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BRAKES!


klingelton
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just what it says in the title!


Over the last couple of weeks, i'd detected a little brake squeaking, so i decided to strip them down, clean them and, if needed, replace the pads (if the friction material was running low).


tools needed for this task will vary from bike to bike, but for mine, i needed hex socket set, normal socket set, screw drivers, brake cleaner and copper grease (if replacing the pads, you will need new pads to fit your bike! i bought mine from wemoto.com).


I started on the front. remove the bolts attaching the caliper to the fork. With a little gentle persuasion, the whole assembly then comes away. Be careful not to stress the hoses connecting the caliper to your brakes. There is a small retaining clip on a pin to the trailing side of the caliper that is removed, along with the pin. this allows the pads to rotate forward. if replacing the pads, undo the screws covering the brake fluid reservoir and gently, but firmly push the pistons back into the caliper. The reason we do this is as you use the brakes, the friction material wears away. we need that space for the additional friction material on the new pads.


ok, so now we have a caliper with no pads in. check the condition of your disk. It shouldn't have a lip. if it does, time for a new one (and more detail than i have experience of at this moment!). clean all the road dirt from your calipers (being careful around your pistons). on your new pads, put a pea sized blob of copper grease ON THE BACK of your new pad (not on the friction surface lol) and spread it around (i used an old rubber glove to do the smearing). This stops the brakes from squeaking.


put your calipers back together and place back onto the disk, ensuring that the 2 sides of the friction material are either side of the disk. do up the bolts. you will have tensions in the haynes manual. if not, tighten then nip up. screw the reserviou


once practiced, it will take you 10 minutes per caliper. Doing this yourself is not only fun, it will save you many pennies. It's really not that tricky to do.

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If you're going to replace old pads with new DO NOT PUSH PISTONS INTO CALIPER until you have first pumped them out a few millimetres, cleaned all the crap off them and polished them. Apply a smear of Red rubber grease before pushing them in. :mrgreen: Pushing dirty pistons into caliper will damage your seals and jam the pistons so you can't push them in. :mrgreen:

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If you're going to replace old pads with new DO NOT PUSH PISTONS INTO CALIPER until you have first pumped them out a few millimetres, cleaned all the crap off them and polished them. Apply a smear of Red rubber grease before pushing them in. :mrgreen: Pushing dirty pistons into caliper will damage your seals and jam the pistons so you can't push them in. :mrgreen:

 

cheers buddy, i just removed as much crud as i could. I will bear this in mind for next time.

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