Testing hand brakes

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Tue 16 Jun 2015 22:26
Testing hand brakes - hillman

How often do the BRs test their handbrake / parking brake ?

Some BRs, replying to the recent thread on electronic parking brakes, said they very rarely applied the handbrake, especially with automatic gearboxes.

I was brought up with the old asbestos linings, and drum and disc steels that were very reluctant to corrode when the car was left unused for a while. In the past I’ve not used my car for several months at a time without problems. The materials now are very different and corrosion is quite rapid if the brakes are not used regularly.

The rear brakes are regulated by a pressure limiter and almost never applied in town and city use where the driver keeps to speed limits. My son bought a car where the rear brake drums were full of rust and so generally corroded that they had to be replaced.

I test my handbrake daily by applying it to control speed while running down the, fairly steep, driveway. It also helps to keep the rear discs clean. Occasionally I do that on steep hills while I’m queuing in traffic.

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Tue 16 Jun 2015 22:40
Testing hand brakes - gordonbennet

All three of our parking brakes are of the drum inside disc design, expensive design to build and fully independent of the normal foot braking system, i prefer these to parking brakes operating on disc calipers, though if truth be told most cars would still have perfectly adequate braking if the rear brakes were drum only, rear discs are mainly for show and overkill IMO on the vast majority of cars.

All three cars are torque converter auto, but we both use the parking brakes every time, the only exception to this is when i'm not going to use the Merc for a week or so and i'll just leave it in P alone.

If you used the parking brakes whilst moving daily on this design the small shoes would wear down in no time and adjusting them up is a faff, manual adjustment only, by design they see little weather so corrosion isn't really a problem unless you go through floods, so i probably give them a gentle application about once a month whilst moving just to keep the friction surfaces in good fettle.

Edited by gordonbennet on 16/06/2015 at 22:41

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Tue 16 Jun 2015 22:46
Testing hand brakes - Hamsafar

If you use mine and many other park brakes while moving even at slow walking pace it applies the service brake with full ABS which is awful. Most modern cars <10 years old have EBD and use the rear brakes a lot during gentle braking at speeds less than ~20mph for an increase in comfort.

Edited by Hamsafar on 16/06/2015 at 22:47

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Wed 17 Jun 2015 13:09
Testing hand brakes - hillman

One of the cars I owned was a Volvo 440, bought when ABS was an expensive extra. That gave it discs all round and the handbrake was the worst of any car I'd owned. Among the faults was that the handbrake would freeze on and the car would drag the back wheels for the first half mile.

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Wed 17 Jun 2015 14:14
Testing hand brakes - slkfanboy

The issue with parking brakes is often that the use the same pad/discs as the main braking system. Which has the issue the apply hot the brake is firm, but the car cools(quickly) the brake slightly release. Not so good on a hill. Some more expensive designs has a seperated pad for the hand brake which is safer but would not last long if used while the car is moving.

I have auto's so this is less of an issue for me.

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Wed 17 Jun 2015 18:48
Testing hand brakes - hillman

After SWMBO had passed her test she believed that she should always do as the lessons stated, eg., park with the handbrake on and gears in neutral. I told her that she'd passed her test and now to do things differently to what she had learned, but no ! I got home soon afterwards and there was a new scratrch on the carport support post and a suspiciously clean rear lamp cover. The carport concrete base had a very slight slope. Thereafter she always parked with the car in gear.

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Wed 17 Jun 2015 19:47
Testing hand brakes - Andrew-T

The issue with parking brakes is often that the use the same pad/discs as the main braking system. Which has the issue the apply hot the brake is firm, but the car cools(quickly) the brake slightly release. Not so good on a hill.

I seem to remember there was a spate of runaways with a Citroen model a few years back because the parking brake used the front discs?

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Wed 17 Jun 2015 20:05
Testing hand brakes - Engineer Andy

My car is parked on a slight slope, so the handbrake has to be engaged when parked (to be honest, I don't know of a situation when you wouldn't), which nowadays is most of the time as I have been travelling to work in London by train. As such, I'm currently using my car only once a week/fortnight at weekends. I tend to get the occasional binding of the brakes, which work loose after a short while, but that's about all.

The handbrake LH cylinder failed on my old car (10yo Micra around late 2005), but to be fair it was getting a bit long in the tooth at the time and still held the car ok on the remaining RH side before it was repaired (it was picked up at service).

I suspect that having both cars at some point sitting around for extended periods building up corrosion on their discs/drums probably encourages binding.

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Tue 23 Jun 2015 16:59
Testing hand brakes - concrete

I was always taught to depress the brake pedal hard, then apply the handbrake up to the pressure point to engage it. This effectively prevented the handbrake cable being stretched when trying to apply sufficient pressure to the calipers. The cable would not apply enough pressure to prevent slippage when the brakes cooled. Still works now nearly 50 years on.

Cheers Concrete

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