How much presure should it take to engage the rear brake?

I noticed I am having to really push the rear brake pedal down far in order to get it to slow the bike down? Is there some sort of adjustment for these things?

 

How's the wear on the pads? You should see the indicator dial on the side of the drum - when you engage the brake, does it go the entire distance on the dial?

Mine only goes about halfway, so I have plenty of lining left. I don't need much pressure at all, it's very responsive.

 

Gonna have to check tonight. I had taken in to a bike shop about 6 weeks ago and they had said the pads looked fine, but I will double check.

 

Re: How much presure should it take to engage the rear brake

That brake lever is pretty long. Doesn't take a lot of force to get a lot of braking. Depending on how you have it set up there can be a lot of travel.

 

If your pads are good, just adjust it. Easy and Fast. You can control how it responds that way, mine breaks soo much better now. (I can lock it if I press hard enough, which is not good, but I have to press HARD)

 

At the rear wheel is the brake arm and the wear indicator. Read the indicator and see if new shoes are needed and a the end of the arm is the adjuster. Push the arm forward to relieve the spring's tension and tighten the funny shaped nut until the travel is more to your liking.

 

Re: How much presure should it take to engage the rear brake

The service manual calls for the pedal to be adjusted to 20mm below top of footrest with another 20mm of free play before the brake begins to engage. This means that the pedal is 40mm (1.6") below the top of the peg before the brakes begin to engage.

While this seems a lot at first I've found it accomplishes 2 things:

1) Makes it a lot less likely that I'll lock the rear wheel because braking at that angle has to be done by the ankle rather than jamming down with the leg muscles.

2) The travel gives me the capability to light the brake light without any brake action (someone tailgating, compression braking etc.).

 

Same here. You should also re-adjust the brakelight switch, but MiCarl's recommendation is spot-on. Putting the bike on the center stand will allow you to spin the rear tire by hand (bike in neutral, of course) when setting the rear brake lever. Adjust that "funny shaped nut" up until the brake starts to grab with the pedal depressed to 40mm (1-1/2") below the top of the peg.

 

Re: How much presure should it take to engage the rear brake

Ok, lets give the complete instructions:

1 - back off the nut where it goes through the lever on the brake drum, have lots of slack.

2 - adjust the stop (buried just ahead of the brake pivot) so the pedal is 20mm (.8 ") below the top of the foot rest.

3) - key on. adjust the brake light switch (same area as stop bolt - spring goes from lever up to it) so it comes on when you just begin to move the pedal. Make sure it goes off when the pedal is released.

4) - on center stand. Adjust nut you loosened in step 1 so that the brake shoes just begin to drag when you move the pedal down another 20mm.

Ride carefully until you get used to it. Many of the pedals I see in photos are way too high.

 

Gonna do this tommorow, cause I am off. I am having to push further than 1.5in to get it to grab, it's actually a little hard to make it grab at all so I know it needs adjusting. Thanks for the info on how to do it.

 

The knowledge base of this site is incredible. I just noticed that my brake light was not coming on when I use the rear brake. Did a quick search and read MiCarl’s post and found out my brake lever is too high, my break engages right away (not good), plenty of pad left. The break sensor works but spring is way out of adjustment, it never engages the switch.

Thanks
BR

 

If correctly adjusted (and Carl was right on by the way) and still have to push real hard to get any braking, you'll want to pull the rear wheel and have a look at the brake shoes. While not worn down (see indicator) they could also be soaked in leaked lube or ??? and might require nothing more than a good flushng with brake cleaner. If they are soaked with something, determine the souce to prevent a reoccurance...

 

I do what MiCarl does but I keep the Rear Brakes pretty tight.
I have the Brake Light on hair trigger.
I can make the Brake Light come-on just by riding the pedal a bit.

I have the Rear Adjuster tight; too.
Keeping an eye in the wear indicator; I run the adjuster up with a 12 mm Socket until all the Play is out and then back-off the Adjusting Nut 2 "Flips" on the detent!

If you run them close like that you might hear them squeal.
If they make noise you have to get rid of the rust ridge on the outside of the Brake Drum and Chamfer the Pads hard edges.

Its worth the extra effort for the precise control you get having Back Brakes that will get-in-the-game for you and give you a confident feeling that the Rear wheel can be locked-up if needed.

If you hit the pedal and can't bring the Rear Wheel to a stop ... that can set-up a situation for not stopping and having to rely too heavily on the Front Binders.

I hate that!

 

Leave us not forget that in a hard stop the fronts do 80% (or more) of the work, the back brake is just there to keep you from swapping ends.