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Handbrake


Lo7Man

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hi I have a 7 with the hand brake on the passenger side . I often find this is impossible to use when caught in que on a  hill  . It worries me that the clutch is going to give up if this continues . Has any one done anything like a brake lock or similar. Any advise on alternatives and recommendation  would be helpful.

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I used to own an Elan with a feeble umbrella style handbrake. It only worked once a year when I adjusted before the MOT. As someone who uses the handbrake a lot to avoid clutch wear, I took a long time to get used to the car. In the end I used to pull up on a hill dip the clutch and if necessary take it out of gear. I would then sit on the brake until the traffic moved, then using a heel and toe technique, I would raise the revs, engage the clutch and then ease off the brake.

To be honest, it was a pain, but there was no choice, and now my Seven has a decent handbrake I never bother using that technique.

Do you have the usual Sierra callipers Jonathan? Last MOT, I was congratulated on my "very effective" handbrake and it hasn't been adjusted in the 40,000 miles since I built the car. Maybe there is some friction in your cables or something preventing it applying sufficient pressure.

Duncan

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Yes, original callipers. I take up the slack in the cable before every inspection. Takes two clicks to full on with both arms. Just passes.

I had a chat with the inspector after last week's near miss. Very experienced Escort builder/racer. He thinks that it's inherent in the design rather than anything I can fix.

Jonathan

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Hmm Jonathan, another one here sceptical about that explanation, at my last MOT I could get more sustained braking effort from the handbrake if I tried hard than I could with the foot brake on the rears (and the foot brake was working very well too). My MOT tester was also surprised by how well the handbrake performed, and it's just the standard setup with Sierra calipers and cable. Might be worth taking another look!
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Hi all thanks for the responses , lots of useful reading. I just need something to hold the car on a hill while in the seat belt harness, I need to make life easier and not wear the clutch to much. Guess keep the handbrake and cable but have a line lock in the hydraulics for holding on hills 

many thanks

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Only time my under dash handbrake gets used is at MoT.  Two years ago I ripped the nipple off the cable end ( awaits ribald comments) and had to fit a new cable. Tester always made me pull hard on the brake and then announce that it only needed to be 16% efficient given the weight of the Seven!!!

Since then I hillstart using footbrake and throttle a la heel n' toe and ignore the handbrake. Line lock will not pass MoT unless it operates via a separate set of hydraulics.

Its not as though we want to d o handbrake turns and if we w a nt the back end to slide then power and lsd do the trick

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It seems quite common for some cars to have a stronger handbrake on the RHS but some are fine - my last 7 (SV) was near perfect balance. I suppose it must be the different routing or maybe something to do with the adjuster being on the RHS. SV is slightly different to S3.

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Hi, we have recently fitted additional electric spot calipers to our own car which is slowly being rebuilt. It originally had the under dash lever. It does go against adding weight but we felt it was worth the effort given the position of the original lever.

Apart from the parking brake, once applied if the cut off key is removed it makes it extremely difficult for anyone to move the car when left unattended. 

The modification isn't to every owners taste but it was a personal decision for our rebuild.

Kind regards the PGM team

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Unless it's changed, the reason hydraulics weren't used for handbrakes (other than parking brake needs to be separate to service brake) is it can't use stored energy to apply it - ie fluid under pressure.

Although what a steel cable under tension is . . .

My trials car has hydraulics connected to the same lever as the cable - works very well, and passes MOT.

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