gbeaird

iTrader: (1)

As mentioned in another thread, I needed a new MC on our 92 B4C 1LE Camaro. I did the MC, new pads all the way around and braided hoses. I finally got things together and took the car to get it inspected. It never even made it into the bay, as the inspector pulled up on the e-brake handle, put the car in first and it rolled right out!!

I have the car back home and am looking at everything, and everything looks good. The only adjustment the FSM mentions is the 'free space' adjustment between the caliper and the e-brake lever. While I do not have the requisite 0.024" gap, there IS space, so I cannot see how a few thousandths of an inch will make any difference here. The lever freely moves, the brake handle moves freely, and when released, the cables have some slack.

What am I missing?? The new pads are Baers on the back. Is there _any_ other adjustment?

Drew

iTrader: (58)

Did the inspection guy YANK! up on the lever violently? Because that doesn't work on later thirdgens. They have a ratcheting self adjuster built into the e-brake lever. If you get excited and yank it with too much enthusiasm the ratchet will skip instead of locking and pulling the cable.

If you look inside the console, there's a great big spring on the side of the E-brake lever mechanism. When you pull up on the handle, you'll see a tab on the lever that engages/disengages the ratcheting mechanism, and when it's disengaged at full released/down position, the spring pulls the slack out of the cable. As you pull up, the tab locks the ratcheting wheel that the cable is hooked into, and the lever starts to pull the cable. You can check and make sure the spring is hooked in on both ends, and that it's not broken. Verify it's pulling the cable.

Next get under the car, and check the points where the cables hook up over the guides under the car in the trans tunnel. It's not uncommon for them to get knocked out of the guides, and when that happens the cables won't pull tight. If one is hooked, the other isn't, it might feel like they're pulling tight, but they won't load the cables properly.

I'd post pics of all of this, posted a few a couple weeks ago even, but privacy concerns and all that... Blah blah blah...

gbeaird

iTrader: (1)

He didn't, actually, just pulled up some, then put the car in gear and it rolled some. He then pulled on it more, same result. The lever on both calipers are moving, and seem to grab okay, but apparently not enough. With the car on jack stands, I can set the e-brake, put the car in gear, and at idle lift off the clutch pedal and the disks will turn.

I don't understand your last sentence.

Drew

iTrader: (58)

Normally I'd post photos illustrating what I'd be trying to explain, but since one member of the forum decided to use the backgrounds of photos I've posted to harass me and took the time to find my home address, I've decided to limit what I post photos of. Since removing only the photos with identifying characteristics would be a pain, I opted instead to just delete all my online images. Otherwise, I would just post a link from a few days ago where I posted photos of all the parking brake guides and anchor points. But anyway.... F that guy.


Make sure the calipers are adjusted properly, sounds like you've already seen the bit in the manual about adjusting the set screw opposite the e-brake lever on the caliper. Make sure the cables are all routed through their guides, and that the self adjusting parking brake lever is correctly tensioning the cables, if there's still a problem, take a closer look at the calipers and pads/rotors to figure out why the levers aren't cocking the pads against the calipers, or why the pads aren't grabbing tight enough to keep the rotors from turning.

It's possible the pads are a compound that needs to be hot to grab, but you shouldn't need enough force to function as a parking break that the pads would have to be hot.

RBob

iTrader: (1)

First thing is to bed the new pads in. This is important, as until they are bedded they won't provide much grip.

For the free travel adjustment there is a thread that goes though this:

https://www.thirdgen.org/forums/brak...s-parking.html

Post #52 of that thread sums up what the OP did to get the rear parking brake to work. Note how he states that he pin needs to push straight into the pad. Prior to that post is other good information.

RBob.

KyleF

This is probably because that is a crap test. One of the service manuals I have states that the parking brake should require a good amount of force (I think it specifies 125lbs of force IIRC) to reach 14 clicks. I don't think any of my parking brakes (Or E-Brakes as some like to call them) does much on a few clicks. Two of those are pretty much brand new cars. On all 4 we own, you have to either pull or push to resistance before they will truly hold. Then just like your regular brakes, the more force applied, the more clamping force that is delivered. Just a few clicks is just bringing the pads to the rotors the same as if you just lightly apply the brakes.

I am not sure how you get the guy to pull the level correctly, but how does this guy assume all parking brakes are designed to be effective with "some" actuation.

gbeaird

iTrader: (1)

@Drew - H0ly cr@p! That sux! Sorry you experienced that. Sad to see there are trolls here, too.

@Rob - Thank you for the info. Odd to see that a really small adjustment in the free travel adjustment can make that much difference. I guess I'll have to have another look, because everything else looks fine. Just for the record, does anyone know what size allen key works on those screws? I have a 7/64", which seems too small, and tried a 1/8" and 3 mm, both of which seemed too big. The car is a Texas car, and been so all it's existence, so while there's some surface rust, rust-belt issues don't exist on this car.

Which pin are you referring to here? Thanks.

@Kyle - Yes, it's a crap test, I fully-agree. I _never_ use the e-brake unless I have to have the car in neutral for some reason and have the car on an incline, which hardly ever happen. But, as the guy in the thread linked above mentioned, it has to work to pass inspection.

KyleF

Don't automatically assume who the troll is.


Well on the older ones, you have to use it all the time to keep them in adjustment. I would suggest you use it frequently for multiple reasons, not just adjustment purposes. Not sure about the later 1LE's needing this, I never had that style on one of my cars.

Wait, that is not true , my TTA had them, but never had to screw with the brakes since I only put about 1000 miles on it while I owned it.

Agree 100%, a lot of people skip this step after they have changed brake pads. Just pump them up and out for a brake test. You can google a procedure. I follow Stillen's recommendations. A Few 30-10mph stops, a Few 50-20mph stops, a few emergency stops... and a cool down period. All while trying to stay moving so the hot pads don't set on one section of the rotors too long (can warp a new set of rotors). Don't quote me on this procedure, I would double check it myself before I went out and did it again. Though, when following it, you smell the pads burning off the coating.

RBob

iTrader: (1)

I believe that the one he is referring to is the rod that is in contact with the parking brake lever. In post #20 of that thread it is part #6.

Note that part #8 is what presses on the back of the pad. So the rod (#6) is activated by the park brake lever. With the free adjustment screw (#23) contacting the other ear on #8.

RBob.

Drew

iTrader: (58)

Funny coming from someone who's previous User ID was banned. Some people can handle criticism, other's make claims like "the LB9 is the king of the torque wars". When you say something that stupid you deserve any flaming you receive. If I was half the troll people think I am, I wouldn't take the time to help people and I would have left that quote in my signature.

Attacking the quality of someone's carpet, making comments about their ex-wife, and how 'we're absolutely going to have words face to face' and sending them their full name and home address is taking things a bit too far. But go ahead and make excuses for a person that does things like that, Kyle... It says far more about the kind of person you are then it says about me.

Not for nothing, but I'm not sure I'd take any brake advice from someone who's been trying to fix his brakes unsuccessfully for months now (Kyle). Yeesh, Back to the Topic indeed.

I'm not seeing anyone getting enough brake bias out of the rears to really 'bed' them. By 92 you're just not dealing with a lot of rear braking action, but it shouldn't really matter for the parking brake. It literally just ***** the pad mechanically into the rotor.

From the original post, and the mention of the free space adjustment in the manual, I was assuming you're already aware of the adjustment. Here's another diagram that covers that adjustment just in case...



Have you checked that the spring on the self adjusting cable is properly tensioning the mechanism? That the ratcheting tensioner and it's release pawl are doing their jobs? Have you looked under the car and checked that the cables are hooked and snapped into all of their guides?







The e-brake cables absolutely have to be hooked into the guides shown above, or you'll get limited parking brake response. People will go to excessive lengths to try to fix the parking brake without hooking the cables up over the guides.



A - Tensioning Spring, pulls the ratcheting wheel (D) and subsequently the primary parking brake tight when the lever is full down (released)
B - Locking Pawl. Locks the wheel/cable (D) to the lever. At full down, it hits C and releases the ratcheting wheel to tension the cable.
C - Pawl Release Tab.
D - Ratcheting wheel.

Hope that clears up any mysteries.

Drew

iTrader: (58)

Almost forgot, here's a nice clear photo of the free travel adjustment screw F, and then another shot showing how it counters the pin E that is pushed by the parking brake lever. Assuming you didn't rebuild the calipers, you shouldn't need to make an adjustment for new pads or other brake maintenance. Gotta remember, these are racing calipers with quick change pads. If they required constant adjustments for every new paid of pads, it'd defeat the purpose.

KyleF

As I said, don't assume who the troll is. Some people just can't help themselves.

Ooooh.... my user ID from when I was 18/19 was banned... OMG! Now who is trolling? BTW the guy and I that were going at it almost 20 years ago still talk on a regular basis and get a good laugh out of it.

Drew, you can go ahead and have the last word on this one because I know you can't let anything go... even to the point of someone hunting you down.

My brakes work BTW, just not the pedal feel I want. Though, you know everything. Thanks for paying so much attention to my life BTW.

Drew

iTrader: (58)

Yep, I can't let things go... Obviously I have to go around trolling tech threads and involve myself in someone else's drama. Obviously. That's why I've had your idiotic quote in my sig for all this time, and didn't just put it back in last night after you made it clear you are still bothered by a previous exchange.

I follow the forum, and recognize the users on it, really don't know a thing about your life Kyle. Couldn't care less really, but when you insert yourself into a conversation to contribute nothing relevant to the technical content of the thread, and you admittedly don't know jack squat about the topic, yeah I'll point out when you're completely ignorant of the things you're talking about.

gbeaird

iTrader: (1)

@Drew, Thank you for the added details. I don't remember if the cables are in the guides as they should be. I'll double-check that this evening. I just never use the e-brake, living here in the flatlands, so I have no clue how things worked before all the brake work.

I agree that the brake bias is so that I may never get the rear brakes bedded in. I guess I could set the e-brake, ease off the clutch and let things spin for a bit until I smelled brake. :-)

I'm hoping I can at least get enough e-brake to pass inspection, else I'll go the antique tag route. I may still do that, but don't know how TxDOT will deal with me showing up to change tags for a car that currently has expired registration/inspection. We'll see.

And in case I DO have to adjust the free travel, does anyone know what size of the Allen key required to make that adjustment?

EDIT: I went out and had a look. Sure enough, the cables weren't in the guides. I popped them into place and..... it made very little difference.

Since I've been cycling the e-brake, I can see that the lever at the caliper is making pretty much full-travel. The lever has cleaned the patina off the mounting bracket where it lays on that bracket as it makes its rotation.

And you are correct. I did not rebuild the calipers, just replaced the pads, hoses and MC.

Drew

iTrader: (58)

I'm not sure the size allen key you need. I could dig out my calipers and a set of wrenches, but seeing as how my calipers are potentially different being parts store replacements, I wouldn't bet on the screws being exactly the same size. The calipers being Australian were most likely metric. I'd probably start with metric keys.

gbeaird

iTrader: (1)

Yeah, I have metric and SAE, and can't seem to find anything just right.

IF it's not a huge hassle, I'd sure appreciate knowing what size fit your calipers, though. I'd bet it's the same.

Drew

iTrader: (58)

It's not too bad, just boxes in the basement. The catch is there's 3/4 of a car packed into boxes, so remembering which box holds which is sometimes fun.

I dug a bit, and was walking back to the computer to report that I couldn't find them at the moment, then remembered I only have two heater cores, and I remember I packed them box into one heater core box, meaning that the other heater core box in the pile didn't have a heater core inside it.

7/64" will turn mine, but it's sloppy. 3mm fits like a glove and is certainly the right one. The reason I say mine may be different then an original set of PBR calipers, is because mine are modern replacement calipers. The design is the same, and they're intended as a direct replacement for PBR calipers, they are just a different casting, and some of the hardware is different.

gbeaird

iTrader: (1)

Heh, I have 'cars in boxes', too! I have some polyurethane sway bar end links somewhere in a box I could use to replace the shattered ones on the Camaro, if only I could find them. Oh well, a set is on its way.

Thank you for finding them! That's exactly the way the 7/64" Allen key fits. The 3mm seems a bit big, but perhaps there's dirt/corrosion in the socket. I'll try again with a bit more effort this weekend. I may even go ahead and get a 'regular' set of disc pads for the back of the car, just in case. I went through 3 sets of pads for the front before I found a set that worked, might as well go through at least 2 for the rearm right?

Drew

iTrader: (58)

Jeeze, now you got me worried I need to check the pads I have set aside for my project. I suppose it doesn't matter too much, they've already been on a shelf for a few years now. I started knocking out the suspension for my project car, before I even had the car back here in my shop to work on it. Figured I'd knock out the body work first, get paint on it, then build it back up from the bottom. Most of the 1LE spec brakes, WS6 suspension, all new steering, bushings, motor mounts, crossmember, etc is all restored or replaced, just waiting for me to finish the farkin' body work and paint. I make a bit of progress, then procrastinate, make a bit more progress... Working around the weather played a roll in it dragging out, now that it's inside the shop, it's mostly just procrastinating. Trying to figure out where to put a larger compressor so I can finish zipping the shitty repaint off, and get on with the refinish and reassembly. In the meantime I've got mountains of take off parts, new parts, NOS GM parts, tucked all over the shop, in the attic, in the basement, the dash is sitting in one corner of my office, and the swaybars are leaning up in another corner. No one ever mentioned how much storage space a project car takes up when the body is stripped to the bare shell.

The upside is I have tons of pics of every little part I've worked on, both to document the work, and to refer back to when it's time to reassemble. I figure if I can share my photos and notes on the forum, it might help someone else, or give back a little to the community... But then one person has to **** off about any little detail they can pick apart because they're a pretentious know-nothing ******* with too much money and no morals or understanding of mutual respect or common decency. You can take the time to help someone and nearly a decade later they'll publicly disrespect you and turn to attacks when you call them out on being an *******. But hey, that's an online forum for you.

Anyway, I hope the info and pics help, if and when you figure out the solution, do try to post it in the thread. You never know when it might come in handy to someone else.

gbeaird

iTrader: (1)

Heh, I understand, and really appreciate the assistance! You've been very helpful, and provided some insight and tips on working on this issue.

This car is in line for a restoration, being an ex-TxDPS car, but I have to finish our decade-long restored project on our 86 SVO. Other stuff, like this issue and issues with the daily drivers, have gotten in the way of the SVO project, but with some hopefully mild spring weather, I can hopefully get more focused on the SVO and get it knocked out. The plan has always been to get it done and in the Houston Autorama that happens Thanksgiving weekend, but for some reason we're always looking that holiday in the rear view mirror.

One of these days!!

Drew

iTrader: (58)

Ah yes... SVO... Neat cars, very unique for a Fox body. Dabbled a bit with the 2.3L hairdryer myself. Put a 86 Turbocoupe drivetrain in an 86 LX coupe, got most of the kinks worked out aside for an intermittent knock... Grabbed a solid short block from an 89 XR4Ti and rebuilt it with new rings, bearings, a Bo-port head, roller cam, etc. It's at the point now I need to convert it to speed density and tune it for 65lb injectors, but the body has just enough rust and weather exposure, I just can't find the love to keep going. I should've snagged a solid SVO body a decade ago when they were affordable. Kept holding out for a clean 4cyl coupe to swap, but they've really dried up.

gbeaird

iTrader: (1)

That's nice! Ours was purchased as a beater several years ago so we could go autocrossing and not be worried about rock-chipping our then current autocross cars. It served us well, running in G Stock, but was getting long in the tooth. Since updates would require replacing OEM parts with hard to find NOS parts, or moving to another class and REALLY having to modify the car, we picked up a 3rd Gen Firebird C Prepared car and retired the SVO. The car has been painted, new interior installed and now I'm working on cleaning up under the hood, replacing parts as I go. We're also adding some suspension bits to make it handle well, and make it a nice driver.

But I grew up with F-body cars, so switching to a 3rd Gen and to a car I wouldn't care much about modifying it just made sense to me. Oddly, the factory parts on the 92 have been more frustrating than the aftermarket parts on the Firebird.

gbeaird

iTrader: (1)

I found another metric allen key. A 3mm key is what fits the adjuster pin on the caliper. Odd, visually, it looked the exact same size as the other 3mm key, but there is no way that other key would fit! I got the 3mm key in the socket, but no amount of turning or even tapping with a mallet would make the pin move. Bend the key? Got that! Move the pin? No way!! I guess 27 years of heat cycling, weather and two different metals in direct contact with one another will get you that!

I also picked up a set of 'regular' semi-metallic rear brake pads and installed them. I repeated the e-brake test with the car in the shop, and they didn't hold either. So, after replacing the shattered rear sway bar end links, I dropped the car to the ground and went out for a road test.

After multiple stops to bed the brakes in, including getting the brakes HOT, I turned back into the driveway, stopped, set the e-brake, put the car in first, released the clutch and the engine died! YaaaaY! I was able to repeat the process, so we may have resolution here!

I'll try to get the car inspected this week, then apply for an antique tag so this annual inspection silliness goes away, for this car, at least.

Drew

iTrader: (58)