Yesterday, I took the trike out for a good sensible little run.

Unfortunately, the weather was not on my side, but I have a very varied mix of quite hot sunshine, in between the bouts of torrential downpours, and it was really a weird weather-day like that because the rain was almost monsoon-ish and then 10 minutes later you were baking, but there you go.

Anyway, what happened, was that there was a young women on her pushbike, and we got stuck behind her. There was simply not a good enough stretch to get round her and so I had to stay there for a few minutes.

Now, it was all downhill, from where we caught up with her, to the top of the hill, was about 600 yards. Then the downhill was not particularly steep, something like a 1 in 7 ( just a semi educated guess ) and she turned off at about 400 yeards from the top, I continues down for a further 350 or so yards to the bottom, so not that long either.

We continued along the road, and then I eflt the bike slow and the engine strain a tad, I felt the front brake and it was stiff, and up ahead was a car park and so I turned in,but, it was by that time, that the frotn end locked up entirely.

There was smoke coming from the disk, and I touched the brake caliper and burne my finger!!!! - the disc Idread to think how how that was, but I spat on it and the spit sizzled.

The thing is, that because ist a trike, we coulf not move it at all ( Im disabled ) and so we just left it there to cool and hoped it would free itself up!

Now, thankfully it did.

10 minutes, and we were able to move it enough to let traffic through and a few minutes more, and we decided it was free enough to go for it.

I was quite litterally only a mile from home... maybe less?

So, I got home just fine and a quick feel of the disk, shows there is no markings of any kind, and the pads look to be just fine too, they have plenty of meat on them, and there is no scoring or markins that are unexpected.

So, what gives?

I live in Wales where is seems to be no such thing as a flat road, and I have been mostly riding cruisers, My Guzzi California did 330K on that, My GL1200 did 35K before I sold it on, and both those bikes are heavy buggers, and neither have ever doen this, and I have had the Harley less than a month and this is another thing in an increasingly longer line of pains that I have had.

I will concede that it has been triked and the front brake is stock, and so its of course possible, and likely that the brakes are simply not up to it.

But I was traveling the speed of a cyclist, and in total, for only about half a kilometer ,even if I was riding the brake, surely that should not have happened should it?

 

Have you tried changing the brake fluid?If you are in a really wet climate water may have gotten in or if the bike is older the fluid may be getting wore out.

 

Sounds like you had a brake hose go bad on the inside , sometimes a hose will get a bubble in them and will HOLD pressure on the caliper . One way to tell -- is if it happens again back out the bleeder screw just enough to let off pressure and re-tighten if your wheel spins it's the hose or a piston sticking

 

Further to your other thread tell us what model year your bike is, there's a good chap! You can include those details in your signature, which will pop up every time you post, as per my photo etc below.

It sounds as if maintenance is in your immediate future! Plus perhaps an upgrade or two. A braided brake hose will let you apply more effort to the front brake, also deal with the possible problem 81rat mentions. Brakes need to be bled regularly and all the fluid replaced anyway, which will come with the new hose. It's possible your caliper piston(s) have stuck and need to be cleaned, causing the lock-up.

If you haven't discovered him yet I can recommend Matts Machine Shop, in your locality, for service and repairs, should you need help.

 

Brake fluid / Hose etc
In honesty, the thought has crossed my mind, but I was not going to bother with it, unless I had the same issue again.

I was thinking that maybe, as it was downhill and there is only one single disc holding the whole thing back, that maybe I just pushed it too much. Perhaps I should have used my foot instead.

Also, I am having a new front end on the trike in a few weeks... Its booked in on the 21st for a wider, chunkier front and I am now considering getting a twin disc wheel.

Just cos twin disk would look better on a chunkier front too!

Now, this is obviously not going to help now, and so yes, I think the least I can do, is drop the fluid I suppose and while Im at it, check the caliper. The hoses are stock and so yes, braided will be much better, but, as Im changing, I dont want to waste money.

Mats Machine Shop.
Not been there, but I know the place. In South Wales. When I was considering the TriGlide, I was looking at The Trike Shop in S.Wales where they have one, and I kind of noticed that South Wales has a lot of bike shops that are decent. Im in North Wales and the shops around here know bugger all about the real engineering side. Its better around here to simply ask one of the local outlaws about getting work done, because the shops dont want to know unless you are happy to pay stupid prices.

Now, I am happy to pay a fair price for a fair job, but £900 for a chain and sprocket replacement on my last bike, says it all. I got them from ebay for £85 and put them on myself even though Im disabled.

Hell, I even remember being quoted £2500 to change the shocks on my GL1200 - again, I did it myself and saved £2000

Why am I tellign you this? Oh yeah, North vs South Wales LOL

Anyway, thanks guys... I will have a play but I wont go too deep.

 

I hope you are talking about using your foot/rear brake, rather than putting your feet down on the road!!!! You really should use both front and rear brakes on all occasions, although that doesn't solve why your front brake seized.

 

EH? No, I meant leaning back and putting my left foot onto the front tyre to slow it down! - what else did you think? LOL

On a more serious note...

Yes, I am fully aware about using frotn and rear brakes at teh right times etc...

I did use the back and front, although I will admit to using the front more.

The rear are drum and while they do an ok job, thats all they do... An ok job. Not great, just ok. The front, even though its a single disc, do a vastly superior job.

I am getting the rear converted to disc soon.

I have also got some fuild, but its been in the shed a while and so I have bought some new. Im going to do that tomorrow IF it stops bloody raining!?