Parking break

Hi All

Is there a way to make the parking brake a little more useful? When I got the VFR you'd barely notice it was activated so I adjusted it nice and tight and it worked great for a while. Some months later and it's back to barely noticing. I'm assuming when you set it nice and tight it never releases fully and eventually just gets warn down,

Any tips or tricks?

Thanks,
R

 

The only bike I've owned with a parking brake was my FJS600 Silverwing; I did not notice any drag when that was adjusted correctly, but maybe you need to check that the mechanism (on the 600 it had a screwjack mechanism to clamp the pads) is properly lubricated so it releases fully?

 

Yeah thinking about it now, the "caliper" does sit at the bottom of the disc, so probably needs a good clean and lube. Thanks

 

So I removed the parking brake and as I opened it a little circlip fell out. Then removed the slide bolts and popped the pads out and you could see the right side pad had gotten stuck at an angle and had warn right through the friction material and was starting to touch the disc.



So pulled the whole thing apart, got some new pads and then reassembled it properly ... about 5 times (I've never fiddled with one of these screw type caliper jobbies before so ). First got the lever arm angle wrong, then struggled to get the right amount of movement with the cable etc etc before finally realising you can set the lever more or less in the right position and then adjust the shaft (in and out) to get the right starting position.

Long story short, it feels like a parking brake again. Hope I did it right and it lasts!

 

Actually that looks just the same as the unit on my Silverwing, and I also had the puzzle of reassembling the parts to get the correct action. Glad you have it sorted. Hopefully you have greased the sliding pins to make sure the action and release is even in future.

 

Definitely did, put a bit of Copper slip on the pins (after cleaning them) as well as the screw shaft.

Thanks