Rear brakes and seat angle

[fatall]

OK, I've had a problems with the rear brakes, when I was stationery and on a slight hill I would use the rear brakes to keep still, but on the Quest the bike would still roll, the brake lever was ok, but it just would not hold the bike on a hill.

So I had some BB7's sitting at home and I decided to swap both front and rear calipers to BB7's. The rear brakes are now very good...maybe to good, it is very easy to lock them up.

Which leads me to the second question about seat angle, because the rear brakes are easy to lock up, I am thinking there is a weight bias over the front wheel.

If I was to adjust the bracket(in the green circle) to the middle hole would this ease/solve the rear brake lockup?

I will most likely do this anyway, but I want to see if this is a problem others have had and did they solve it the same way?

 

[John Tolhurst]

Hi fatall, 
In theory, yes,

Hi fatall,

In theory, yes, you would move your weight back slightly. In practice, no, you won't notice the difference in lock-up tendency. On my Quest V2, the standard brakes are easily able to hold me stationary on a hill. Same on my Quest V1.

 

[fatall]

Thanks for the quick

Thanks for the quick response.

It is quiet unnerving when you lockup the rear brakes(don't want to think about locking the front brakes

)

Would it be worthwhile to adjust the rear calipers so they are not as effective ?

 

[John Tolhurst]

Locking up the rear brakes is

Locking up the rear brakes is not an indication that locking the front is imminent. The rear locks because of weight shift to the front, adjusting the power of the brakes is a way to manage this. One way of reducing rear wheel lock might be to put a larger disk on the front. A larger disk will brake more powerfully, so your grip the lever will be softer, and this might mean you are better able to grip the rear brake lever more softly too and avoid rear wheel lock. You do need to develop if you can the ability to press each level according to the braking load each tire can accept. They are different, and under full power stops you'll be able to put hardly any force on the rear brake, as without weight on the wheel it will lock very easily. Motorcyclists must learn this too. The front brake is the one that stops you. I once had the surprising experience of doing a rather decent stoppie (rear wheel up under brakes) on my motorcycle - legs up too, essentially standing on my hands. Fastest stop I ever did, and the rear brake contributed squat.

 

[fatall]

I moved the bracket to the

I moved the bracket to the middle hole and loosened of the rear brakes a tad. I think it has eased the chance of the rear brake locking up. One benefit I didn't expect, with the shift of weight to the back, has taken some weight of the front suspension giving a better/smoother ride over rolled gutters/curbs alt=\"smiley\" height=\"20\" src=\"http://cruzbike.com/sites/all/modules/ckeditor/ckeditor/plugins/smiley/images/regular_smile.gif\" title=\"smiley\" width=\"20\[/IMG]

I will see how this goes over the next couple of weeks and I might even try to move the seat to the lower holes alt=\"enlightened\" height=\"20\" src=\"http://cruzbike.com/sites/all/modules/ckeditor/ckeditor/plugins/smiley/images/lightbulb.gif\" title=\"enlightened\" width=\"20\[/IMG]