I love the Pacific Northwest. Only, it’s often too cold and/or too wet to ride a motorcycle. No more riding all year for me! My YZF-R1 had been sitting since last Autumn. Since Spring came, there have been some great days for riding. Unfortunately, they’ve been days when I had to go to Seattle. Since lane-splitting isn’t legal here, it makes more sense to drive the car. It gets better mileage and burns regular fuel, and me bum gets tired about 20 miles or so before I get to the office. Weekends were rainy, of course. :rolleyes: The sun finally came, and I charged the battery. Whoops! The fuel went bad. Wait for a siphon to arrive in the mail. Then wait for another sunny day. Change the gas and… Still won’t start. Take care of other responsibilities that take up a lot of time. Finally, Sunday, I drained the tank again, got some more fuel, and it started right up. Take off down the road and…
The front brake isn’t working. I squeeze the lever, and there’s nothing until the very bottom; then there is a slight amount of braking. Probably unsafe to ride, because I might need my brake; or, suppose I squeeze the lever and the front brake suddenly decides to work and locks up?
I see two possibilities: One, there’s air in the line and it needs to be bled; or B, the callipers have limited movement. I don’t see any bubbles in the fluid reservoir. If there’s air in the line, shouldn’t I be able to ‘pump’ the lever and have full braking? I’m thinking that the callipers got stuck in the moist atmosphere, and that’s the problem. What do you think?
(FWIW, I’m planning to ride into town and drop the motorcycle off at the shop today. I’m going to get wet. I’ll have them fix the problem and have a lube and oil change, and IRAN the chain.)
Why would you be able to pump them up? If you have air in the line (a little or a lot), here’s what happens:
you squeeze the lever; piston in master cylinder seals off the bleed port and pushes fluid (or more air?) toward slave cylinder.
air the line compresses. If you’ve got a lot of air, then you won’t develop much pressure before the lever bottoms out.
you release the lever; piston in master cylinder retracts, uncovers bleed port, and things (i.e. the amount of air and/or fluid in the line) are exactly as they were before #1.
If you’re able to develop some braking force near the end of the lever stroke, then obviously the pistons are moving. The problem is either air in the line, or the pistons are far from the rotor (requiring a lot of movement before they start squeezing the rotor).
Is there zero lever resistance (except for its own return spring) until late in the stroke, or is it a progressive, “spongy” feel?
If the former, then the slave piston seals may be bound up in their bores in a position with the pistons held slightly away from the rotor: you squeeze the lever, the pistons move freely until they start gripping the rotor, then when you release the lever, the slave pistons’ stuck seals tug the pistons back away from the rotor.
If the latter, then you’ve somehow gotten air in the line, though I’m not sure how this would have happened while the bike sat in storage.
You might get a more definitive answer on an R1 forum or on a general motorcycling forum with other riders from your area. If it’s something that happens to R1’s or to any motorcycle in the Pacific northwest, then someone out there will have seen it before.
Spray calipers liberally with brake cleaning fluid
Remount wheel
Bleed/Replace brake fluid
Unless there is something structurally wrong with the calipers themselves, this will almost certainly take care of the issue. I’m not a mechanic, but I have 8 years of racing experience & working on my own bikes.
Well, the bike’s in the shop. They’ll make sure everything is safe. I’ll LYK what the verdict is on the brakes.
Off topic, the Yamaha dealer closed shop in October. I prefer BBRP, but they’re always extremely busy; so I’d taken my bike to Al’s in the past. You should read this story about how they treated customers. (Long story short, they did burnouts on a customer’s R1, customer complained in writing, phoned the shop to ask for a written apology, general manager relays a message inviting the customer to a burnout party – at the customer’s house.) The guy at BBRP told me the rest of the story about the damage they caused to the customer’s ride.
Last week had some beautiful days for riding! Unfortunately, I was in Seattle those days. Saturday was glorious! But the shop was closed. Typical. Rain today, but it let up enough for me to get the bike.
The verdict: The callipers were a little cruddy. They also changed the hydraulic fluid and bled the system, changed the oil, lubed it, changed the air filter, gave it a good inspection, and a test ride. Only $150.
Just got a little wet on the ride back. I know the speedo goes up to at least 107 mph.