Time, robbin.roddewig@verizon.net writes: Hi all, So it appears that my new towing beast has an electric brake control. My M-23 dual axle trailer had drum brakes which are a loss (literally the right side has no parts anymore). The brake assemblies need to be replaced. I assumed before buying the beast that this would means surge hydraulic brakes. Maybe discs. But I would like any advice you folks have on going electric (trailer super store has very reasonably priced whole drum brake assemblies) versus hydraulic and disc versus drum. Since the current rusted assembly is drum would putting a whole new drum assembly on be easier? Has anyone done this kind of rehab to trailer brakes? I do car brakes of all kinds but usually am not removing everything, well sometimes but I was much younger then. Would it be a poor idea (as I assume it would) to just rely on the F-350 brakes? Hope to see some of you at Annapolis. Even considering the Good Old Boat Regatta. Robbin M-23 The Other Woman, M-10 Tonka _______________________________________________ http://mailman.xmission.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/montgomery_boats When posting, remember that there is no privacy on the Internet!