I’m getting driver complaints about brake pedal travel and lack of hold. I can lock up the brakes at 45mph, he can’t, but driver weighs 40 lbs more than me, so maybe I can improve brakes?
Adjusted pedal linkage to take out play. Pedal all the way back and MC lever at rest. Any pedal movement immediately moves lever. I think I did that right.
Bled brakes. Rock hard firm pedal. No sponginess when things get hot. I think I have no air/bubbles in the system. Check.
We are running soft/aggressive pads (red, for Parolin karts, from what I’ve researched). These are the pads that came with the kart. Possibly caused glazed rotors? I can fix that, but they look ok to me. Opinions of pic below?
Also, and the real reason for this post - how do I use the spring/adjuster thingies to take up air gap between pad & rotor? I can probably figure it out by taking it all apart, but I’m sick and feel like crap at the moment. Not sure it’ll fix the complaint, but still needs to be minimized to reduce pedal travel before engagement. Downside is driver needing to keep feet off pedal to avoid riding brakes, but I’m not the driver…
Those are older style brakes, the springs are simply pad retracting springs. The only way to take up the air gap is to shim between the pads and pistons.
While shimming would be preferred you can also shorten your actuator rod so it is in the travel. Are your pads newer? If they have been contaminated replacement would be a good idea, it would also help your long travel issue. This looks like an older CRG set up.
It takes force, not driver weight, to lock up brakes.
Lockup brake pedal force on my AKUSA shifter is 400# which translates into a brake rod force in excess of 1/2 ton. It’s also enough to make the (aluminum) brake pedal take a permanent set!
It does, but it requires more force at the pedal. Increasing driver weight by 20% increases total kart weight by 10% and therefore the force needed to lock the brake by 10% if the center of gravity location stayed the same.
I mentioned driver weight because I thought it factored into (1) tire contact patch friction and (2) momentum and mass needing to be slowed. Maybe I’m more aggressive on the pedal, but I lock em up easy, bigger driver can’t seem to slow the kart down enough. Obviously something needs to be corrected with our mess.
