brake changing?

Piece of cake!

- Loosen the bolts that hold the caliper on.
- Pull caliper off.
- Loosen the bolt that holds the pads in the caliper.
- Swap pads out.
- Toss long bolt back in.
- Install caliper back on.

Breaking the pads in is important. You'll get many different "how-to" responses.

I know how I did it and it worked fine. I'm going to wait to see what the experts say before I open my yapper any further.

What kind of pads did you get?

 

where do you live? I'm sure someone nearby could help. I kept having trouble with a couple bolts so I bought the greatest breaker bar ever, a piece of steel pipe that basically extends any wrench I own. Works great.

 

I have the exact same bike you do and will (continue) tearing it apart tomorrow.. I'll try to remember to take pics and post for you.

Procedure:
1. On each brake caliper, on the "top" ("out" side of the caliper, in the center, between the mounting bolts) there is a sunken allen head bolt. This holds your pads in place. Remove it, but don't let the pads fall out. There may be an aluminum clip that fit in under the bolt, take that out.
2. Remove one pad, and then wedge a flathead screwdriver in where it went. Your old pads were pretty worn down and your new ones will be fatter, so you need to push the pistons back into the caliper a bit. You need to be a little careful here, as you do not want to bend, dent or score either the piston or the brake rotor! Use the screwdriver as a lever and gently (using only "forearm strength" - you shouldn't have to involve your shoulder) force the pistons back.
3. Put the new pad in on that side, obviously with the pad material facing the rotor.
4. Repeat steps 2-3 for the other pad in that caliper.
5. Fit the allen-head bolt back into the caliper, feeding it through the holes in both pads. (Reinstallation of the aluminum clip is optional - I remove it on my bikes so I can check pad life more easily.) Thread it a little into the caliper to make sure it stays put but do not tighten it.
6. Repeat steps 1-5 for the other caliper.
7. Put some blue threadlock (NOT red!) on the threads of each allen-head bolt, then tighten it down to 16 ft-lb. If you don't have a torque wrench, 16 ft-lb is "forearm tight" on a 3/8" wrench - again, you shouldn't have to involve your upper arm or shoulder.
8. Pump the brake lever several times to move the pistons back out to where they should be, then a couple more times to make sure everything feels right. Go out for a ride and break in the pads with ten hard 70mph -> 10mph slowdowns. Do *not* stop during this period. After doing the slowdowns, ride around for another 5 min or so and you should be broken in and ready to go

If you're interested, I've got a full set of basically-brand-new (one race weekend) EBC HH's that I don't want. If you'd like 'em, you can have 'em.. otherwise they're just going in the trash.

 

Curious to know (not that I doubt ya): why is it important not to stop? Where did you hear/come by this information?
michael

 

Short answer: It will leave a deposit of brake-pad material on the rotor and cause judder during braking. Most of the time people complain of "warped rotors" it is actually this.

Long answer (warning, technical):
Traditional/old brake pads use abrasive friction to create a torque that slows the wheel. The brake pad and the brake rotor scraped across each other, and broke off tiny bits and chunks of material, and the energy required to break each little chunk caused the wheel to slow. Usually the pad was made of a much softer material than the rotor so that rotor life was much longer than pad life.

Modern performance brake pads (high-end street such as EBC HH, and race applications) use something called adherent friction. Basically, instead of scraping and wearing away at the rotors/pads, what happens is that the pad lays down a very thin deposition layer of its own material on *top* of the rotor's surface. When the brakes are applied, the pad "sticks" to its own material, producing a much higher level of torque (stopping power) than could be obtained using the traditional abrasive process. Instead of abrading and wearing away pad material, it sticks to itself and molecular bonds between the pad material in the pad and the pad material on the rotor are created and broken repeatedly. (Imagine two pieces of tape, sticky sides toward each other.)

This process, however, only works well when the pads are very hot. In addition, it also only works, obviously, once the pad material is laid down on the rotor. Step 8 in that process is called "bedding in" the pads, and is the process of getting that initial layer of pad material. The repeated stops are to heat up the rotor and the pads into the temperature range where this process works. Once they're there, the pads will lay down material anytime they're applied. It's very important that the wheel not stop immediately during this period, because if it does, the pads will leave an extra-thick spot where it stopped. (It's actually sometimes possible to see the pad pattern on that spot if it's bad enough.) As long as the wheel's spinning, the rotors will have basically exactly even amounts of pad material everywhere.

 

ah. that makes a lot of sense to me. thank you for taking the time to explain it as such. : )
michael

 

I'll take em if he doesn't!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

I'm not sure they'll fit your 1000RR.. I'd have offered them to you a while ago if I thought they did

edit - I checked EBC and they're different part #'s, Vesrah has different as well. I don't think my EBC's will fit yours :/