Just about to put ZX in for MOT. One of its faults last time was a high hand brake and it is very high now - in fact all the way up. Is it a job a novice can do? If so is it in the Haynes manual - I have misalid mine so unable to look up.
Cheers
High hand brake
Moderator: RichardW
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Dave Burns
- Posts: 1915
- Joined: 14 May 2001, 05:30
- Location: United Kingdom
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- x 2
You need to take the drums off and make sure the shoes and the adjuster mechanisms are ok before doing anything to the cables, its usualy that the wear hasn't been taken up.
Stick you foot on the brake (with handbrake off) and make a mental note of how far the pedal travels, now do it with the handbrake on, if on the second pump the travel is much less then there is a fair bit of wear present which needs adjusting out, assuming the shoes have plenty of lining left on them of course.
If its got rear disc brakes and the cables are good, then simply adjusting the cables should solve the problem but check the levers on the calipers for excessive travel before hand.
Do not simply adjust the cables on drum brakes though without investigating the mechanism first, doing so can cause some loss of leverage resulting in reduced force on the shoes, a possible mot failure due to ineficient handbrake may be the outcome.
I would recomend the novice to have someone with the necessary knowledge on hand for the first time round where the brakes are concerned.
Dave
Stick you foot on the brake (with handbrake off) and make a mental note of how far the pedal travels, now do it with the handbrake on, if on the second pump the travel is much less then there is a fair bit of wear present which needs adjusting out, assuming the shoes have plenty of lining left on them of course.
If its got rear disc brakes and the cables are good, then simply adjusting the cables should solve the problem but check the levers on the calipers for excessive travel before hand.
Do not simply adjust the cables on drum brakes though without investigating the mechanism first, doing so can cause some loss of leverage resulting in reduced force on the shoes, a possible mot failure due to ineficient handbrake may be the outcome.
I would recomend the novice to have someone with the necessary knowledge on hand for the first time round where the brakes are concerned.
Dave
My guess is the one or both of your self adjusters has seized. Please take into account all the Dave has said. Ideally you should strip the brake system and clean and free off everything , and dismantle the adjusting strut, clean it and make sure that all is nice and free. Having done this job on my Renault 21 in the past I learnt from experience that the adjuster wheel should be greased.
Having said that it may be possible to manually adjust the brake without dismantling by using a screwdriver inserted through a wheel bolt hole to turn the adjuster wheel.
BE VERY CAREFUL. these cars have diagonally split brakes which means that the off side rear is paired with the nearside front. If a rear brake overheats and boils the fluid that circuit will collapse. If both overheat then both circuits collapse. Yes I speak from experience - suddenly finding I had one circuit down, pedal on the floor and a smoking rear wheel.
So best to overhaul the thing properly and ideally change the brake fluid - new is supposed to boil at somewhere around 400c, old when its absorbed water tends towards 100c.
Jeremy
Having said that it may be possible to manually adjust the brake without dismantling by using a screwdriver inserted through a wheel bolt hole to turn the adjuster wheel.
BE VERY CAREFUL. these cars have diagonally split brakes which means that the off side rear is paired with the nearside front. If a rear brake overheats and boils the fluid that circuit will collapse. If both overheat then both circuits collapse. Yes I speak from experience - suddenly finding I had one circuit down, pedal on the floor and a smoking rear wheel.
So best to overhaul the thing properly and ideally change the brake fluid - new is supposed to boil at somewhere around 400c, old when its absorbed water tends towards 100c.
Jeremy