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Mountain Bike Help: How to fix my brakes, they feel mushy?

halik

halik

Lifer
Any ideas?
They are disc brakes with steel lines, i got the front one tweaked pretty decent, but the rear one still feels mushy...
 
Steel lines as in: they're mechanically actuated with cables or they're hydraulic with steel line casing?

If cables: not too much you can do. Shorten the cable and housing as much as you can. Replace the cable (not the housing) if you haven't done so in a while and lube it up well before reinstalling it.

If hydraulic: you probably need to bleed your line and/or replace the brake fluid. Air in the line will make it feel mushy since air can compress.
 
shimano levers (all aluminum),
no-name calipers as far as i can tell.

Mushy as in when i push on it as hard as i can , it still wont stop. If i were to push the front one all-out, id fly over the fork and handlebar 🙂
 
Do what Fausto said. lube teh cables. try new ones. the can stretch out. keep everything as short as possiable.

 
Originally posted by: halik
shimano levers (all aluminum),
no-name calipers as far as i can tell.
Click to expand...
Can you adjust the pivot point on the levers? I know you can do this on some of them. Moving it out to give you less mechanical advantage would make the brake feel less mushy......at the cost of some braking power of course.

 
Originally posted by: halik
shimano levers (all aluminum),
no-name calipers as far as i can tell.

Mushy as in when i push on it as hard as i can , it still wont stop. If i were to push the front one all-out, id fly over the fork and handlebar 🙂
Click to expand...
Oh....I thought you were talking about lever feel. How much room do you have between the rear pads and the disc? Sounds like you need to adjust the brake to take some of the play out. Lever travel can't pull enough cable to get the pads firmly on the disc.

 
Originally posted by: Fausto1
Originally posted by: halik
shimano levers (all aluminum),
no-name calipers as far as i can tell.
Click to expand...
Can you adjust the pivot point on the levers? I know you can do this on some of them. Moving it out to give you less mechanical advantage would make the brake feel less mushy......at the cost of some braking power of course.
Click to expand...

im gonna look into that. I remeber my moms bike used to have great, hard brakes and now theyre all crazy mushy, so i figured its just a matter of keeping the lines tense and the calipers as close to the disc as possible
 
Originally posted by: Fausto1
Originally posted by: halik
shimano levers (all aluminum),
no-name calipers as far as i can tell.

Mushy as in when i push on it as hard as i can , it still wont stop. If i were to push the front one all-out, id fly over the fork and handlebar 🙂
Click to expand...
Oh....I thought you were talking about lever feel. How much room do you have between the rear pads and the disc? Sounds like you need to adjust the brake to take some of the play out. Lever travel can't pull enough cable to get the pads firmly on the disc.
Click to expand...

well its little bit of both i think, im gonna get the caliper closer to the disc and adjust the play so when i grab it full force, its gonna lock the wheel
 
sounds like theres too much slack in teh cable if you pull and they dont stop. also check your pads. they could be worn out. also make sure the rotor is clean. if any oil got on it your brakes wont work. cleaning it with rubbing alch works well
 
Originally posted by: halik
Originally posted by: Fausto1
Originally posted by: halik
shimano levers (all aluminum),
no-name calipers as far as i can tell.
Click to expand...
Can you adjust the pivot point on the levers? I know you can do this on some of them. Moving it out to give you less mechanical advantage would make the brake feel less mushy......at the cost of some braking power of course.
Click to expand...

im gonna look into that. I remeber my moms bike used to have great, hard brakes and now theyre all crazy mushy, so i figured its just a matter of keeping the lines tense and the calipers as close to the disc as possible
Click to expand...
Pretty much. The cable will stretch a bit over time and the pads will wear. Both will make the pads further away from the disc surface.

Easiest way to adjust is to put something with the clearance you want between the disc and pads and then pull the cable tight. Take out the spacer and then make fine adjustments with the barrel adjusters on the levers until you get things where you want them to be.

 
Originally posted by: TheEvil1
sounds like theres too much slack in teh cable if you pull and they dont stop. also check your pads. they could be worn out. also make sure the rotor is clean. if any oil got on it your brakes wont work. cleaning it with rubbing alch works well
Click to expand...
Acetone is better IMO. Cuts oil better and won't leave any residue. Just don't get it on the rest of your bike.....especially anything painted.

 
Sounds like you have a bad seal in the master Cyl or the caliper. If you don't know what either of those are, I would recomend you take it to your local bike mechanic. You're probably lookin at 20-40 bills to get you fixed up safely.
 
Originally posted by: halik
on the side note, how much would hydraulic lines/calipers/levers cost?
Click to expand...
Anywhere from maybe $140 to $300 depending on what setup you wanted. I'm a little out of the mountain bike loop, but that's a guess based on a few online shops I frequent.

 
Originally posted by: hippy
Sounds like you have a bad seal in the master Cyl or the caliper. If you don't know what either of those are, I would recomend you take it to your local bike mechanic. You're probably lookin at 20-40 bills to get you fixed up safely.
Click to expand...
These are cable-actuated discs, not hydraulic.

 
clean the cables, dirt inside cable housing can cause enough friction to significantly reduce the force transfered to the brake mechanism.

remove the cable housing from the eyelets, clean and use a little pledge to wax the cable a bit.

 
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