Post by krashbandikoot on Dec 9, 2012 19:28:48 GMT 1
A couple of years ago I manged to find the shitest bike garage in the UK who managed to totally screw up my bike and do £600 worth of damage to it.
One of the things they managed to totally stuff up was the front brakes. The instruction was - Remove, strip, clean, put in new seals, rebuild, test.
They did all of that but the problem was there was no progression at all. The brakes when the lever was pulled was either on or off. Anyway, I decided to do the job myself so stripped and rebuild the whole braking system - New pistons, seals, master cylinder rebuild and new pads.
After a few applications of the brakes I was back to the same problem with a really hard lever so I put up with it for the last couple of years but now I've finally decided to get to the bottom of the problem.
I asked my 3rd son to take a look for me as I just wasn't getting past what the issue was. So he took off the brake lever, stripped it, cleaned it, (again) and put it back on after checking there were no issues with the braided brake lines.
With it all back together he bled the clutch side caliper first then turned his attention to the throttle side. After a few pumps the lever went hard so he persisted, grabbed a hand full and forced the fluid out.
What popped into the bleed pipe was a black beetle!!! It must have been tucked up behind the bleed nipple and was causing the obstruction making the brake lever go hard.
I'm amazed how this thing got in there. I can only think that perhaps while it was in the screw up's garage they must have knocked off for the night leaving the caliper in pieces and it crawled in there.
So it just goes to show when you think you've done everything sometimes there's causes for things that are totally unexpected
One of the things they managed to totally stuff up was the front brakes. The instruction was - Remove, strip, clean, put in new seals, rebuild, test.
They did all of that but the problem was there was no progression at all. The brakes when the lever was pulled was either on or off. Anyway, I decided to do the job myself so stripped and rebuild the whole braking system - New pistons, seals, master cylinder rebuild and new pads.
After a few applications of the brakes I was back to the same problem with a really hard lever so I put up with it for the last couple of years but now I've finally decided to get to the bottom of the problem.
I asked my 3rd son to take a look for me as I just wasn't getting past what the issue was. So he took off the brake lever, stripped it, cleaned it, (again) and put it back on after checking there were no issues with the braided brake lines.
With it all back together he bled the clutch side caliper first then turned his attention to the throttle side. After a few pumps the lever went hard so he persisted, grabbed a hand full and forced the fluid out.
What popped into the bleed pipe was a black beetle!!! It must have been tucked up behind the bleed nipple and was causing the obstruction making the brake lever go hard.
I'm amazed how this thing got in there. I can only think that perhaps while it was in the screw up's garage they must have knocked off for the night leaving the caliper in pieces and it crawled in there.
So it just goes to show when you think you've done everything sometimes there's causes for things that are totally unexpected
